santa cruz 2007/5/20

My friend Leo got a squeaker ling on some squid around 30 feet, I tried bottom bouncing a barbless watermelon apex and caught 2 rockfish in 40 feet, and then a third trolling a swimbait.  we ran into tom and scallen out there too. looks like allen put his client Andy on the fish! we headed in pretty early.

Leo called the santa cruz outing 'civilized' fishing, which is so true compared to davenport or something.  always a little more fun when you catch a few of course...

J

We got much better weather than I expected - almost no wind, I got into the harbor at noon and it still was down. I have a theory that as the wind howls over the SC mountains from the NW, the eddy of calm near SC gets wider, for a while.  Because at 3 it came up with a vengence.  Really pleasant in near the city earlier tho.
 I got out to 95 ft generally between the Mile Bouy and the Lighthouse.  About 2 miles out from the harbor on a slant.  Seemed to be a strong drift to the NW.  There was a short period swell running that gave me some concern, but it never broke and I got used to the bounces, all coming from the NW.  Trolled purple haze hootchie and purple flasher, 1 lb ball, various depths and speeds, looking for salmon.  Saw nothing out there except what I guess were sardines or macs chasing my lure to the surface.  There were several groups of PBs in the area, no radio traffic or my radio wasn't set right. 
After a few hours of trolling I headed in to fish off the Lighthouse with what I had for rockfish - my Walleye Runner lure - brought up 15 and 19 inch lings and kept a med brown which I gave to a teenager fishing the yak ramp.  That was a nice ling Leo had.

It was great to se you guys out there.

My new friend Andy had a blast and learned a lot today. His best lesson?  Always remember to bring your paddle with you....Haha, sorry Andy.


(I always bring an extra paddle just in case, and an extra seat as well ever since I went all the way to la Jolla to fish with PAL, and discovered I had no seat...DOH.  Pal lent me  a nice surf-to-summit which I have since refused to return, it is so comfortable)

We found an array of small rockfish,. blues, gophers,  and kelp rockfish.  Andy pulled up a nice ling that was about 23.5 ".  I ended with a half-limit. Really hard to let that one go, but we did, unharmed.  Andy is the master ling gaffer, leaves his plastic tip on the gaff- in through the mouth, out through the gill and hoist.  Perfect Job.  I think we have a new fishionado here, can't wait for Andy to start posting.

the wind came up pretty stiff on the outside of lighthouse point by 10am, but cowell's was still nice, just no fish hitting in there.

Off the water by noon.  One detour when we found the public lauch floating dock COVERED with sea lions.  I went over and tried to intimidate them, but lost the staring contest.  My eye contact was broken by the 4-inch fangs this one guy was showing me, rolling his eyes and standing up......Ok, you da boss.

We used the rental yak float dock thanks to the consideratin of Ben, the guyworking there today.  had to huck our yaks to the cars but it wasn't bad.

In all a great go-out.  Best of all was seeing John and Tom, and john's friend out there with his legal lingcod.

Allen

Wow that area is starting to produce! Who said their aren't any fish in SC?

Latest reports indicte the deeper water is better than shallow in that area.  West cliff refs 80-100 FOW.  Or South Rock, which has been hit or miss.  When it's "hit," good big vermillion and bolinas.

Allen