Kayak outing Day 2: Gaviota State Beach WSB 10.4.12

After driving back to my cousin’s place from La Jolla fishing, I asked MeatHunter if he’d like to fish again the following day somewhere up north since we’re driving back that way to get home. He was quick to reply, “Oh, hell yeah!” We decided that we would wake up at 4:45am and head north to do another adventure in Santa Barbara, an area that MeatHunter was familiar with.

We woke up at 4:45 and said our goodbye to my cousin, who was getting ready to leave for work. We arrived to Santa Barbara a lil after 7am without any bait. With nothing open, we decided to continue driving north to an Albertson’s to see if by chance they had frozen squid, and sure enough they did! The store stocker had asked Tim if he was going to Gaviota to chase after some wsb, something that surprised us as well as perked our interest. From my previous knowledge and prior pier fishing trip there, Gaviota State Beach was more popularly known for shark fishing: leopards, smoothhounds, and specifically threshers. I didn’t expect to hear about wsb fishing in this area.




We got to Gaviota State Beach around 7:40 to mostly sunny forecast with some strong offshore breeze, which quickly tapered off to barely a breeze through the morning/early afternoon. Tim and I unloaded our gear and easily launched out from small 2’ shore breakers. Gaviota is totally different from what I am used back home in Nor Cal where the powerful coastline is scoured with rocky terrain and steeper sandy bottom, whereas Gaviota is completely sandy with a slow long decline out to the open calmer ocean. Visibility in this So/Cen Cal green water was clear (down to 15’), with water temps starting at 57 degrees and rose almost 7 degrees by the time we got off the water.







Both MeatHunter and I had our rods rigged for halibut (slider rig) and dropped our lines around 60’ to a very slow drift that started southeast and later shifted to northwest. The first couple hours I wasn’t having any success whatsoever, not even a nibble; while Tim was having a lil better success catching a few lizardfish and a jacksmelt. I was getting less confident as the morning rolled by without any bites that I decided to pull out my iphone and googled “kayak fishing Gaviota” to see if I can get any info on this unchartered area. What came up often on the search engine was a great white attack on a kayaker. “OH GREAT…….”

The first thing that popped in my mind when I first sat on Gaviota’s water was how sharky this area was: the ultra clear visible blue-green water with some clouds overhead, a wide open flat sandy bottom with no kelp or rocky structure whatsoever, and lots of school of baitfish swimming through with sea lions just cruising along, and no dolphins present. Even worse was that I completely forgot to recharge my Shark Shield from fishing day before at La Jolla! Now I felt completely vulnerable out there in the open shallow water in clear view for anything to see me from a long distance, sitting on a long floating plastic resembling a hopeless prey of the sea.

I tried not to think about the landlord, but boy was it hard not to! Throughout the outing I would often keep my eyes on the FF, as well as underneath me with my polarized sunglasses to get a better view just in case. After being bored from hours of nothing, I decided to do something to distract me from boredom when all of a sudden my rod went full screaming bendo, forcing with my unlatched Ultra 4.3 rod pod to open fully sideways!!

Caught totally off guard from the moment and freaking out that I was gonna lose my rod, the words “Oh sh*t!!” immediately came out of my mouth as Tim turned back to see what just happened. Luckily I had my rods clipped to rod leashes or that rod woulda went long gone. I quickly grabbed my rod, strapped my rod pod down and was off on the fastest sleigh ride ever! I initially thought that I had a shark with the way this fish was pulling hard and fast. After 10 minutes of going in every direction and pulling me everywhere while staying at the 45’ bottom, I knew that I didn’t have a thresher (after having caught one outta Monterey last year) and began to believe that I had a big bat ray. The fish would not get off the bottom no matter how hard I was trying to pull it off the bottom. After five more minutes I was able to get the fish off the bottom. However, the fish would continue to fight hard to get to the bottom and was successful in doing so a couple times before I was able to tire it out. I was able to slowly lift the fish up, but it would fight back peeling line. As soon as I saw on my FF that I had the fish about 20’ below me, I kept my eyes below to see what this fish was when all of a sudden I saw a giant flash of silver!! Right away I knew I had caught my biggest wsb! As soon as it surfaced with exhaustion, I grabbed my game clip, clipped that bad boy, and released it overboard. Knowing that it was game over, I yelled out victoriously!!

I couldn’t believe what I had just accomplished, being that this was my very first time out on Gaviota’s waters. I was very fortunate, lucky and humbled by this unexpected experience. Tim and I continue to fish for another hour or so without any more success. During that time, I kept the wsb alive on the game clip overboard. I usually immediately bleed my wsb, but decided against that w/o having my Shark Shield in this sharky water. It was only before I decided to call it a day when I pulled out my knife and bled the fish. It immediately let out a large pool of blood that turned a large area of the water to red, which didn’t help ease me at all lol! In the end, everything turned out to be an exciting adventurous day

Bro, YOU ROCK!!!! nice report... nice pics!!!!

Thanks for the report. Nice fish!! 

YEAH! Nice work Daniel, awesome report, I am headed to your neck of the woods this weekend.

AWESOME WRITE UP!!!!!! even better fish, thanks for the great report and congrats on the great wsb daniel, cameron

Not much too add here except great job Dan. I have to be honest WSB was the last thing I thought I would hear on the radio but I was really excited when the news came in. I had zero larger fish bites and caught a smelt and some jumbo macs and tons of lizard fish. Didn't feel to sharky to me but then again I try not to notice. Only mammals I saw were seals although like always not as many as Monterey. I had a great time though and would fish the area again. 

Jai BOOOOOIIIIIIII 

All those and huge Congratulations on a absolutely gorgeous WSB.... A hell of a story as well. Thank you brother 

Hells to the yeah! Thanks for the steaks. (-:

Wow great story and pics.  Congrats on catching the beast Ghost!

Martin


Sent from Martin's iPad using Tapatalk

Sweet Report!

Daniel, that was a fantastic report dude! beautiful fish.

Great story, great pics, and great fish!  WTG, Dan.   

Hell yeah!!!

WSB A-Hull Ninja!!!!

WTG brother!!!

 

 

Sincerely,

Jim

Daniel, thanks for the killer write up & congrats on that big c-bass bro! It makes the catch even sweeter being in a new spot & after hours of trying.  Nice camera work Tim!   

Sweeeet!  Thanks for the report and pictures Daniel.