Lessons I learned on my kayak today!

1. It’s best to turn the fish finder on before launching the kayak.

2. Get bait before 6 a.m. or after 6:30 a.m.

3. Turn on bait tank before getting to the receiver.

4. Don’t use short topshots when using the Ahi Sabiki rod.

5. If you need to be off the water early, the fish will be biting.

Thursday I launched my kayak at 6 a.m. and tried to turn on my fish finder. Nothing. Tim said one of the cables to the battery must have loosened. Fortunately Tim hadn’t launched yet so he reached inside the front hatch of my kayak and reattached the red wire to the battery. Lesson 1 learned!

We reached the bait receiver just before three sport boats. The sport boats depart at 6:00 a.m. and their first stop is the receiver. It takes about 30 minutes for them to load bait and depart. With three boats loading bait and the Cougar (bait seining boat) tied up to the receiver, there’s no room for kayaks. Lesson 2 learned!

Joe was on the receiver today and he said if we hurried he could load our tanks before the sport boats. I reached around to open my tank and there was no water in it. I realized I hadn’t turned it on and I have to peddle forward to prime the pump. I made a quick circle then noticed Tim was doing the same while poor Joe was wondering what we were doing. Lesson 3 learned!

No sardines just anchovies today so bait making was first on our agenda again. As we left the harbor I notice a marked change in the water from a few days ago. The water was clean with a surface temperature up to 67 degrees.

As we trolled towards the headlands, we saw many birds working an area about a half mile off shore.


Birds working off shore.

As we raced to the area, so did more birds from all directions. Tim reached the area before me and he started catching bait immediately. When I got to the area Tim said they were big mackerel – too big for the Sabikis. I used a leadhead and curly tail plastic and caught a few big mackerel then the small ones arrived.

I pulled out my new Ahi Sabiki rod that has the line and hooks run inside the rod. We were sitting in a little over 50 feet of water. As I dropped my Sabiki down, the line hung up before it reached the bottom. I had used a bimini to Albright knot to connect the mono to the spectra. The knot was too large to fit through the guide leading inside the rod. I cut the knot out and retied with a back to back uni knot. It was a much smaller knot but still a little large to go through smoothly. With a little juggling, it would slide in. I’ll use a reel with all mono in the future. Lesson 4 learned!

Bait making was fun. Sitting out on the water watching the sport boats checking out their spots trying to chum up the fish. I watched a school of bait skip across the water just in front of me traveling very fast. They were gone before I could even grab a rod to try to catch whatever was chasing them. Once we had our bait, we worked our way to the kelps off Strands trolling a live mackerel. On the way a pod of dolphin played in front of me as if leading the way.

I tied off to a kelp strand and dropped down a mackerel. As soon as the mack hit the water it raced to the kelp and wrapped itself up. This was repeated over and over again. Finally I decided to try anchovies instead. I cut up the dead chovies and chummed the waters. The first through fourth anchovies were picked off. The fifth brought up a legal calico that swallowed the hook. It was bleeding to much to release so I gave it to Tim. I hooked another fish that came up with kelp wrapped around it. It was a very large and fat calico that spit the hook when I tried to remove the kelp. I would have released it anyway and I did get a good look at it.

A baby seal bobbed around between Tim and me for a while. Once he left the area, the fish started to bite again.


Tim tied to a kelp.



I caught a couple short halibuts then I had to head back to the harbor. I had a doctor appointment that required me to cut my time on the water short. Tim said he had lots of work to do so he was heading in too. When we reached the red buoy off the headlands, birds were working the area and we hit a school of barracuda.


Birds working a school of barracuda.

After five fish, I had to pull my jig in and pedal fast to get in soon enough.


One of my barracuda which were released.

When I looked back, Tim was still back by the red buoy. I guess he won't make it in early today after all. The fish must be biting.

I called Tim in the evening to get a report. He said the calicos moved in after the barracuda. He caught at least ten calicos but only kept four for dinner. Then the mackerel came back. He said he caught more than 60 fish after I left. Lesson 5 learned!

It was a wonderful day on the water and the ocean was alive everywhere I looked. Later in the afternoon, the whale watching boats watched a pod of five killer whales frolicking on their way north. It’s always exciting on the water especially in a kayak.


Areas Fished Today!

976-KayakJan June 6th & 9th

June 6th - I picked up a nice load of sardines at 8 a.m. and headed towards the beach. The water was dirty, green and filled with floating trash everywhere. The weather was sunny and the waters were glassy smooth which made for a nice day of kayaking. Fishing on the other hand, was more than slow. I can’t blame the fish for leaving the dirty water for cleaner areas.

No bites along the beach and only a small calico and sandbass in the harbor.

Spots fished along the beach.

June 9th – We launched at 6 a.m. and waited for bait while the Dana Pride loaded theirs. Jeff handed me a nice scoop of bait and apologized for only having anchovies. Mondays are poor bait days since the receiver gets cleaned out of good bait over the weekend. As we left the harbor, Tim commented that we need to make bait.

