Wednesday, February 21, 2007

Live From Key West



















The drive from Marathon to key West (with the top down of course) has got to be one of the most beautiful scenic trips one could ever take by car. The fact that we are still in the USA with this unbelievable water, it is just hard to believe. Key West has a lot to see, and we did do Duvall street in grand fashion. We have some pics here of some of the more legendary places to visit while in Key West, right now- there is a huge art show going on that has really been something to see. The nautical art is just amazing! Great show!
We look forward to getting out on the water tomorrow with Suzuki fishing guide Nick Malinovski. Nick fishes out of Hurricane Hole and is known for being one of the best charters in the area. If you are going to be fishing down here during prime season like now, be sure to book your charter well in advance.
FISHING UPDATE: Just got back from Key West fishing with Captain Nick! Awesome day full of nice Yellowtail and a real nice Bonita! We released everything and had an enjoyable time back at the Hurricane Hole Marina. Captain Nick runs a great 28 footer powered with twin Suzuki four stroke engines. A great ride, and captain Nick and his fishing team really know the waters here in Key West. I highly recommend them, for either a full or half day charter. The Yellowtail action was red hot today! Commin back in August for some Mahi!! Cant wait!
Tight Lines!!

Jim Baugh

Tuesday, February 20, 2007

Live From Marathon Key


Marathon Key is just beautiful! Some of the best fishing is just off our beach, only a mile or so. Today I hooked up with my buddy from Hampton Virginia Barry Buchanon and crew to fish for some Yellow Tail.
We had experienced a bit of a cold front, and it did seem to slow the fishing some. But we did catch a mess for dinner. Also caught and released today were three King Mackrel all in the 20 pound class.

The trick today was using something called a bait ball. A mixture of sand, cereal, and chum. Then you make balls out of this mixture and place overboard in a baseball like manor. It really did attract the fish very well, something we might try in the Chesapeake Sometime!

Tonight we are cooking up fresh Grouper, Yellow Tail, Shrimp wrapped in bacon, and some fresh Spiney Lobster that I bought at the dock fresh. We will feed a small army tonight at Barrys house in Key Colony Beach, that should be a hoot. I have learned a mango recipe that I will try and post up here soon.
Been a long day, and heading to Key West tomorrow to fish and shoot some Suzuki Fishing guides. We should be back in West Palm Beach by Friday to see my Cameraman Wayne Baker.
Have a gooden and Tight Lines.

Jim Baugh

Saturday, February 17, 2007

Live From Miami Day 2

View Jim Baugh Outdoors Miami Boat Show Slide Show.
Click link below
http://www.jimbaughoutdoors.com/jbpvidstrm/mibsVIDstills.wmv

WOW, what a day. Reporting now from Key Largo after one exciting day on the water with some unreal Suzuki rigs, we are talking trips and quads. In other words 900 to 1000hp on the back of some rather high performance boats.

It was great to start the day at the Suzuki booth and hook up with Dean, Ron and Terry. It was a bit like going down memory lane. After all, Ron has been with Suzuki for over 20 years, and actualy was my buddy Joes Suzuki Rep when we first started Fishing Virginia TV about 19 years ago. It was cool, the fact that we all had been working with or promoting Suzuki for 20 some odd years!! My how time flies!!
The Suzuki booth was just awesome, great displays, and had terrific traffic. I had a chance to review with Ron the next show that we both will be doing in a couple of weeks in Greensboro NC. Look forward to that show as well.

What can I say, in southern Miami offshore shooting some of the finest high performance boats in the world, powered by the best outboard power there is, Suzuki four strokes.

Just look at these pictures, they say a thousand words. I shot video and stills off of a 36 foot Yellowfin powered by triple Suzuki 300's. The featured boat was an awesome Twin Vee powered by FOUR 250 HP Suzuki Four Strokes!!!! This was one of the wildest rigs I have seen, and had the opportunity to talk with the president of Twin Vee Daved East. I have spoken with Dave several times over the years, and it was great to finally meet him. Dave said twin 300's would be an incredible set up for his 36 twin V.
Enough of my talkin, these pics will show what awesome boats these are, we had an excellent day for shooting as well.

Funny thing is that even with four 250 HP Suzuki four strokes, you still could not hear them running at idle!!! What power, and what a boat. Check out Twin Vee and Suzuki, you will be glad you did.


Next report will be from Marathon with my buddy Barry Buchanon. Till then, Tight Lines
Jim Baugh

Friday, February 16, 2007

Live From Miami Day 1

Hello Folks.
Jb here reporting from the Internet Cafe in downtown Miami. The Miami International Boat Show has just been incredible. The Suzuki booth is something to see! There of course are some great displays of the Suzuki 300 four strokes, and we saw one real cool rig with a Suzuki 250 on a Hydraulic Jack plate on a Andros 26 footer. Great boat for the Bay.

