Still some fish in Santa Cruz

Went out with Dan FinFan this morning.  A Dock at the aHarbor.  Dan took three waves over the bow of PredatorMX on the way out, the entrance is shoaled big time.  He tok them like a pro, though.  (whew).

His story but my teaser here

Bushy

Im guessing Hali ?   

This was my first time yak fishing and thanks to Bushy it was a great intro to the sport. I ended up with a nice keeper Ling that my wife and I just enjoyed part of for dinner.

He had me on the Prowler 11, so super stable through the waves. I definitely got soaked going out of the harbor but I was wide awake after that.

The trick of the day was to use a sliding sinker. Bushy started with that rig and me on a pyramid sinker and he was catching 2:1. He graciously gave me his rod after he pulled up a nice black and brown, and the Ling found my squid pretty quickly after that. It's like the wind was waiting for me to get bit because 10 min after the ling was landed the wind picked up and we had to come back in.

Thanks Bushy for a great first day!

Dan

Nice job! I went out too for my first time but opted to improve my yak skills in the elk horn slough. Hoping to get out before the season ends.

Putting FinFan in the farmer john was the right choice. Waves at the harbor mouth were the real thing, but luc kily, they broke then backed off whn hitting deeper water inside the harbor. He took them at the crest though!  What a MAN!

Weird how the different rig caught fish. Dan actually was using a three way swivel with 12" dropper to torpedo weight por nada. The 8oz sliding sinker was key yesterday.

Dan was in the PredatorMX.  I was in Ultra 4.7.  I forgot my seat, so we "borrowed" one from the stored kayaks at A dock. It was some archaic model with about 3" brick-hard "cushion" on the bottom.  My center of gravity was elevated to the extent that I felt alarmingly tippy with the East Wind side waves hitting us on the way back in.  Even while fishing, I dangled most of the time for stability. It was choppy from the get-go, with 1-2 ft wind waves from the East.  And the pre-storm E Wind kicked up early, around 10. 

That's fishing Santa Cruz in December, though.  Still got dinner!!

Bushy

Nice!

I was testing my camera out at the harbor last week, and it didn't look very inviting then:



A wipeout in that location under those kind of condition would not be a good thing...

Nice job putting finfan on the fish Allen. Guessing the sliding sinker rig made the bait seem a little more fluid. Thanks for the report. You being a local , sure you know the local reefs more. Santa Cruz kicks my ass. As it sounds like FM1 as well .

I have fished SWS more often and have saved a few honey holes  in my mind there as well.  .
That's if Jim hasn't picked them clean yet .

Thanks for the reports and pictures guys.

Looks like good times.