As we were traveling towards the headlands, I noticed some porpoise with birds working an area offshore. I told Tim there must be bait with them and he raced off saying “let’s catch them.” We made it to the area just after the birds and porpoise left. We dropped our Sabiki rigs down and quickly were on our way with fresh mackerel in our bait tanks. Tim was using the new Ahi Sabiki rod that keeps the bait hooks inside the rod when not in use. I had to have one. Much safer on a kayak. I picked mine up on at Hogan’s Tackle on the way home.

We stopped just past the headlands in the kelp bed and fished close to the Western Pride out of Newport Landing. The wonderful smells from the Galley almost made us order breakfast burritos from the boat. They left quickly having failed to chum up the fish. We left shortly after.

We fished along our way to Salt Creek Beach. We trolled live mackerel or a Rapala. The water was 66.9 degrees, a little green but clean and calm. I found an area just off from the Ritz Carlton in the middle of a kelp bed with some jumping bait. I tied my kayak off to a kelp strand and dropped my one and only sardine down. It got nailed but I missed the hook set. Darn. The mackerel were troublesome as they were great at wrapping themselves in the kelp. Fortunately I was fishing with spectra with a foot of mono so I could pull them out. I switched to anchovies for a while and landed a nice keeper sandbass, a short white seabass and a small sandbass.

I noticed a school of fish fry had gathered in the bottom of my kayak. I assume they were looking for a safe haven.

Fry in my kayak.

A couple of times, I also saw something large working the kelp edge. At first I thought it was a porpoise but it was just one animal. Then I thought it might be a marlin with its large dorsal fin sticking out and as it dove its big tail surfaced on the way down but a marlin seemed unlikely that close to the kelp. I suppose it could have been one of the small white sharks recently spotted along our coast but I’ll never know for sure. The ocean is an amazing place.

Around noon Jack joined us in the area. He had picked up a couple of nice calicos along the way on the Berkley Jerk Shad. He had fished around the red buoy off the headlands. Tim switched to Jerk Shad after he ran out of bait and both Jack and Tim had better fishing than I did fishing live bait. About 1:45 p.m. we began fishing our way back. The wind picked up and the sea surface ruffled as big swells rolled through. I caught a big mackerel (plus many kelp strands) on the way back trolling a small Rapala.

Spots fished 6-9-08.

The sun never broke through during our 9 plus hours on the water. When I reached the harbor my fish finder had logged 13 miles of travel for the day with a total of 60 miles on my kayak since getting the fish finder. Sure is great having a kayak for fishing. Plus the convenience of storage and launching from Tim's Dana Point Jet Ski and Kayaks place is awesome.

Alaska - Cold, Picturesque and Fabulous!

May 27th eleven fishermen from New York, Georgia, Washington and California converged in Sitka for 4 days of salmon and halibut fishing with Herb Tennell's Outbound Alaska Charters (http://www.outboundalaskacharters.com/). This was the second annual Alaskan charter for Excel Captains Justin and Jason Fleck. The rest of the Fleck charter consisted of Tim Turis, Basil Pappas, Jim and Tom Carlisle, Al Scow, Dan Felger, Auggie Roberts, Phil Reumler, and me. This was my first trip to Alaska.

Once we all checked into the Westmark Hotel, we had dinner in the hotel’s restaurant to organize the next day’s fishing. Tom had prepared a schedule for rotating passengers and boats so we would get a chance to fish with everyone in the party and split our time between the two boats – the 33 foot Micah with Captain Herb Tennell and the 30 foot Jagar with Captain Steve Runnion. We also agreed to split our fish equally for the trip regardless of who caught what. Then we each put $20 into a jackpot for the biggest salmon of the trip.

Alaska lived up to its reputation of being cold. The temperature ranged between 48 and 58 degrees all four days with the water temperature topping out at 46.6 degrees. I wore two pair of wool socks, 5 layers of clothes and two pair of gloves and my toes and fingers still went numb. The cold didn’t keep the fish from biting though. Each day cruise ships would arrive as we were leaving the harbor and they departed Sitka as we returned to dock. We missed the tourist crowds.

We met at the docks at 5:30 a.m. to head out fishing.

Both boats arrived at the fishing grounds around 6:30 a.m.

The first day I was fishing on the Micah with Herb Tennell. Captain Herb had the boat ready with G. Loomis rods and Shimano reels with counters loaded with 25 pound line all set up around the boat and baited with cut plug herring. Mooching for salmon is the method Outbound Alaska Charters uses in lieu of trolling. We each picked our spot and dropped our bait to the bottom in about 220 feet of water. “Seven quick winds then stop, then repeat the process until you reach the surface” instructed Herb. This gets the bait spinning so that it attracts the salmon. It didn’t take long until we all hooked and landed our daily limit of one salmon on the Micah. By 8:00 a.m. we were headed long to the halibut grounds, an area that Herb hadn’t yet tried this year.