Speaking of the Andros with the 250 Suzuki, this was one of the boats that one of our viewers wanted us to check out at the show. The boat was parked right in front of the Conference Center and I had a chance to talk with Andy the President of Andros Boats. The 26 looks like a great contender for the Chesapeake Bay. A nice deep hull with decent freeboard, yet with the jackplate it can run in the most shallow of flats. Andy was real big on Suzuki Power Plants, he felt it was the only way to go with the Jack Plate Rig. The Boat is pictured here.












One of our viewers also wrote in and wanted us to check out the new 38 Contender with trips. There was a lot of talk at the show about this boat and it got a lot of looks. There was so many people on the boat, we just took a pic and moved on. You can get all the info from their web site, but it did look like one awesome boat. She had a very nice hull, solid build, and roomy. Pic is below.









We are using the International Hotel for our base of operations for this trip, and it is located right on Biscayne Bay, just beautiful. We celebrated Joe's birthday Thursday night at the Key West Cafe and they even let me in the kitchen to cook!!! They specialized in Jerk seasoning, my fav. Food was great and the service was excellent.
We will hit the show again tomorrow and tour the in water portion of the show, then head down to Key Largo, and be in Marathon on Monday to shoot a Suzuki Dealership, then on to Key West for another shoot.

Weather has been fantastic, 74 yesterday but windy. Miami is a cool town. If you like boats, this is a show you don't want to miss. Certainly one of the largest boat shows in the world.

Monday, February 12, 2007

A Farewell Boat Cook Out


We had some friends over this weekend for a great winter cook out on the boats in Hampton. I called some of the Hampton Pirates "Blackbeards Crew", and special four legged guest Tina Turner Baugh, over for a special steak and boat salad feast. Times like these I usually will shoot a cooking segment, or try something new for one of our magazine columns. I came up with a new version of my famous boat salad that was a BIG hit.

For the moment, today I am at Whitlow Cheverlot getting the final Vette project done before I leave for the Miami Boat show, a new\replacement security system. Now, I really don't care about security systems, everyone tells me that Corvettes are a hot left item, I just don't believe it, at least not in my area. Fact is, the Vette key is computer controlled, meaning if you don't have the key, there is no hot wiring, nothing, you can NOT start it. Soooo, why would I bother with replacing the factory passive security system?? Because the security system is tied into the ignition, meaning, if the system is faulty, YOU CANT START YOUR CAR!!!! Has happened three times, so I figured I would get it fixed before leaving for the Keys trip. And one more thing, If I told everyone back home in Hampton I was not coming back from Key West because my car would not start, no one would ever believe me! LOL. So, here I am, at the dealership again. Great Coffee though, and wireless Internet service is awesome.

Ok, back to the cook out. I love cooking on boats, well, houses as well, but cooking on the boat is just the best. I hate a boring salad, so as Emeril would say, I try to kick it up a few notches. Here is what you do, try this at home, you will love it.

At the store get:
Fresh Lettuce, Spinach, good tomato's if you can find them, Hanovers are #1, Pepperochini, Yellow, and Red Peppers, fresh Jalapeno peppers, feta cheese, olive oil, large Portabella Mushrooms, & Parsley.

First, take the jalapeno and cut in half, clean out. then stuff the pepper with feta cheese. Do about 20 of these and place in a jar. Fill the jar with olive oil and fresh Garlic cloves. Let stand at least one day.

For the rest of the vegetables, cut the tomatoes, wedge style, clean the Spinach, and cut the peppers in half horizontally. Clean the pepper out, cut the top portion into small pieces to put in the salad, and leave the bottom half whole. You will use the bottom half of the pepper for a vegetable bowl to put your salad dressing in. Very nice garnish!!!!!

Once you have the plate full of all your vegetables, and arranged in an artistic manor, take out your stuffed Jalapeno peppers and place them throughout the salad. Pour some of the seasoned olive oil over the salad, and you have got it. I garnish with some fresh Parsley.

Now let me tell you how good this is. I fixed awesome Prime Rib with this dish, and was very good, all anyone talked about was how fantastic the salad was.

Fun was had by all, and a great winter boat cook out before the Miami Show. Try this salad dish for your next dinner party, it will be the talk of the evening!!

Winter storm is expected tomorrow, so I will be leaving a day early, trying to stay ahead of the bad weather. I will have reports and pics of the Miami Boat Show later this week.

Staying under the radar south bound, and yall have a great Valentines Day.

Jim Baugh
 

Wednesday, February 7, 2007

Miami, Marathon, Key West, West Palm Beach

Hello Everyone!

Jim Baugh Here.

