Crescent Bay Diving

The bro and I went to the Crescent Bay in Laguna Beach for some snorkeling. This actually was the first time that I have ever snorkeled from the mainland. I got used to thinking that Orange County beaches and harbors are silty, dirty and green. I neglected to give South County a chance, despite knowing in the back of my head that it is known for being a great dive spot.

We went out in about 10-15ft visibility with a light-moderate surge. I saw some nice calicos, a big sheephead and schools of shiny baitfish. I dove and swam next to beautiful rock walls with Garibaldi nibbling on the mossy faces.



After getting a little too close for comfort at Seal Rock, we traversed the coast, absolutely pumped to be enjoying one of the prettiest coves in Southern California. Andrew said that the palm trees on the point looked like paradise.


A hammock and some iced water could really make it paradise.

I checked the sandy bottom for halibut but found none. It became more fun to get near the surf zone and ride the surge back and forth floating inches from the constantly resurfacing bottom.

I can't wait to get back out there...especially with some SCUBA gear.

Logistical Issues(Catalina Canceled)

I was supposed to sail my relatives over to Catalina this weekend, but for "logistical issues" the trip was canceled. That is as far into the details that I have been told...pretty vague...pretty lame.

I then say screw em, I'll take the boat over with a small 1 or 2 person crew. I already booked some nights to camp in Little Harbor and had visions of spearfishing. But no, they want to go for a day sail on Sunday. Weak.

My Uncle Cliff is in town, so I convinced him to go fishing on the whaler. Smart choice. We had the most productive day of fishing I have had all summer(for him the past 3 years). We pulled in about 10 bass each and other assorted fish. We had another octopus spit onto the deck. We fished the octo-bait but no real hits. The action was on live-anchovies and it was relentless. Here is a shot of Cliff with the knife for a scale(I forgot the measuring tape again) with a nice calico bass.

The action was soo hot that I broke the pole that I got in Italy when I tried fishing on Lago Maggiore. I wish it had broken on a fish hookup, but sadly it was when I snagged the rocks. I found out that the pole was made of carbon fiber, ultra low quality, but carbon non-the-less.

While we were on the water, I saw the Bell Family sailing over to Catalina on Seeker. I yelled out to them and they stopped by the boat for a "stop and chat". I wish that I could have hopped a ride with them, but I had "logistical issues".

Fishing Report: LB Breakwater 7/19/09

After receiving the "you need to get a job" talk with my parents, I needed to take my dad fishing and share some of the good life with him. I wanted to make it as easy as possible, so got his reel restrung with some 15lb test and cleaned it. The boat was ready in the water with gas, and all the tackle and tools were ready to go. We had a party at my cousins' house last night, so we went to bed easily when we got home. We left the dock at 5:45am.

Anchovies again and straight to the weather side of the breakwater. My dad pulled in a big sand bass on his first anchovy, and not too much later I pulled in a small calico bass.

My dad landed a big cabezon with an octopus in its mouth. After setting it free, he hooked up the octopus and had a huge hit from probably another rock fish but "farmed" it. My dad said that growing up being called a farmer on the water was a serious putdown.


We then shifted spots and I wanted to fish plastics, so I tossed a color that I have never used before, all red and speckled. I worked 4 calicos into the boat on the red lure.


The live bait was bringing in the bigger fish, but fishing plastics is super fun. Today was the best day of fishing that I have ever had with my dad. It was constant action on different kinds of bait and excellent conditions. I had some fish leftover from lunch on Friday, so we are gonna eat 8 fish tonight.

Keeper Kount brought to you by the folks at Mackerel Hunter:
4 Sand Bass
1 Calico Bass (and 3 released legals)

Fishing Report: LB Breakwater 7/17/09

Left the dock at 5:30 with my buddy Danny Bluth, Servite '05, same as Wednesday.