Basil with a nice king salmon.

Justin with a big Alaskan ling.

Jim and one of his kings.

Justin, Tom, Jim, Tim, Me and Auggie with our Kings.

Dan, Jason, Tim, Jim and Auggie with kings.

Halibut fishing consisted of Shimano TLD 25 reels filled with 80 pound spectra set up around the boat. Two of the rods were set up with a double 10/0 J hook, a one pound weight and a salmon belly for bait. The other rods were set up with a short (24 inch) leader of nylon cord with 15/0 circle hooks and a two pound weight clipped to the spectra and baited with salmon collars and guts. We dropped them to the bottom then cranked up 5 winds and put the rod in the holder and waited in the heated cabin to get a bite. We were fishing in 330 feet of water.

The passengers on the Jaegar took a little longer to get their salmon limit on day one so they fished halibut closer to the salmon grounds. This proved fortuitous as the Jaegar caught several larger halibut (up to 70 pounds) whereas we struck out on the larger fish. A fun time was had by all and we were back at dock by 5:00 p.m. Alaskan Amber or Alaskan Summer Ale in the bar, dinner in the hotel and we all hit the rack.

Jim and Jason with Alaskan Summer Ale

A twenty legged starfish.

The Jager.

We repeated the process each day fishing salmon in the morning and halibut in the afternoon, rotating passengers and boats. The second day was foggy and we were treated to an aerial display from a couple of humpback whales before we began fishing. What a delight.

Frolicking humpbacks.

The Micah in the fog.

Fishing was good again as Al caught a 30 lb. salmon and Tom caught one that weighed 31 lbs. then Tom caught a 141 pound halibut. Tom had a good day.

Tom with his 141 lb. halibut.

The third day it was my turn to fish the Jaeger with Jason, Justin, Tim and Auggie. Now that was quite a day. It was difficult to fish while laughing so hard. Amazing how funny this group could be. Getting our salmon limit the third day took a little longer but it paid off for Tim with a 31 pounder and Justin took the JP lead with a 36 pound salmon. The afternoons’ halibut fishing honors went to Tim with a 150 pound fish. The Micah had trouble getting their last two salmon to round out our annual 3 fish limit of salmon so they left that for day four. Gramps took the Micah’s big fish bragging rights the third day with his 115 pound halibut. We went to the local sushi bar to celebrate the days catch this night.

Justin's 36 lb. salmon.

Tim's 150 lb. halibut.

Jason's golden eye.

Dan and his 115 lb. halibut.

Auggie and his big halibut.

Sushi Celebration!

On our last day, nine of us pitched in $20 for a one day halibut jackpot. Herb and Steve decided to have both boats make a 50 mile run south to the open ocean to pick up the last two salmon and try for some trophy halibut. The ocean was glassy calm! Very unusual and very pleasant. Phil hooked a nice salmon and when it hit the deck, he clinched the salmon jackpot with a 41 pounder! Way to go Phil. We moved out to the halibut area and set out the baits. About an hour later, the scents rounded up a 150 pound halibut for Jason which nailed the days’ halibut jackpot.

Phil and his JP King.

Halibuts are filleted on the boats, however, the carcus must be kept until the fillets are offloaded in dock. The boat returns outside the harbor to dump the remains. Salmon are gill and gutted on board then the fish processor (Quality Processing) fillets the salmon.

I took my Spot Messenger along on the trip and set the tracking feature on each morning. The following map is a compilation of the spots we fished each day.

There's an animosity between the commercial fishermen and the charter boats. The commercials believe the charter boats are taking their catch and are fighting back with a bumper sticker campaign. The bumber stickers are not very polite either.

Herb and Steve were both great. Not only are they very professional but they are fun to fish with too. They were always there changing our baits and netting or gaffing our fish. They provided sandwiches, chips, sodas and beer for lunch, plus plenty of snack foods throughout the day. One day we were even treated to halibut ceviche, halibut cheek sashimi and raw oysters. Talk about top notch. It was hard to say goodbye to our captains and call it a trip.

Sunday morning we headed to the airport for our flight home. Quality Processing met us at the airport with our fish fillets – two fifty pound boxes each. I also asked for some salmon bellies and collars to take home and Quality packed a 50 pound box of those for me. The airport was packed and check-in was slow but we all made our flight and our connections. More importantly, all our fish made the connections too.

Although I didn’t catch any trophy sized fish, I caught my share and I truly enjoyed fishing with good friends. As for my salmon collars and bellies? I marinated them in a teriyaki sauce and smoked them. My freezer was almost full with the salmon and halibut fillets but the bellies and collars topped it off.

We are all enjoying our fresh salmon and halibut for dinners and I can't make it much past breakfast before eating some salmon belly.

I am already looking forward to our next year’s trip.