The next several days are quite rushed as I am getting ready for the trip south to the Miami International Boat Show. I will be at the Suzuki Marine booth Saturday Feb. 19th. Afterwards We will leave for Marathon Key and do some more shooting, also hook up with Hampton Fishing Buddy Barry B and Crew.

After Marathon, we will head to Key West to shoot some Suzuki fishing guides, and shoot the JBO Show Corvette. The show Vette will be on display after we return in both the Vetts at Waterside and The Hampton Corvette Show.

My buddy Joe will fly out of Key west back to Amelia Island, and I will drive the Vette back to Hampton. On the return trip, I have a real treat instore for myself. My cameraman of 15 years Wayne Baker will have just moved to West Palm Beach Florida with his wife Susan. They will still keep their condo and boats in Hamtpton, but will be spending at least the next year in West Palm. Wayne got a great job with Lockheed Martin with their 3d animation team. Very exciting. Here, you can see pics of their new house and read their Blog at
http://www.susanwaynetropicaladventures.blogspot.com/

Preparing for this trip has taken some time. First off, the Vette needed some work. I replaced most of the seals on the LT1, and gave her a complete tune up. You can see the most recent pic of our show vette. Just log on to
http://www.jimbaughoutdoors.com/vette.htm
Other items on the list for the complete refurb of the show Vette is a new Opti Spark, Water Pump, leather Seats with new foam, and lastly some quad tips. Complete restoration should be done before the Vetts at Waterside and Hampton Corvette Club Show.

I have also been working on the entire Keys tour. The Florida Keys is just not a place I have ventured to simply because I have not been able to so. Well, now both my kids are in college and with high end lap tops, I can take most of my office with me while I am on the road. So this year I finally took Barry B up on his offer to head down, it also fit in well with the Miami Boat show. Bary told me instead of renting a house to base out of, just rent a nice house boat and stay on the water, so that is what we are going to do on this trip. If all goes well on this excursion, I probably will just buy a nice house boat, keep it in Marathon or Key West, and stay there three to four months a year. The backdrop in that area for shooting footage for Suzuki is just to nice, the annual Miami boat show is there so, it all makes since. We will not actually be shooting shows down there, just mostly footage for our sponsors and special segments as well as features for our year end DVD's

Bassarama & Virginia Beach Boat and Sport Show

The first two shows this year that we appear in were both very well done shows. It had been maybe 15 years since I had been to the Bassarama in Richmond and boy have things changed. I appeared at the Verizon\Sportsmans Channel booth and we really had a good turn out. Many fans came by the booth, had their pictures taken and they could download them from the Verizon site later that evening. Was also great to see Ronnie Bach, had been a while, Ronnie always puts on a good show.

I have just returned from the Virginia Beach Boat show where I was at the Whalens Marine\Suzuki Booth. We had good traffic all day. I gave out 30 packs of Power Shad to the first 30 folks that came by and said they saw our postings on tidalfish.com. Needless to say, the baits were gone in about 45 minutes! The show was very good and clean. There seemed to be a lot more boats than last year. The talk of the show was the Bluewater boats and the 430,000 36 foot Grady. Boat looked nice, but needed Suzuki's!!

Fishing out of Hampton

Fishing news out of Hampton, well with the heavy trade show season, I have not been for a few weeks. I do know the large stripers are not so far north now, and just off the eastern shore. I plan on doing a couple more trips for the monster Rockfish, however this time of year I do a lot of traveling and then Will be locked in the studio editing Jim Baugh Outdoors for our second quarter national broadcast.


In the Galley

New in Jim's kitchen is beef stew in the famous Trojan Crockpot. Here is what you do, simple and fantastic. Buy cheap beef tips, red potatoes, red onions, celery, two cans of low sodium beef bullion, pepper, and let it cook for 10 hours. Fantastic. We fixed it up on the dock last week, had the Hampton Pirates over and had a great dinner.

How about that Casey Baugh

Well most of our viewers know about my son Ben Baugh. He has been on our TV show his entire life, and now is a JR at University of West Virginia and he is doing fantastic. He is already considering his masters degree, and still is looking hard at doing the Coast Guard. Pop is proud of course.
My daughter Casey Baugh has been accepted to several colleges, and recently was offered a $40,000 scholarship to Ferrum in Virginia. She is very excited and will be touring the campus this week. Very proud of her, she is a cutie for sure. And yes it is true, she has her dad wrapped around her finger. Oh well, she is a good kid!

That is about it for now, need to go check on the Vette. Be sure to also see what is happening in our monthly columns in the Chesapeake Angler Magazine and the Nor Easter Magazine. A complete trade show and appearance schedule is on our home page at
http://www.jimbaughoutdoors.com/

I will be reporting back here after the Miami Boat Show. Also will talk about the bite in Marathon. We should be fishing the first day we get there.

Tight Lines!

Jim Baugh