How Did You Get Into Fishing?

[Sharkyispy]

My fishing passion started when I was about 5. In fact I still have the reel from the combo my grandfather bought me when I went on my first trip with him. I grew up near Buffalo NY. We fished many creeks, streams and rivers and would eventually move up to lake fishing on Lake Ontario or Lake Erie as I grew up and became more experienced. My grandfather gave me a valuable gift, the gift of appreciation of spending that precious time together and enjoying the outdoors( catching fish was really a bonus then) one I grew away from for a while when I moved to PA and found fishing just wasn't what it was like when I was growing up. My grandfather came for a visit before he passed and I was able to go fishing with him one more time. That trip to a small lake helped to rekindle the fishing fever. I remember when I went to Cape Cod when I was 12 and had a great ocean trip that always stuck with me. I caught my first shark there and a nice size cod that I was proud of for a 12 year old without a clue to what he was doing. When I finally went back to the ocean a few years later to fish here in NJ, I was hooked again. Starting on a blue fish trip that I took my younger brother out on where we caught a bag full of fish. Several years later and many $$$ more spent on the latest and greatest equipment, lures, two boats later, etc, etc it's a form of "therapy" just to get out on the water and spend the day dropping the lines in the water, my wife calls it an addiction - I guess it really is now. I'm looking to retire and run a charter business when it's my time(if not sooner). My true hope is that I can pass along the passion I have for fishing to my two young daughters. We're off to a good start, I hope that I can keep them interested the same way my grandfather did for me.