Saturday, July 24, 2010

Sporty Seas Albacore Arrive! ...and DIE! (7/01/10)

Thursday, July 1st was NOT a good day to be a TUNA. It was our first Tuna excursion of the year. The Seelicious, along with Tuna Time and Caddywhompus, left the dock around 4:30am and were running to Tuna Town on a nice slick ocean! Seas were 1 and 4 with very little wind.




However, we knew there were showers in the area and they would kick up some brutal SW wind chop in the afternoon. We zig-zagged between showers as we headed West. We ran over a warm plume of water that we saw the night before on the SST and felt the fish would be on the backside of that plume.



We found clean bluish water out at the 125 line and went as far as 125.30. The first fish hit around the 45.05/125.16 line for us. We had the outriggers down and clones were a'dancin' behind birdies!

Before we knew it, the sounds we were waiting to hear...
The outrigger popped, and the reel began to sing. ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZzzzzzz! FISH ON!

FIRST ALBIE OF THE YEAR!!!



The first few fish were singles, but consistent. An hour or so later, we switched out the birdies for Archer Bars and immediately got pounded! A couple doubles and triples, landing our first triple of the year successfully! After that, almost all fish were 'Bar Fish'!

Many of those fish ate up their last 'Hawaiian Breakfast'!



The weather continued to go to Tillamook Manure as the day went on.

...Waves were steeper, and troughs were deeper. But the fish kept biting.



We put a few more fish in the boat by 1pm, and with weather in the minds of us all, we chose to pick up and run back to the barn.   Before we ran, we could see Tuna Time hooked up with another one!


Good thing we did! Running back up and across that SW chop made for a VERY sporty ocean!



Add blowing rain and it felt more like February out there!



We ended up with 28 fish for the day. We had a NICE grade of fish, for this early in the year, with a 20lb average. What an awesome way to kick off the 2010 Season!! Thanks again, Buddy! (great pic, btw)!




Happy4thofJuly!!

Thursday, July 15, 2010

Salmon Fishing- Garibaldi

I was invited to fish with Johnny Bowles out of Garibaldi for spring chinook and possibly some inshore halibut or rockfish. I headed across the hill with Dylan and hopped aboard with Johnny B. We set out across the bar, checked crab pots, and continued on...



FULL VIDEO LINK HERE

and here's more of the story...



Ran up to drift a couple areas for halibut, or maybe a rockfish.



We only fished for halibut for an hour or so and wanted to come back in to hit the tides right.



Checked the pots and ran in to pick up Johnny's Daughter


and she brought us good luck!!



FISH ON! We tell Captain JB to take the fish (he never gets to,... always handing 'em off!).



Abby (sp?) was on the camera filming the second half of this video and did an amazing job keeping the camera still, focusing on the fish, and just plain balancing herself?! Great Job Abby!



We released a nice 28-30lb fat boy and were happy to do so! Was a great day on the water, just wish the sun would've come out a little earlier! The company couldn't have been much better. We even picked up a live sand dollar, that we decided needed to go back to the water and live a little longer, til we could pick up it's shell later.



Thanks again for a great trip, Johnny! Next time the sun will cooperate with us a little more! Your 1st Mate is a Great Good Luck Charm!