At the fuel dock, the bait guy didn't like the fact that we were getting anchovies, while everyone else was getting sardines. Most the boats looked like they were going out for 1+ days of offshore fishing, so sardines were their pick. This meant the bait guy actually had to open the anchovy tank and move his net to a different location. There is no amount of Pabst Blue Ribbon at 6 in the morning that can make that an enjoyable activity. I also found out that if you give the bait guy some hats and a T-shirt from your fishing sponsors, you can cut in front of every boat. Anyone interested in my new venture Mackerel Hunters LLC? We have apparel! We asked for only $10 of anchovies, rather than the $20 I have been accustomed to and found that this was the right amount. The bait stayed alive longer and still had enough dead guys to chum the waters.

Limited by gas, we chose to fish the breakwater just past the bait barges. We fished the inside of the breakwater and hooked into 3 legal sandbass, 1 octopus, and 1 queenfish. We dropped anchor about 5 times, but never pulled more than 1 fish from each spot. There was action, but not as constant as the other side of the breakwater.

We left for the other side of the break water at around 10am. There was a zoo of 3 small boats anchored and 2 more trying to get in all trying to fish the end of the breakwater. Knowing that these goofs probably saw some boats and thought that it was the spot tried to squeeze in. I did not want a fouled anchor and crossed lines, so we went down the breakwater about 100 yards. We anchored 20 yards off the wall and we easily dropping our anchovies into the surging rocks. There was less thick kelp as the bay side, just some light growth, so for the most part we could get our bait into the rocky surge.



The action was hot on this side of the rocks. We were getting constant hits on the anchovies. We experimented with the couple of sardines that made it into our scoop and found that they were awful, which explains why every boat jockeying for position at the end of the wall were skunked and resorting to trolling.

We pulled in lots of calico bass, 1 sand bass, and 1 barracuda. You were either getting caught in the rocks or hooking up on the weather side of the rocks. We ended up running out of bait and tired by about noon.

Plastics and irons were not working, and really not needed because the live bait was so hot. I was working one pole with 10lb test and outfishing Danny on 2 poles with line in the 20lb range. The largest bass was landed on 10lb test.

The Keeper Kount brought to you by the folks at Mackerel Hunter:
4 Calicos
4 Sand Bass (largest 16.5 inches)

Fishing Report: HB Flats 7/15/09

Went out to HB Flats by the two oil rigs off Bolsa Chica/Huntington Cliffs. At least ten 1/2 day boats and about 20 private boats were working the area past the rigs. We stayed inside by the platforms and had a consistent action. The 1/2 dayers never held a position and we could see that they were not doing well. Barracuda were in the area the day before, but none today.

Picked up sardines from the bait dock with some squid. The live bait did not do well for a couple reasons:

• No Pump, only buckets of water
• Sardines were a month old
• Too much bait
  
• Mixing varieties
  

Got bait in the water at about 5:20. First sardine hooked a calico withing a minute. Saw color and the calico spit the bait. It was possibly legal sized.

We were plagued the whole day by fighting fish to the boat and as soon as they saw it they spit the bait. We are gonna try again tomorrow with live anchovies. We are hoping to set the hook with some smaller bait that can easily be swallowed.

I snagged a 12 inche halibut jigging a squid head on the white/glow iron by one of the rigs. I got the Tady blue/chrome and worked the surface every now and then. No action on the blue/chrome.



My legal sand bass was caught on fresh dead squid hooked on a 1/4 ounce lead head.

I landed a short sand bass on fresh dead squid.

Sand bass seen but not landed, roughly 5, were all in the possible legal range and all sand bass on either squid or live anchovies.

I filleted my sand bass at home and cooked it on the stove with 1 part olive oil, 1 part butter, and 1 part white wine with bay leaves. It was some of the best fish I have had in a while.

We are heading out tomorrow at about 5am probably back to the flats with frozen squid and live anchovies or small sardines. Hopefully the bite will open up and we can catch our 10 fish limit.