First came a colorful yellowtail snapper, then a darting blue runner. Five-year-old Lauren Fernandez was excited to reel them in.
"Can we catch another one?''' Lauren asked captain Mike Haines.
Replied the guide: "All right. I'm going to cast this out for you.''
Lauren waited impatiently for a fish to strike the live shrimp on her hook, and seconds later she was hooked up, struggling to turn the handle on the spinning reel.
"Wow, Lauren! You can do it,'' her mother, Margie, encouraged.
Watching the kindergarten student pull in a feisty blue runner Saturday on Biscayne Bay, it was hard to believe that only two years earlier, she had been diagnosed with an aggressive type of cancer called rhabdomyosarcoma. It's a malignant tumor of the soft tissue, which appeared on Lauren's buttocks.
Now, after a year of chemotherapy and radiation treatments at Baptist Children's Hospital, Lauren's tumor is gone. And she was enjoying her day on the water like any other kid, except for sounding a bit more grown-up than the average 5-year-old.
"I'm going to be a doctor when I grow up - and a teacher!'' she declared.
Lauren and 13 others who have undergone treatment for a disease that's not supposed to affect people so young were treated to a half-day fishing trip by organizers and sponsors of the Lucerne-Gossman Memorial Backcountry Fishing Competition, slated for April 21-23. The tournament raises money for children's services at the new Homestead Hospital.
Each child received a free rod and reel, goodie bag, glass trophy and picnic lunch at Homestead Bayfront Park. The fishing tackle, bait, food and prizes were donated by local companies. Each fishing guide donated a half-day trip.
"It's their busiest season - that's huge,'' said captain Dave Sutton, the event's coordinator, of his fellow guides.
The kids and their parents seemed to enjoy themselves. Saturday marked the first fishing trip for 13-year-old Edward Nina of Miami, diagnosed last year with Hodgkin's lymphoma. Fishing with captain Jimmy Hixon, Edward caught snapper and jack crevalles.
"I liked it a lot,'' he said. "When I was catching fish, they kept pulling me back. And we were going fast in the boat.''
Six-year-old Juliana Bach, who has been battling leukemia since she was 3, caught barracuda and snapper with captain Rich Smith. Juliana's mom, Lenora, said her daughter has been off treatment for nine months.
"She's got four more years watching it, and then she's cured,'' Lenora Bach said.
Said Smith of his young guest: "She's a trooper. I fell in love with her in five minutes.''
Several of the young cancer patients look up to 23-year-old Amanda Shugart, a 6 {-year brain cancer survivor. Now a student at Miami Dade College studying child psychology, Shugart comforts new patients at Baptist and plans a career working with pediatric cancer patients after obtaining her doctorate degree.
But on Saturday, Shugart was just another newbie angler who enjoyed catching her first shark - a three-foot bonnethead - with captain Brian Helms.
'My arm started getting tired, and I was like, `You reel it in,' '' she said. 'But (Helms) said, 'You have to go down and reel up.' It took me, like, 10 minutes.''
Tom Schramm of the Homestead Hospital Foundation said he expects the kids' fishing outings to continue.
''It's a day for children to spend with their parents and get rid of the stress of cancer,'' Schramm said.
