Big Ab-Cab Combo at Bear Harbor - Video Added

The family vacation to Tahoe for a week was the usual blast - no Macks, but didn't try too hard - lots of hard time on the beaches.     Drove 7+ hours back Wednesday the 30th, unloaded the yak and all the Tahoe stuff and re-loaded til 2AM - 3 yaks, 4 paddles, camping stuff with deluxe seafood kitchen in mind, wheel barrow, 7 rods, tackle and bait for all, food, wetsuits, diving gear and extra gear for my uncle and cousin, and a bunch of other stuff and headed out to Bear Harbor early on the 31st, solo.     I pulled into the parking lot around 10:45 - behind schedule, threw on a frame pack stuffed with two tents and a sleeping bag, filled the wheel barrow with a kitchen box and a cooler with a few bags strapped on top, and headed down the .4 mile trail to Bear Harbor, anxious about whether I'd get one of the 3, first-come-first-serve campsites right AT the beach.  I managed to get the good spot, did two more trips back and forth from the truck to camp, dumped the 3 yaks off into the bushes but in plain site and then had to drive back out to Redway (hour+) to pickup the wife and kids - she won't drive the road into Sinkyone Wilderness State Park.  The treacherous 1 lane dirt road for 25-30 minutes on the way into Bear Harbor is one reason I got the good spot and that we've always managed to get a spot down at the beach - not that many people come down here.  But it's worth it.   

I hooked up with my uncles (my Dad's 2 bro's) and a cousin and his buddy - both 13, on the road back toward 101 and gave them details of the campsite and arranged to see them in a couple hours after picking up my family.  My uncle had broken it to me on the phone the night before when I asked if he's bringing his kayaks - "we're bringing surfboards...  is that OK?..."  I'm like, "of course - Right on!" but I was thinking something else...     I later realized it was a space issue for them, so that was cool.  It led me to bring my tandem, the Scrambler XT, and the X-Factor.  Anyway, I got the wife and kids and we stocked up on groceries and ice before hitting camp late in the afternoon.  We greeted the relatives at camp and we went back to haul the boats down, then I got all 3 of our tents set up, BBQ'd some chicken and drained some brews, visited with the uncles and cousin Jake and buddy Jeremy, and had s'mores before crashing out in anticipation of the next morning's abalone opener and some yak-fishing! 

It was hard to have hauled all the gear in, gotten the camp setup, and seen a little window where I could've gone fishing that afternoon - it would wait, and Friday, August 1st would be an epic day.   

We got up a little late right at low tide - 5:50AM.  There was a wind chop on the water, I didn't know for sure how all the guys would feel about the open-water paddling, and the call wasn't clear with the boat situation.  The boys are both in junior guards, good swimmers and surfers, and my uncles are very salty like me, and like my Dad was.  I decided to put one uncle on the Scrambler, the other on the tandem with my cousin, and I'd take Jeremy on the Gator Hatch of the X-Factor.  We were ready to charge it and everyone was stoked - "guide us, Abking!"  (They know me as Eric!    )  We launched with no problems and paddled south and landed in a special cove, where I have many times in the past 19 years hiked the beach and gone around a no-pass to get to - it's a grueling sand-trudge, and the no-pass is a chest-deep rock wall at minus tide - you only go when it's flat, and people have gotten stranded on the other side.  Paddling down there in 25 minutes is an amazing feeling after all of those past trudges.     We got in and my crew were all rock-picking - I started to dive shallow, wanting to search for an old-growth for a bit before coming in the rocks to help the boys find and feel some abs.  We had to be careful of them finding some big ones and wanting to pull them (they both had tags) and then the group having too much meat on day 1 of camping.  I dove in 6-8 feet for a bit and then worked my way into about 10' of water with 2-3' of vis (good for way north coast), and nice boulders on the bottom.  I was thinking, "I should have my anchor and float - I'm getting too deep to relocate an ab in this vis without help from a long kelp...".  Then I swam around one of those beautiful, life-covered boulders and saw a huge old-growth, just hanging.  I found a kelp frond and got to the top for air.  The thought crossed my mind that the ab was easy to see and a video would be priceless on this, but I didn't want to take the chance of getting knocked away by a surge and not being able to find it again.  I got the big iron ready and descended on the ab.  A quick pull feels so sweet on a huge ab that's hanging side-wall like that.  I surfaced and put the 10" guage to it, knowing it was a 10 before I did it - it was significantly bigger than the caliper!  I gave a holler and held it up, and the guys saw it and hollered back.  I headed in and took some gear off and played around in the rockpicking areas with the boys for the next hour.  My uncle Gene got a nice 9+, my uncle Robin found 2 small ones, and the boys got to feel an ab, but that was it for the group.  We had the two old-growth to save for dinner, as well as a big rock crab I pulled out of the kelp.  So the only ab I found out in paradise that morning was a 10.75"er.  It made for a great start to the day.   

