I've been having a rough time with co-workers, family and friends lately. Little jabs or normal things that I could usually blow off are getting to me lately. Only way to help reset the mind was to go out and let some salt air blow it all away in the wind. Unfortunately, that was literally what happened as the marine forecasters sh!t the bed once again!!!!
The marine forecast called for 2-3' swells with 2' or less wind waves and light and variable winds for inshore waters. It was more like 4-7' swells with 3-4' wind wave washing machine conditions!!! WTF!?!? Many big boats stayed in, but not me. I was the idiot that took a flats boat into that washing machine. The guys who got out all had boats that could handle those seas since they were made for that and even they were complaining on the radio that conditions sucked.
I worked a stretch from OB to MB and caught a few dozen mackerel and a dozen or so herring and sardine. I figured it was a success since I had plenty of shark bait now, but soon would realize, it was going to be shark bait for the boat. (I really needed to take some video as the pictures are nowhere close to the reality of the seas) I even wore my life vest the ENTIRE time while I was out there including while fishing as I was sure I was going to go overboard at times. I was taking some breakers over the bow, which to say the least, is not a good thing. Any more weight on the boat and I would have never made it out the inlet without a bigger motor.
I was ready to call it quits early when I pulled up this.... My eyes lit up like saucers since I know what this means.
This got me fired up to keep looking. I got a halibut bite, but it raked the back of the mackerel and never got to the hook. I was drifting pretty damn fast, so it never gave him a shot to suck it in.
I then hook into a definite halibut and eased him up the best I could. It was hard to fight a fish with a life vest on, but I was not taking it off. I got it to the surface and it was a 20# class halibut! As I was reaching over to take the cork off my gaff, he realized he was at the surface and ran straight don! On the run, I felt a pop and slack. I reeled up and the hook was there and everything.... It just pulled the hook....
I decided to make some longer drifts and found a fishy bottom. It was short drift after short drift after that and I was getting slammed on each drift before finally hooking up. I was sure it was a big Black Sea Bass as it was kicking my ass on the 60# rig and I could not get it up. Then my lines snips! WTF! I had a clean angled snip in the 80# leader material. Truth be told, it looked very sharky.
I went through 2/3 of my mackerel (since all the dine and herring died) just getting slammed and losing fish every drift. I tried tying on a stinger rig and this is what happened the second I hit the bottom.
I went though all of my great shark baits, but soon thought of Jim's soupie from the boat a few days ago. I'm pretty sure it was a pack of soupies as I would get slammed fast and they would spit it or take off like a bat out of hell. I finally got a mack up that hit the bottom for 5 seconds before being grabbed and spit out. You can see the tell tale shark teeth puncture marks which look like the puncturing teeth of a smaller soupie or very possibly spiny dogfish.
I went through every last bait and failed every time to catch anything. The damn things would not take a dead bait either as I tried a few times. (I wanted to filet a mack and put that over, but refused to do so since I was affraid I'd cut a finger off in those sloppy seas.)
Good thing I called it quits also since the wind started howling and made the inlet a horrible mess. The swells were almost stopping my boat in its track just trying to enter the inlet as the tide was rushing out.... I need a bigger motor....
I came home with nothing as the sharks got all of my baits and I never got anything on the deck.
Well, it gave me hope and I found a few other legit fishing spots for my sonar. It cleared the head also, but would have done much better if I got that halibut on the deck. In any case, I found what the MAX limit on my boat is and hope not to go out in slop like that ever again. I want some flat, calm SoCal seas!
Oh well, until next tide!
