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If you love fishing, I would like all of you to meet John Alexander.

John is the “angler’s angler.” Not that that is all he does. While fully devoted to his profession in Federal law enforcement, John manages those holidays to do the type of fishing that most of us lie awake at nights just dreaming of.

Now, mind you, John is not boastful, and has recounted these experiences as life’s events sans braggadocio over the years that I’ve had the good fortune to run charters for him here in Southwest Florida.

Experiences like sharks off the Great Barrier Reef in Australia; mammoth snook along the waterways of Belize; white marlin on light tackle off Cabo San Lucas and more of the same were recounted as part of the patter, year after year, as we made ready for his fishing adventures here in Southwest Florida.

Marco Island in the fall was a family thing for John, not a primary fishing destination. But, for all of us who like to fish, as the saying goes, “well as long as we’re here...”

So John fishes here, just for the sport of it, never expecting anything too very special.

Over the many fall trips we would catch nice snapper, maybe some pompano and trout and even an occasional flounder or black drum. And on just a very few occasions, slot snook and/or redfish. Fun, but rather mundane for someone who has traveled the planet for great fishing experiences.

John was always happy with what he caught here. He is that kind of guy. But I wasn’t.

For the backwater and nearshore angler here in Southwest Florida there are tons of nice fish but they sash-shay through here at specific times of the year; tarpon in May and June; Monster sharks in the same months; grouper in the dead of winter. Sure there are lots of redfish and snook around backwater in October and Goliath Grouper and smaller kingfish nearshore but how about something that would ring John’s bell.

Well, this year we were going to make a super effort to ding that bell.

Our two scheduled charter trips were scheduled last week. The strong winds made a trip nearshore an expected sloppy event, so we opted for a backwater adventure. We had a nice day with lots of fish but nothing that you would classify as spectacular — nice snapper, a couple of flounder and a five pound black drum all made it into John’s cooler heading for the evening dinner table.

John, in his graciousness, was most thankful for the catch and his morning on the water.

But again, I wasn’t. This place is better than just a middling fishing location. We would try and fix that tomorrow on John’s final trip.

To start we upped the bait offering. An early morning trip to the great fishing shop in East Naples long before the sun was up and we had six super pinfish under the bubbler and ready to go.

Next we broke out two beefier rigs with 17# mono, long fluorocarbon 50# leader and circle hooks. If we were to match the world class stuff this might be the day.

Thankfully the day was passable. High overcast, a bit of a biting easterly wind at ten plus knots and an active incoming tide made for a no-excuse day.

We fussed around the edges of the ICW enroute north with our tethered pinfish with nothing more than some solid action with a jack crevelle that had to be on steroids destroying our rig in an instant.

We continued north and rounded the corner into Rookery Bay with the water cascading over the deep drop-offs and setting up counter currents on all the mangrove edges. John exclaimed, “Man, this is a fishy place.”

He was right! Although tough to fish with the super strong current and swirling eddies, there had to be big stuff deep just picking off the swirling bait fish.

We tried three times to get an anchor set that would give us access to a mangrove edge producing a choice current split. Finally the claw anchor held with the rode dancing like a yo-yo. John was ready to go!

The first couple of pinfish deployments ended in either snags in the mangrove roots or flat out pinfish escapes. Undaunted we pressed on and on the third pinfish toss something really different happened.

John tossed the bait downstream into the current and as we chatted he didn’t notice that the line was moving back upstream. Neither did I. That is until John, taking up on the line stated that he was snagged again.

Can’t be — that bait moved against the water. Just then we both saw the flash of a huge fish on the surface just abeam of the boat. He showed more prominently a second time. Looked like a humongous redfish.

Yanking on the line just made the surface appearances of the big fish more frequent. He had come upstream with the pinfish and was wrapped around a tree branch. “Heck of a way to lose a trophy,” I thought.

As I was considering powering up and moving the boat towards the stymied fish, he suddenly came loose and took off down the channel at a line depleting speed. All John could do is hang on, touching the drag with just 17# line would surely end the event.

Luckily the fish stayed in the center of the current flow and away from the mangrove edges. He stopped and John started the retrieve. He’d go a few feet of recovered line and the big redfish would take them back.

Again and again.

The struggle was enormous. The fish would run; John would retrieve; the fish would run... Twenty minutes into the struggle, John’s arms began to cramp and he had to alternate one to the other. The big redfish fought on.

Time seems to melt away in fishing moments like these and I can’t tell you how long it took but John was alternating cramped hands, drinking bottled water and perspiring profusely. But finally we had a mega redfish alongside that I didn’t think would fit into the huge net. Finally we scooped him up, with John and his beautiful redfish (40 inches and 24#) equally exhausted.

We took a picture and then spent the next 15 minutes reviving the redfish with water over the gills and John with drinks of cool water. Both knew they had been in a championship fight.

The redfish finally popped back to life and with a flip of the tail bid adios.

John regained his color and said he wanted to go home.

Southwest Florida won the kudo when John acknowledged, “That was the best fishing experience in my life.”

And I knew he meant it.

Capt. Bill Walsh owns an established Marco Island charter fishing business and holds a current U.S. Coast Guard license. Send comments or questions to dawnpatrolcharters@compuserve.com