We were supposed to be fishing shallow water, but it sure was getting deep--the hype, that is, not necessarily the water. "See, already we've had a visual grand slam," said Joe Gonzalez as he poled toward the hole where we'd seen a bonefish disappear a few minutes earlier. "You hooked a tarpon on fly, you caught a permit on bait, and now we've seen a bonefish. That's a visual slam, isn't it?" he queried, all seriousness aside.

Gonzalez and I were scouring Bicayne Bay during prime tarpon season; a time of the year that's lately turned into prime tarpon-fishermen season--and we were comfortable and lonesome, doing what Gonzalez has casually kept to himself for the past few years: scoring big on the major flats species without getting in on the increasingly crowded lineup that typifies tarpon season on the flats off Miami.

The past several years it's gotten harder and harder to get up early enough to stake a claim on many of the more popular and productive flats. And unless your idea of a good time is running at top speed in the dark--and even then you are likely to have a race on your hands--the simple fact is these days anglers have to share their territory and cooperation is an essential in light of the high demand for a limited number of spots.

Used to be that the tarpon alone were enough of a challenge--now other boats and other anglers are more of an impediment than reticent fish or fly lines that won't straighten out. Sadly the most experienced anglers are too often the rudest. Screaming matches are becoming routine and high blood pressure is just a part of the day. So when your intent is to have fun and catch fish, what is the alternative?

That's what I had come to find out, and what I found was that it's possible to have your tarpon and your solitude too, and a whole lot more fishing than you're likely to get if you stick with the traditional tarpon drill. Gonzalez had promised me permit fishing. That's where he's been focusing his charter fishing efforts for the past few springs. For several tarpon seasons he had been after me to go permit fishing with him. Somehow I hadn't been able to pry myself away from the tarpon routine. My days on the flats are few enough as it is, and during tarpon season I'm seldom willing to spend much time doing anything other than chasing tarpon.

But one perfect spring day I acquiesced. I met Gonzalez just after daybreak at Key Biscayne. To my surprise, we kicked off the day with a little tarpon fishing.

Turning north through Bear Cut under low clouds scudding along on a stiff breeze we ran out past 10 feet of water, just inside the waves breaking over the bar off the south jetty at Government Cut, that deep incision in the seabottom at the south end of Miami Beach. Gonzalez handed me a 12-weight rod and as the wind and waves nudged us steadily toward the beach on Fisher Island, I made long casts with the sinking line, quartering downwind, and retrieved the bushy, dark fly in long, steady pulls back to the boat.

The fish were there, and after a couple of drifts, and a couple of hits, I got with the program and hooked up. Poor light, heavy clouds and choppy water created a blind- casting situation for those tarpon that morning, but when conditions are better the demands on the caster ease up, too. On calm, slick mornings, the fish roll on the surface and become a lot easier to locate and cast to.

The fish that morning certainly weren't hesitant to strike, though Gonzalez acknowledged it's pretty much an early morning shot, no matter what the weather and conditions. Bear Cut and Government Cut both carry a lot of boat traffic, and once the day gets underway and the fish get run over a few times, they are lot more wary and difficult to entice into striking.

Once the sun was fully up, having missed a couple of strikes and breaking off a 70-pounder on a long run, we abandoned the tarpon and headed south to a promised rendezvous with the permit.

Permit frequently swarm across the flats of Biscayne Bay this time of year. Warming water and abundant food create ideal conditions for them. At higher stages of the tides they'll move onto the flats to feed, but throughout the tide, the deeper currents in the channels and cuts provide perfect byways for fish trading back and forth between the hard coral bottom of the deep oceanside flats and the food-rich basins and grassflats of the bay.

We started our search on a deep flat south of Soldier Key. The tide had already turned and the current was running strong across the flat when we pulled out of the channel and began poling.

The flat was light and hard, a mixture of coral rock and sand. The north edge of the flat dropped crisply into the depths of a channel. About 70 yards across the flat, a deep, white-sand-bottomed tongue of green water, a natural pathway from the deeper waters of the Bay, cut deeply into the shallow water, then ended abruptly. This is where the fish were coming from. Working with the tide, they were making their way along the trough, far into the interior of the flat under cover of the deeper water. When that dead-ended, they popped up over the edge, out on the flat, to feed and work into the current, moving steadily toward the protection of the channel on the north side of the flat.

This is where we waited to ambush them. A couple of bruisers snuck by and a couple of small groups, without us getting a cast off to them.