Salt Point-Bodega Crew 9/13

We hit Salt Point on Thursday for one last rockfish hooray with bsteves before he heads north to greener pastiers.  launched into foggy conditions but very little swell (Pic 1).  Sunrise was awsome. (Pic 2).  Was hoping to get out their at first light but we had to stop and help some guy who ran off the side of the road into a ditch.  Naoaki think Brian did it because he was ahead of us in his truck but somehow even after stopping to help we got to Gerstle Cove first.  Our newest member Sherman (toysrus) hit the big blue for the first ocean kayak trip.  You know kayaking fishing is hitting the mainstream when we get guys like Sherm join up.  Watch fella's this dude can fish.  Here he is with his vermillion.   This fish shook off the hook, fell into the water and Sherm was able to gaff this thing while it was under his boat.  Did I say that Sherman can fish.(Pic 3).  I fished for cabbies all day, cause that's all I needed to get into the top ten for AOTY.  Caught more gophers than I can shake a gaff at.  But finally right before I headed in, on my last spot, Bendo, big tugg, a 29in ling.  Well I'm thinkin' at least we have fish fry.  I drop down my root beer curly tail, this time with a huge helpin' off ab guts.  And this time the gods blessed me with a 22.5 inch cab.  When I saw the eyebrows on this guy, my heart started to pound.  I was thinking to myself, Hobbs do not farm this guy like the one at Elk.  I swipe at it and miss, but on my second try I get'em in the mouth.  Yehaaw, I love kayak fishing.  Thanks to Mooch for the intel on the root beer curly tail.  bsteve had a nice day with the vermillion in the kelp.  Here is a pic with us and our catch (Pic 4).  Ran into Jonez and his brother in the parking lot and had a chat.  Nice talkin' with you guys.  Anyway it's all about the halibut for now.  See you all in Tomales.

NICE! Where do you launch at Salt Point? We drove down there once and took a quick look around but did not find a place to put in. Thanks,

Matt

nice jobs guys,  meant to be there myself but had to work...should have picked-up the phone instead...

Great job guys. Nice glass conditions too.
The weekend after this the conditions will suck because I am bringing my kayak to the coast. You have been warned.

Matt:

We launch out of Gerstle Cove.  It's a reserve to ok to paddle through to get to the fishing grounds.

JIm

The ocean was very nice at first like this video

but the wind picked pretty quick.  I was Catching Chinas & Gophers next to Brian's Reds.   Had not productive day but always nice to out w/ guys & we got well known Bodega bay fisherman (toysrus) join to our Team & he can teach me how to catch real fish now!
& very nice to meeting you, Jonez & his brother (Bill?)!

P.S: That was Jim (Inseine) that made up Brian's caused accident story...  I don't have anything to do w/ it.

Holy GREASE batman!!!  What a way to say goodbye...catch anything on the flyrod?

Congrats guys...love that sunrise picture. 

Jim and Naoaki, thanks for the photos and videos.

To answer your question Sean, nothing on the fly rod for me, at least I didn't hook myself this time.  I was using my old fiberglass 8 wt with some floating line which meant I didn't quite get down to the schooling blues and blacks.  Then the wind picked up so I put it away for the day.  Anyway, I'll have to go out and buy some sort of shooting head for BAMIII.

I did manage a quick dive for some abs right at high tide.  Thank goodness the visibility was amazing.  I was spotting decent ab habitat from the surface and then diving down only to find out that the bottom was in 25-30 ft of water.  The kick down and back up had me passing a few moon jellies each followed by small blue rockfish.  It was some of the prettiest diving I've done on the North Coast.

Brian

Good meeting the "Bodega boyz" As the pics showed, it was incredible out there. After the B.B left it calmed to dead still. The morning SW winds diminished to zero. I was going to dive, but opted for more fishing and just soaking in the beauty instead.  The evening was one of the most memorable I've had on the ocean. Hard to believe I was still on the ocean. My brother and I were enjoying just paddling around and casting with our light rods for blues and olives. The sunset was the capper. Didn't have my camera, so I missed a chance to capture it. Next morning was almost as calm as the evening, with a high ceiling fog that made it easy to see where you were at all times. We ventured further north than I have in the past and caught a few lings, nice reds, and olives. Trolling back brought a steady stream of blues bending the rod. The most thrilling thing was a huge humpback whale breached right next to me. Maybe 75' to my right. I was busy rerigging, not paying attention when it breached and blew. It startled the crap out of me. Then it breached four more times before it sounded. Very cool. Last year I had a whale go right under me. Breached right in front of me then right behind. Sure glad I didn't hook that!! Would have made hooking the seal seem like child's play... Also saw a dead floating sealion on the way back in. Don't know if there were any bites out of it. Didn't get that close to it. Jumped in for a limit of abs, and then speared a limit of pearch before heading in. It was my brother's maiden kayak fishing trip. Couldn't ask for more perfect conditions. Also met Rick out there and camped together, then fished the next day together.  Catching was ok, fishing was fantastic!!!!

Hey Brian,
I used to throw flies at the blues and the perfect and cheap line to use is leadcore. You can make up your own from trolling line. Just used a white deciever. The kind of conditions we had out there though, I would use top water poppers for some real fun.

NICE as CAN BE!!  sweet conditions up there fellas! 
Welcome! toysrus/Sherman it's gonna take over if it hasen't already.(if your out in the ocean on a thin piece of plastic?..TOO LATE! cuz it's gotcha!)

Congrats on that damn Cabbie Jim!  for a fish that people don't target, they sure have been elusive
(i was gonna look on Ebay for some ab-guts but no luck) i needed one so bad too. (got mine see BH 9/15 report)

Kind of a bitter-sweet send off for Brian, gonna miss ya' buddy!  see u @BAMIII though.

Salt point in on my next years list of destinations for sure!

thanks for the pics&port!