Did I mention how clear the water was at the Rocks?
Met Corb at the landing at 7 AM. We sat around for a while when the “Derelict Crue” showed up. Had bagels, coffee, and a shot of Patron and we finally got to load.
We baited up and were underway at about 1:30 and Randy gave us the lowdown and Cookie did a tackle seminar. Cookie also went over the way the Star processes fish… It wasn’t too hard as even Coob’s understood it (more on that later).
On Saturday, we trolled for Blue Fin Tuna at about 180 miles from the point. We had a few stops and some bait fish mixed in, also got one nice Yellow Fin Tuna and a large Yellowtail on the troll. Once the Seiners started wrapping, the bite was done.
Blue Fin Tuna on the deck.
Randy made the call to hit Cedros… The Yellowtail were up and ready to rock the next morning. The BD crew started to fish with the iron and the long rods. We did well. I had 7 the first day between 20# and 40# on the iron.
Typical Cedros Yellowtail.
Everyone got fish on the iron and some of the guys handed off a bunch of fish to the “farmers”. Highlight of my day was seeing a jig get nailed by a HUGE Yellowtail that took me right around the bow and then came off. Straightened out the hook on my jig! That fish was huge and determined. The second day let some of the guys redeem themselves and the farmers to catch a bunch more baitfish. I know most of the BD guys didn’t touch a bait both of those days. Oh and no pussy pads allowed either.
G-Spot with a Cedros Yellowtail.
We headed off to the ROCKS and we were all stoked as the reports of tuna were on the radio. The following morning the rocks came into view and we all took pictures as the boat trolled around looking for tuna. We anchored up and the crew got the kite up and G-spot was first on the kite.
The Rocks...
We picked away at a larger grade of Yellow Fin Tuna (30 –90#) and some small Yellowtail on bait. Cuda did get a small Yellow Fin Tuna to go on the skip jig. All of the football Yellow Fin Tuna were releases unharmed by the crew. The birds were going off and the Yellow Fin Tuna were boiling around the boat nailing the bait. When the bite died down, some of us went down in line class to get bit. Calico (Ron) landed a nice Yellow Fin Tuna (40#) on an Avet SX with 15# line. I got two (40# and 60#) on the 20# test. It really wasn’t too bad; you just couldn’t horse the fish in.
Ron on the 15#.
Me on a Kite fish. If you look at some of the other pics when we are bendo, one of us would always "escort" a fellow BD'er through the farmers to ensure no tangles or hassles.
Yellow Fin Tuna on 20#.
Chris (Dos Locos) with a nice Yellow Fin Tuna.
Now since this type of fishing requires a longer soak than an offshore tuna bite, there were some tangles. Okay, there were a lot of tangles… “Kool and the gang” (as we called them) just had massive tangles all day, not to mention that when one of them hooked a fish that they tangled up all over again. What a cluster fuck. A few words were exchanged between anglers and some of the “gang” finally got it, but most were still ‘tangling and not angling’.
This is Nick, our new BD recruit making it out of the corner on the long rod.
This was my first time on the kite and that was a lot of fun watching the two Sardines fluttering on the surface where the tuna would just erupt on them.
When our spot shut down, we started trolling for Wahoo since the water temp was right. As we left the spot, the Yellow Fin Tuna erupted on the bait that had been under the boat. Dos Locos got a nice Wahoo on a marauder and there were a couple more landed on the troll. On the next stop, Cuda got one to go on a bomb and that was the biggest Hoo of the trip at 69.7#’s. Did I mention that Ron had lost his voice; well until he got picked up on the bomb and then you could hear him loud and clear.
Chris' first Wahoo. Made his trip.
Ron's Wahoo. That's a 70# fish!
After anchoring up for the night, a few of us tried the dropper loop for Yellowtail, and a few were caught, but only one with any size to it. The next morning, we trolled around for more Wahoo, but didn’t get shit, and then anchored up for the Yellow Fin Tuna. We scratched away at the Yellow Fin Tuna for the rest of the morning and afternoon, with bigger fish coming over the rail in the afternoon (40# to 107#) including Corb’s uncle Mike with the Jackpot fish. Now Mike can fish, even with a replacement knee. He was always bent and landing fish. We were all happy to see Mike get the big fish for the trip.
Mike's JP fish as it hit the deck.
Mike with the 107# Jackpot Yellow Fin Tuna.
We left for Benitos that afternoon and we got there the next afternoon. We did a few drifts for the reds and loaded up on them. The Yellowtail were up, but so were the furbags. Cuda bounced a 20#’er right out of the mouth of a large male and let him have it verbally. We all had a good laugh as we went around the corner of Benitos and started to head back up the line. The plan was to try and find the Blue Fin Tuna off shore on our last day out and then arrive the following morning. The weather was shitty that afternoon and into Friday. We trolled and trolled and trolled. Finally we got a stop on the Yellow Fin Tuna about 100 miles from the point and it was wide open for about an hour on 20# to 50# Yellow Fin Tuna. Oh, but the 8 foot swells at 5 second interval didn’t help things along with Kool and the gang tangling everything that hit the water.
Randy made the call to head for home and we had a brief by Randy on how we did and the fish processing… Now it was made very clear when we left and when people landed their first fish what the options were on fish processing. You could take it home (from the dock), or have 5 Star process it for pickup the same day, or have 5 Star process it for pickup at a later date. Apparently ‘the gang’ didn’t quite understand that and what should have been a 5-minute chat with Randy turned into 20 minutes of stupid questions.
After a prime rib dinner (did I mention that Tommy and Eddie are the shit in the galley on the Star), most of us went to bed and bounced around for the rest of the night.
We pulled in the next morning early and some of the BD crew was down there to meet us. We got the fish and gear unloaded and said goodbye to everybody. Was a great trip. The Star has a great crew, skipper and is a great boat. I had fun getting to know some of the BD guys better that I had met in the past and meeting some of the other guys on the trip.
My tally was:
11 Yellowtail to 45#
8 Yellow Fin Tuna to 60#
3 Blue Fin Tuna to 35#
I'd like to say a couple things about this trip; first I learned a lot on this trip about fishing the iron and casting, second we were a pretty relaxed bunch on this trip, I can't imagine how this would have turned out if the fishing was scratchy? Some of the inexperienced guys would listen and some would not. I know I tried to help where I could and got both positive and negative responses from the other fishermen. If you go on a trip like this, then go with your eyes open. There's always something to learn. If you're a n00b, then pay attention and ask for help. These fish aren't Steelhead or Trout that you catch at home, they can pull hard and make you look stupid, and these aren't even the big ones! Rant is over, I had a great time.
Mark
What really happened on the RS 8-Day 
Linear Mode
