What Goes Blog

Labor Day Weekend 9/4 - 9/6

2009-09-09T00:18:00.000-07:00

Labor Day weekend my fishing buddy, Scott, and I made a long put-off trip to a part of the Golden Trout Wilderness. Our goal was to check out some camp grounds, explore the viability of a backpack trip, and to explore a few nearby streams for Golden Trout.

We both took Friday off and crossed our fingers that the entirely first-come-first-serve campground wasn't full to capacity. Scott had a few alternate ideas in his back pocket should we find the grounds full, but it turned out we had the pick of spots, having arrived at 10:00 a.m. sharp.

At 10,000 feet, every movement resulted in amusing moments of breathlessness. First, we set up tents, and as surprisingly difficult as that was, it was good we did, because at noon a thunderstorm rolled in and dropped rain and hail on us for an hour or so. I took the opportunity to catch up up on some sleep.

After the rain stopped, Scott suggested we go try out a nearby meadow for some small-stream trout stalking. We drove over to the trailhead and made the short walk to the first stream we came across. Scott spotted fish almost immediately, so we strung up our rods. Scott had a 2 wt. and I have a short 3 wt. I'd been advised to bring a rod as small as a 00 wt., which I wasn't even able to find, at a reasonable price, online. Golden Trout, especially stream dwellers, are far to the small side of the wild trout scale. Palm-sized jewels of the trout world. Mostly golden, they tend to have round par marks down the side, a thick, reddish swath down the lateral line, and often have bright orange bellies.

Being in a meadow, with little in the way of cover, these goldens are pretty skittish. We spent a lot of time peering around rocks, over tufts of earth and grass, or on our knees in the soft meadow grass. Scott got a fish right off, using a (grass) hopper pattern. I'd tied on a similar dun-colored "stimulator", that drew some voracious hits, but I had a hard time sticking the tiny fishes.

Intermittant rain and hail followed us up and down the beautiful little stream. A piercing chirp dogged us as well. I swiveled my head looking for a bird that could be making the sound. Then I turned around to look into a field of gravelly earth and boulders, to see a marmot, poking its head over a granite boulder. Marmots are organized in their defense of home grounds. The "chirp" is known as a "chuck" and is a warning to other marmots, mainly family members.

It was pretty fun watching the little trout blasting out of their hiding spots, in the shade of a boulder or bush, and attack my little dry fly. Frustratingly, it rarely resulted in a hook-up, and most that did get hooked, quickly came off. I brought one to hand early in the day, but that's all I could manage. I believe Scott landed four.

The night ended with freeze-dried meals and beers by the camp fire. My Pad Thai was woefully undercooked. But I'm still hearing about how good Scott's chili mac was. Sleep was fitful at best, on the ground, our first night at altitude. I was happy when the sun came out so I could get off the ground.

Saturday was the main focus of the trip, a hike out to Cottonwood Lakes. The hike was about 5 miles each way, it began at 10,000 feet, and it was going to push the two of us to the limits of our "fitness," but it pretty much had to be done. The lakes are known to have a larger average size of goldens, and also to be in a beautiful area.

For the most part the hike is fairly level, meandering through a beautiful pine forest. I wish I'd taken the time to research the type of trees and birds we might encounter up there. It's too bad people don't treat strangers on the street as well as hikers treat each other on the trail. Nearly every group or individual we encountered stopped to chat about the weather, the trail, each other's destination, or just to get an idea of where they were in their day's hike. Valuble information, sometimes encouraging, sometimes not is gathered in these short conversations, and it shaped our day in both directions. The last mile of our hike accounted for about half of the 1,000 feet of elevation gain. Some of the stone steps were enough to stop us in our tracks, gasping for air. We ran into a younger couple who told us we were within yards of the top, and after a chat, we made it over the top.

After chatting with three gentlemen who were warming up for Whitney, we staggered to Lake 1. We found a place out of the persistant wind, and basically dropped our gear and collapsed onto our backs for a while. Getting back up was embarrassingly difficult. Like two big turtles, we stiffly struggled to right ourselves, grunting and chuckling. Then we strung up our lake rods (both 5 weights, I think). I had to hop from stone to stone to reach a large rock to use as a casting platform. Getting my feet wet would not have been acceptable with such a long hike back to camp. My first cast drifted near some grasses, and a trout about 8 to 10 inches bolted out of the shade and blasted my fly. It really only succeded in knocking it away, but it gave me the impression I was in for some good fishing. The wind was pretty gusty at times, but settled often enough to cast. I did get a few wind tangles, which required sitting on the rock I was casting on and concentrating on tiny 6x tippet when I really wanted to be casting.

