The early September morning was perfect. It had gotten cold during the night, and there was frost on my boat's deck a few hours earlier when I launched. Now it was downright hot, about 85 degrees and sunny.

I put my Maritime Skiff in at Ocean House Marina in Charlestown, Rhode Island. On my way out of Ninigret Pond, a few schoolies were chasing sand eels on the flat, so I anchored up, waded into the foot and a half of water, and cast a Ray's Fly, Flatwing. After a couple of fish, I got back into my boat and headed out of the channel toward the open ocean. Just outside of the salt pond, bluefish were blitzing on the surface tight against Charlestown Beach. The blues were small, maybe 3 to 5 pounds, but they attacked my popper as soon as it hit the water.

The sun was climbing high, and with calm seas it took only 15 minutes to run to the West Wall in Point Judith. Two fly rodders were already into fish, so I cut the engine at the end of the current and drifted. A wave of fish sped toward me; I picked up a lighter rod with a small bay anchovy pattern on it and cast.

As they came closer, I could see they were false albacore. One hit hard and ran, and after a 10-minute fight, I had him in the boat. I could hear the guys on the breakwall pretty clearly now. One of them had landed a bonito and the other a Spanish mackerel. I had come to fish Newport's rocks for big bass, so I cranked up my Yamaha and began the 20-minute ride to Newport. Maybe I'd hit an estuary after I worked the rocks, but for now everything was just fine.

Some people tease Rhode Islanders about the size of their state, but people from Little Rhody just smile. True, there are only 100 miles of beaches and 400 miles of fishable coastline, but it doesn't take a long drive to get to them all, and you can catch many different species of fish. There are stripers from April through December, bluefish from May through September, bonito from July through September, and false albacore from mid-August until October. Toss in a resurging squeteague (Narragansett Indian for weakfish) population, some skipjacks, small offshore bluefin and yellowfin tuna, and blue sharks, and you've got your hands full. There are rocks and ledges, jetties, beaches, flats, salt ponds, and estuaries to fish--and you can hit them all in about an hour's drive.