We got back to a sunny camp and my kids were playing - they love the place.  Bacon was frying soon and everyone had pancakes.  Then my cousin Jake asks, "So can we go kayak fishing tomorrow?", and I was so freakin' pleased to be able to excitedly announce to him, "we're going TODAY, MY MAN!"  He was as stoked as me!  We geared back up and headed out for a couple hours of fishing.  It was slow at first, then I hooked up and landed a 23.5" cab - I never weiged it, but it was like 8 pound class.  I thought it was a ling at first.  It was nice to bag a nice cab to get on the board with a strong early leader for cabezon on AOTY.     I wanted to measure, photo and release, but it had been slow to that point so the group said we should keep it for dinner meat to go with the ab, and I was in agreement.  I bonked it.  We went on to catch several smallish blues and one bomber black that got put back by Robin.  Then Gene, who'd only had a bite while the rest of us had landed at least one or a few, got his hail-Mary fish with a 23.25", near cookie-cutter twin to my cab.  He bonked it, and it's a good thing because deep-fried ab and cab were hot items that night in camp.  We ate so well that night.  I may have drank a few too many beers though, since there was some champagne and wine happening too...    

We did a nice lunch and then hiked up into the forest on the way to Jackass Creek before the big fish and ab fry.  I've had many ab-cab combo days, but I think this one was the best.   

Saturday came and I was thinking of NCKA at Elk.  We had some nasty early morning winds that blew us off our destination to an alternate spot that wasn't that great.  We found a few abs, but none were pulled.  The wind died a bit then the whitecap machine turned on.  I didn't know if we'd be able to get out for fishing that day, but we went for it.  It was a mess out there, and having a 13 year old kid on the Gator Hatch in messy seas with both of you fishing is pretty hair-ball!  We did OK though, catching several smallish blacks and blues again, and then Jake got what, again, I thought was a ling when I saw it, but it was a 24.125" cab!  So in 24 hours or so we caught 3 cabs:  23.25, 23.5, and 24.125 - not bad.   

Mama and my little guy, Collin (5), opted to leave that evening, so I drove them out and got back in time for uncle Gene's version of pan-fried fish.  The big cab and a nice black for dinner and we were living like kings indeed.  We were all feeling quite exhausted, but in the most content kind of way.   

I got up this morning to a quiet camp - the uncles and the boys were leaving today, and all were too burnt to go abbing again.  I really wanted to get them some meat for the road, so I geared up, hopped on the Scrambler for the sake of lightweight efficeincy in the flatness of the morning, and headed down to that alternate spot that we found a few at yesterday.  I went right back to one that had clamped down the day before, preventing me from pulling it.  I popped it pretty quickly with no weightbelt - pinned my legs under the rock.  I wanted one for each uncle, so I flopped over a few rocks to a crack where I'd found a few and I worked on one for about 10 minutes before moving to another.  Getting down without a weightbelt sucks, and I'd shipped it out with some other no-longer-needed stuff with my wife the afternoon previous.  Oops!  Anyway, I managed to pull a second ab, tag them (both about 9" and deep old-growth), and paddle back to camp before my little girl was awake and as the guys were getting going.  The uncles were stoked to get some ab, and they suggested I should take the boys out for a last fishing run and they'd take some loads to the trucks.  I took them up on it and me and the boys had a blast out there - I was finally on my X-Factor alone, with my tripod-mounted camera and feeling more stable without one of the boys on there, and the boys were doing great on the tandem.  Jake caught a bunch of little blues and a nice black and took the quantity award, Jeremy caught a big black, a couple little ones, and had a ling to the boat that was a pure, never-hooked hitch-hiker that let go before I could paddle the net into place, and I caught several smallish blues, a black or two, and kept a 19" vermillion to send with the uncles.  We wrapped it up around noon, got the gear packed out to the trucks, and parted ways on an epic adventure of a camping trip.   

I met some cool folks that I directed to this site:  Gus and Brenda and Bill from Shelter Cove/Sacramento.   

Sounds like an awesome weekend with family. Good for you for taking some time for the boys. I am sure they wont forget that weekend ever. We drove down that road probably15 years ago while staying at shelter cove in a house. I was looking for those 10's which are becoming ever elusive. When we arrived there the water looked like chocolate milk and almost like it had a thickness to it. But the weather was really nice so we just enjoyed ourselves and had a picnic.  We have not been back since but I think about that place fromm time to time and just wonder, hmmmmm, I should go back there. I remember some concrete foundations there and thought that there must have been some significant structures there at one time. Thanks for the nice report. Do you live up in that area? That was a long drive for us for a weekend from Petaluma.