The largest snafu of our trip was that we each thought the other would bring a map of the area we intended to hike. Not the biggest of deals, the trail is unmistakable, and well-travelled, but it limited our options once we arrived at the lake. We'd gotten word from other hikers that Lake 1 was surrounded by swampy grasses, and would be hard to cast to, but that Lake 3 was surrounded by rocks, and easier to reach from shore. We'd also heard that Lake 3 was about a half mile from Lake 1 (though this was from a woman who asked if she was near the campground, and was still a good 4 miles away).

The lake was in a very shallow basin, surrounded by marsh and meadow, then pines, and the whole area was rimmed by bright granite crags. The lake basin was shallow enough that in some locations it was difficult to even see the lake. I'd imagine the surface area of the lake changed dramatically with the seasons. Occasionally a marmot would bark at us, or a huge raven would wheel across the sky, but there wasn't much else in the way of wildlife. We were mercifully spared the annoyance of mosquitos or black flies the entire weekend. Occasionally, I'd look around and not see another soul, then moments later, a line of hikers might file past on one trail or another. The sky remained deep blue and cloudless the entire day.

We took a break from our current spot to try our hand at the outlet of the lake. The wind was blowing towards the outlet, and our hope was that moving water, and insects blown towards that end of the lake might afford more productive fishing. We never really were able to get close enough, due to the marshy ground, and our lack of a map required a decision to be made. Neither of us were willing to wander too far in search of the lakes, not wanting to waste energy we'd surely need on the way back. Being that we'd found fish where we were, we went back to our previous casting positions, agreeing that at 3 p.m. we'd begin the trek back to camp. I think Scott landed a few more fish, but as the day before, I had more missed strikes than ones that stuck. Even the few that stuck came off the hook pretty quickly. I ended up not landing any fish at the lake. But as is often said, sometimes it's about the fishing, not the catching, and the privilege of being in such amazing place, having so much fun, was more than good enough for me.

We'd decided to take an alternate route back down from the lake. The route we'd come up was short, and steep, rising around 500 feet in the space of a mile. Much of the uplhill journey was a step or two, then rest, struggling for air. The hikers who were prepping for a Mt Whitney hike told us the route they'd followed was a little longer, but a more gradual incline. That sounded much less knee-crushing than stepping down the granite steps on our route in.

Mirroring my experience hiking Mt. Whitney, as the day wore on, the preparedness, and expectations of the hikers we encountered had to be questioned. It seems as the afternoon wore on each successive group seemed... well, we became concerned when we met a European family, the mother whom, I'd guess was in her late 50s, was dressed in shorts, a tank top, and flip flops. She asked how far the lake was. I'd say they had a good 3 miles to go and no visible tent, sleeping bags, or anything to protect them from what I'd guess were nights in the mid to high 40s. And this was around 4 o'clock in the afternoon.

We pressed on, and after a short stop to filter some water, a couple hours hiking - including some out-of-body moments - walked into the campground at a few minutes before 6 p.m. Beers were opened, and butts were parked. I think we were both a little surprised at our accomplishment, and the fact that we weren't in need of any medical attention. Blistering was even kept to one each, I think. I was pretty wiped, and after dinner of curry rice, and some beers, I hit the sack. Again, sleep was difficult on the ground, but I got much more sleep than the previous 2 nights.

We got out of our tents, stiffly, a little after 6 a.m., and stood around trying to wake up. Scott's espresso maker was in a bear locker a couple feet from the entrance to someone's tent. When another camper went ahead and opened it, Scott took the opportunity to get the essentials of coffee making out. We decided just to get all of our stuff out, and began slowly breaking down camp while the water heated for morning shots. I became less and less stiff as I gathered gear and rolled up sleeping pads, stuffed my sleeping bag, and dismantled my tent. I actually felt pretty good for having slept 10 hours on the ground after a 12-mile hike. We took our time cleaning, packing and reorganizing gear, in no hurry to go anywhere.

After packing up the truck, we had one more stop to make. I got a tip from a friendly angler from a trout-fishing website, on a spot to try some stream fishing. The spot is a stream away from the regular area spots. We parked, lined up rods, grabbed tackle kits, and GPSs, and scrambled down to where we could hear rushing water. Almost immediately we split up, as access to the water was limited. I looked for a place to cross to the other side, fighting through dense brush, and finding the ground to be surprisingly marshy. Because we were so close to driving home, I stopped worrying about how wet my feet got.

I found a little pool, and made a few attampts to trick some little trout, to no avail. I decided I'd cross over, and fish from the other side, which was much more open. I was near a good place to cross, and jumped onto a large boulder. The next rock was down a steep side of the boulder. I shuffled down in order to get closer to jump, and began to slip down the boulder. I was about to make the leap when my ass touched the steep boulder, and I heard a click before jumping safely to the next rock. I quickly reached behind me to feel for my GPS and realized only the belt clip was still there. My GPS had unclipped against the boulder and fallen into the fast-moving water. I looked all over the area. Supposedly it's a waterproof GPS, but it's also gray and black, and I never saw it again. Initially I was pretty bummed. I use that GPS pretty regularly, and it did have all the data from our hike, and some fishing spots. Scott came through the brush in the same spot I had, and asked what was up. He'd found me on a rock in the middle of the stream, without my rod, peering into the water.

