The Black Pearl Mothership Trips

Happy New Year to All and a Fishy Year Too!
Getting off to a great start, down the line we'll probably see Black Pearl trips devoted to Nor Cal groups.  In the meantime, we're on it.  Detailed info and trip schedules are updated weekly at http://www.kayakfishing.com/trips.html.  According to the Skipper, "The kayaks will make history come April through early July at The Channel Islands this season" and I believe that.  I'm onboard about a trip a month with Trout Traubman, Anacapa Bob and a handful of other experienced mothership anglers chartermastering the other trips.  The Black Pearl's crew is well on the road to having the kayak thing wired and they guide the private charter groups as needed.  Captain Craddick's been nailing the spots so far.  If you get hungry for rockfish, there is a mid February trip running to the cold water region of Northern Baja that has big fish opportunities too.  Rigged rental kayaks are available for fly-in anglers.  With the boat limited to 13 anglers per trip, it's easy  to accomodate all your planning needs on an individual basis and we're happy to do it.
The opportunities for yellowtail, white sea bass and halibut plus all the species we know and love promise to make the Black Pearl trips the greatest kayak fishing destination on Earth.  We've got a "hot list" going for WFO bites that will run on short notice.  Not too short for Norcalers though since I have to drive or fly down from West Sonoma.  These will be targeting yellowtail and white sea bass on wide open bites.  Just drop me an email to be added to that list.  We've also added a dedicated Forum for the Black Pearl Mothership trips at the Forums page at Kayakfishing.com. 

As a note, There is an outfit in Eureka trying to land albacore by mothership and Fijicharters.com is running 6 pack day trips to the Channel Islands from Oxnard.  Feel free to contact me anytime for info and I hope everyone has contiinued good fishing through the winter.

I just decided to book on the Jan 16-18 trip out of Point Loma heading south to Baja.  Still a couple spots left if anyone is interested ...

-Allen

Here's my report that I posted on NWKA.

-Allen

On Thursday I made the call to just drive down instead of flying.  It just felt right to do this so I could have my own kayak and bring all the gear I wanted.  Left San Jose at about 10AM, hit traffic in LA, and arrive right around 7PM.  It was a long drive.  Everyone else more or less had their gear on board so I quickly loaded all my stuff, probably way more that I needed.  We shoved off around 8 and after a quick stop at the bait barges to load up on fresh live sardines, we were on our way.  We motored all night and woke up just as we were pulling up on the spot for the day.

Here's a pic of the Black Pearl.



We had a big kelp bed to work and after a quick breakfast we were out fishing.  In no time at all I had my first hookup.  Turned out to be a ~30 inch ling.  We spread out a bit but eventually settled on working a bull kelp bed in about 75 feet of water.  The bull kelp they have down there is different than we have in NorCal or the NW.  It has "horns" to it.  Quite snaggy too.  Trout hooked up on a monster sheepshead as well as a ling about the same size as mine, with a big belly.  This pic makes my ling look smaller, but honestly, it was the same length and had a bit more width to it, but a smaller belly.



It was a slow pick, but everyone caught a variety of fish including lings, sheepshead, calicos, reds, browns, and other various rockfish.  I didn't take too many pics the first day as I was in relax mode taking it all in.

We motored up the line at the end of the day and anchored close to where we'd be fishing the next day.  Woke up on day 2 and motored a short distance to some offshore rocks.



You can't tell too much from the pics but there was a big swell going.  With a slight offshore wind, it was a bit bumpy to start out with, but eventually settled down  Here's Dave in front of the rocks with a nice wave breaking through them.  We didn't get too close for obvious reasons.



It was a bit slow at the rocks with Trout pulling in a nice red.  This guy can fish!



We decided to move inshore and try another spot.  While waiting for lunch we dropped a few lines off the big boat and in no time we were pulling in some nice reds and a couple lings.  Ate quickly then got back in the water.  Had a steady pick of fish including more reds, calicos, and lings.  I caught my first calico during this session.  Not the biggest, but it was my first!  Also got my first ocean whitefish.



With a little more than an hour of daylight left, we decided to move way offshore to a deepwater rockpile and fish from the big boat to fill the coolers.  We were treated to fast action on boccacio, whitefish, and starry rockfish.  And the sky really lit up for a beautiful ending to the trip.



Did I mention we loaded up on the fish?



We didn't get into any yellowtail of WSB, and the action wasn't as hot and heavy as I was expecting, but I couldn't have asked for a better crew to fish with.  We had an ultra limited load with only 7 kayak anglers on board.  That was really nice as we weren't crowded and stepping all over each other on the boat.  Good times had by all.