Nice stuff Eric.  Glad to hear you had a more than successful trip.  I was planning to come up, but the wife's work changed the game plan up on us and Drew started football last week, so I was a little tied down.....

Thanks for the awesome report and pics.....some day I'll get my 10+'r.

Norm

Great time and a great report, I took a quick look at the pics before I read the post and thought they were lings,

Bear harbor's been on my "get to" list for years, just never made it, maybe some day.

Thanks for sharing your adventure

dale

Thanks, Guys.   

Do you live up in that area?

Rave - I live near Eureka, and it's a little over a 2 hour drive for me to Bear Harbor. 

Here's a few more pics:

I hope my kids fall in love with the ocean playground when they're big enough.   

Looks like a fine spot. I wanna go there someday too. Thanks for the report.

That trip looked like it was off the hook!!! Wat to go and thanks for the report. Pretty cool it was almost like I was there with you. Andy

Beautiful pics and report Eric! Thanks for sharing that. And those cabs are piggies. Guess I’ll have to do some more cab hunting next time out because you’re definitely winning our bet right now.
Pat

Beautiful pics and report Eric! Thanks for sharing that. And those cabs are piggies. Guess I’ll have to do some more cab hunting next time out because you’re definitely winning our bet right now.
Pat

You were definitely on my mind, PK!   

I just hope we get an opportunity this year to hookup, fish, and share the prize.   

GREAT report, thanks! How is the Bull Kelp crop up there? It is so thick here in Mendo it is hard to get through in some spots and even worse getting back up with the iron, gauge and fins all wanting to catch on it!

John

GREAT report, thanks! How is the Bull Kelp crop up there? It is so thick here in Mendo it is hard to get through in some spots and even worse getting back up with the iron, gauge and fins all wanting to catch on it!

John

The kelp is definitely thicker this year due to a lack of late Spring storms with 30' swells - it's still nothing compared to places south though, because the lack of vis/lack of sunshine into the water up here limits it.  There aren't big offshore kelp beds up here.

Abking, thanx so much for this post.
I have been there once before i started yakfishing. For weeks I wanted to post asking about yakfishing there, but was hesitant about blowing a secret spot. Just last night i threw the idea of a weekend up there out to my buddy and showed it to him on GoogleMaps. This morning i had convinced myself to post seeking info. I mean how secret could it be. If you look at the map of Sinkyone there are only 2 obvious road access portages, Bear and Wheeler, with Bear being by far the more protected. anyway, I came to post and saw yours! Thanx again. More than enough info/motivation here.
Last time i was there all i had with me was an eagle claw 4 piece fly/spinning combo rod wit a small spinning reel with 4lb line. I lost about half the pool to snags (felt real guilty about leaving line in the water in this pristine place) and then used a piece if drift wood as a makeshift bobber with a 3ft leader. caught enough rockfish to feed the the landlubbers i was with.
Met the Ranger, nice guy, and talked fish and surf with him. he told me about the good ab picking to the south down the low tide beach and around the no go (swim) point. I remember thinking it was a good thing you get em on the rocks because the water looked like chocolate milk, even on a small swell.
This place is a true gem. We had to camp at a site in the trees on the way to the beach on the first night, but got the primo spot the next morning. I love the sound of the frogs in the stream.
I do remember there being some strict dog leash rules. The ranger did say hed turn a blind eye to off leash way down the beach to the south, as the dog were "contained" by the seacliff and couldnt bolt after his elk. Apparently this has been a serious problem, resulting in very bad things happening to both elk and dog.

how secret could it be

No prob, sharky.   

While enjoying a beer and the late afternoon low tide on Bear Harbor beach Saturday I saw a guy out diving the cove.  I saw his better half on a rock watching him, so I approached her, wanting to give her information if she was able to meet the most basic rules of friendly engagement.  She was very friendly, so I told her that her man was diving where there were no abs.  I told her where to send him for better results - her name is Brenda and her man, Gus, came in soon and the 3 of us BS'd for a bit.  I gave him lots of info, and I felt great about it.  He got his limit the next day, including his PB, a 9.5" ab, in one of my spots. 

I've met many cool people on the beaches and at this site.  I share info and make it known how I feel about the resources.  I've caught a little shit from some, saying I shouldn't be giving out the info, and I've thought alot about it.  The alternative to sharing (telling the truth) is biting your tongue (lying?), and I don't care to live that way.  Is it about saving it for me to harvest?  Nope.

If things get screwed up more quickly because more people utilize and consume them then we should all pool our energy and take action to protect and save those things.

I've decided that sharing makes my life better.   

I've decided that sharing makes my life better.   

Good stuff  Good karma to you my brother