St Augustine 3/22/2019

Eddie2002 · March 24, 2019, 10:05:30 AM

Just got back from spending a week at the Ocean Grove RV park just south of St Augustine. Had a chance to do a little crabbing off the dock in the marsh behind the campground. Water temperature was around 65 degrees and I put out two ring traps baited with chicken legs. Caught one small female which I tossed back in and one nice sized male in about an hour during low tide. After that the current was too strong. A kid fishing with a rod brought in two more keepers but they fell off before landing them.
One crab was just a tease so I tossed it back at the end of the day. They are out there but the water was still a little cold.

SHELLFISH · March 25, 2019, 08:41:18 AM

Thanks for the report but sorry to hear you didn't get more! That's the way it has been by me too this year so far.
I made the mistake of visiting the St. Augustine seafood festival yesterday. It was more a country fair with arts, crafts and food trucks.
I bought a $9.00 crab cake sandwich that was 90% filler. I went there primarily for the chowder cook off by area restaurants.
Although advertised I find out the cookoff is decided in the fall! They also advertise $5.00 parking and free admission. Actually $15.00 parking and $5.00 admission!
Never again!

Eddie2002 · March 25, 2019, 09:30:13 AM

We were thinking about going to festival on Friday but wandered around the city instead playing tourist. Most of the sea food festivals I've been to have been a disappointment with overpriced small portioned food which is why we skipped that one. I'm a regular at St Augustine and use the prepaid parking card available at the information center. It's a good deal with all day parking at the garage for only $3.00. The catch is you need to purchase the card first. The crabbing season is still young and at least some good sized ones are out there. It was fun just to get a couple ring traps out.

saltysenior · March 29, 2019, 01:36:54 PM

a seafood festival at a seaside town is no better than one in Omaha Nebraska...

SHELLFISH · March 29, 2019, 01:49:15 PM

Quote from: saltysenior on March 29, 2019, 01:36:54 PM
a seafood festival at a seaside town is no better than one in Omaha Nebraska...

Unfortunately you are correct!

saltysenior · March 29, 2019, 07:15:37 PM

they can get that frozen and breaded s#*t just as easy to Omaha as to a seaside town....most folks that go to a seafood festival wouldn't know the difference between a carp and snapper if you put enough coating on it.....even in Md.I'd bet a festival will have 1/2 of the seafood from Buga-Bugaland..

Crabcruncher · April 04, 2019, 05:13:07 PM

I just got back from the BugaBuga land Seafood Festival and they had food trucks with Nebraska tags on them.
The shrimp flavored corndogs were eight bucks.

SHELLFISH · April 05, 2019, 08:08:08 AM

I didn't think of looking at the tags on the St Augustine food trucks.

Nebraska shrimp experts!