NJFishing.com Celebrates 20 Years!!!

[Ice Cream Bill]

Gerry,

Congratulations on 20 years from the REAL Bill Fish, aka Ice Cream Bill on here!

Keep up the great job!

Bill Fish
SWABC

[jakesdad]

Gerry,
Congrats on 20 years. To think how much free time I had before NJ Fishing.

From lurking for a few years to being a member for almost 10 years. I do have to say the number of friends I have made over the years thru NJ Fishing of some really great people, and some not so great, is appreciated.

Continued success in the future.

Henry

[hartattack]

From the helm of Pop-Pop's Toy, Bbbioonic B__ (didn't 'no' the spelling of that word was censored here), ROFLMFAOPMP, Roasters, Rockfish Smartie, Cawfee, Lady Di, Hefty trash bags, NJF Fantasy Football (ouch), fence shots, SeaTrekker, 'Always', Chelsea Roommates . . . .

Dang - I remember when door prizes outnumbered the guests at JJBitings.
Heck - I remember when our Captains were deckhands (& vice versa).

But I'd be lying if I didn't admit that the first thing that came to mind when Gerry started this thread was how much I/we miss Mike Wells/Life's a Beach.

So I'll share a brief story about the first time I met LAB in person - it was on my first NJFishing fishing trip (Stripers aboard the Mi-Jo).
- Before departure Mike gave the mate a humongous piece of beef - "here put this somewhere where it won't get fishy" (I didn't know Mike was butcher, a GENEROUS butcher)
- When Rammfish Robbie hooked into what was thought to be a sizable striper LAB commented "Now we'll get to see how strong that Cajun Red Mono is. Looks like you got a 24 footer" Sure enuff Rammie was tangled with the boat next to us
- LAB proceeded to photograph Rammie fighting the 24'er with his Spinner held upside-down. LAB had a NJF field day with that one.
- This trip pre-dated all our RFA trips, but definitely set the standard: nice boat, good Captain, good food and laughs . . . but NO FISH

Now here's a shameless plug for 2 links on NJF:
- 9th Annual RFA Flukathon Sat June 17th Official Sign Up - Let's fill 'er up: http://njfishing.com/forums/showthread.php?t=95828
- Fond memories of LAB: http://njfishing.com/forums/showthread.php?t=60098

The friendships I've made with members and sponsors on NJF are priceless - thanks Gerry, it's genuinely appreciated !

[Wilson]

[ALS Mako]

wow how time flies...but i can't be that old...
lots of fond memories and meeting great peeps from this site.
a big thank you to Gerry Z. for coming up with a great site...now if he could only catch a striper

[Pennsy Guy]

Congrats on 20 years & here's to another 20--at least!
Met some great fishers from the site and fished with them learning much & from the site itself.
Keep up the great work which we all know you will.....

[shrimpman steve]

Congratulations on a job very well done

1)the truth is there is no good looking Zagorski brother

2)mom doesn't like either one

Bahahaha

[Joey Dah Fish]

Congratulations to my ******* brother on 20 years of being the best damn NJ Fishing Site ever. Very proud of you and how you made you idea reality and continue to do great things on this site and herd all the cats. Wishing you many many more years of success

[Gerry Zagorski]

Originally Posted by shrimpman steve

Congratulations on a job very well done

1)the truth is there is no good looking Zagorski brother

2)mom doesn't like either one

Bahahaha

Oh man... The Shrimpman lives. And oh BTW, fishing with shrimp is not the only reason people call him Shrimpman

[AndyS]

It's SO bittersweet, Looking back at the old message board and seeing Life's a Beach and Ms Gold, it saddens me so much. The brutal fights in the winter with LAB just flat out roasting people, it's a wonder anyone stuck around !
Funny thing was, I think Mike's antics projected a kind of unsettled peacefulness among the crazy world in which we live. It was for the love of the sport that drew us to the new website.
You can visit the old message board on the "way back" internet time machine.
https://web.archive.org/

Moving through the years I was reading so many Raritan bay reports and very few offshore canyon reports. I thought wouldn't it be nice if I could arrange a few offshore trips and get some of these guys off the bay and show them the waters of the canyons. It happened, and I think I ruined a few people along the way. The look on a persons face when they latch into that 1st yellowfin is priceless !!!

The website got me in touch with a gents I fished with back on the old Gambler, how cool was that !!

Amazingly enough Gerry reached out to me to be the moderator for the freshwater section, honored and never looked back.

I always say, posts bring more posts. If it hadn't been for NJF I would have never hooked up with what has become a very dear friend of mine.
I read a post from someone fishing the North Branch near Rt. 206. I thought, hey that is right around the corner from me. A few PM's later and we have been great friends every since. I can't begin to tell you how many great people I have met (and became friends with) along the way thanks to this website. It gets tough making new friends as you get older but we can easily find common ground here.
Don't know how many years I have been hanging around here, probably since the day my wife said "hey, you can read fishing reports on the internet"

Thanx again to Gerry and everyone who made this possible. Congratulations and cheers hope you have another 20 more years.