He asked what I wanted to do. I decided that the GPS was gone, nothing was going to change that, and I didn't want it to ruin a great trip. So he lead the way back upstream. The more open side was no less marshy. Scott pointed out good pools to fish. Eventually, we both got into some fish, and had a blast. Sight fishing timid little golden trout is a sublime way to fly fish. It may not be the typical idea of trophy fishing. But like the guy, Mark, who gifted us this spot says "Trout live in beautiful places."

We scrambled back up the embankment to the truck. I took off my soaked shoes and socks, took a "Baja shower" with wet wipes, wiping mud and blood off my legs. Then we piled in the Explorer, and headed off to Lone Pine, and some oxygen-rich air.

Golden Trout Wilderness at EveryTrail

Map created by EveryTrail: GPS Trip Sharing with Google Maps

Mono County. Day 3 - 6/14/09

2009-06-23T10:17:00.000-07:00

Sunday morning was slow and heavy. We definitely fit too many beers into too little time. Nobody was in too big a hurry to pack up and get out on the road. Scott came in with coffees and breakfast sandwiches as I sat in the huge easy chair, staring at nothing in particular. After everyone had taken care of their "morning reading" and showered, we packed up, cleaned the condo a little and headed out to the Explorer to organize for the morning's fishing.

Sunday was a beautiful, sunny day. Scott had hung all our wet waders on a fence, and put our boots in the sun to dry. This was partially because they're more comfortable to get into when they're dry, and partially to alleviate the funk that was taking over Drew's vehicle. Duffles, packs, rods, float tubes, and other gear were removed and reorganized for the drive home.

I'm not sure what time we pulled out of the parking space at the condo, but it was around 9 a.m. when we pulled up to a flat dirt lot not far below the dam that feeds from Lake Crowley into the Lower Owens. It was substantially warmer at the Owens than anywhere else we'd been. We slid out of the truck, and looked down at the river. Drew and Scott seemed pretty optimistic about how the water looked. Personally, I was a little confused. I thought the Lower Owens was this classic trout water, but we were in a huge dirt lot, and there were any obvious trail to the water. It was not at all what I had pictured. Still, we began assembling gear, and retying with lighter leaders and flies. The technique was pretty much the same as on the East Walker, but apparently the fish were going to be spookier, because we went down a weight in leaders and tippet, to 5X.

As usual, Drew was in the water far ahead of us. I'm not sure I was too motivated Sunday. It was getting hot, I was already dehydrated, hungry, and hadn't slept well. Regardless, I climbed down the steep dirt bank, hoping to get at least within shouting distance of Drew, since he was usually the man with the plan, but I ended up far downstream. This section of the Lower Owens was odd, I thought. The banks were very steep, the dirt loose, and there were few obvious spots to squeeze through the brush near the bank to get in the water. I was a little underwhelmed, having heard a lot about the Owens. Unfortunately, I ended up in a pretty swift section of the river.

Drew moved even further upstream, and Scott got on the water not too far above me, but quickly moved upriver. I guess my low energy, and honestly, total lack of experience, kept me from making the decision to fish more appropriate water. I stubbornly worked a section that, in hindsight, was all wrong. On top of it, I must have lost two or three complete 2-fly rigs in trees and to underwater snags. Tying those rigs is a bit of a drag, but it gets easier the more you do it. The conditions made it tough to keep retying; deep, swift water, and not many places to sit. My patience was running out quickly, and on top of that, the increasing hoots from upriver was beginning to get to me. It started to seem like every time I let myself look upriver, one or both of those guys had their rod arm in the air, fighting a brown trout.
I sat down in the dirt on the bank to tie another set of flies on, and kept hearing Scott shouting, "Marc, Marc, check it out!" and was thoroughly disgusted with everything. I found myself angry, hungry, and every time I heard a "woo!" upstream I got angrier. But since the trip had been so great up to then, I thought I'd sit there, breathe, tie on new flies, have a Cliff bar I had with me, then work my way upstream and horn in on whatever honey hole Scott had been working.

The Cliff bar made me feel a lot better, and I was relieved I'd been able to turn around my mood. I waded out in to the river, and on my second attempt to flip my flies into a slow, shady spot across the river, got them snagged in an overhanging tree. All this while I could see Scott and Drew with rods bent upstream. At one point I was so frustrated I was slapping my rod on the water. This time, I reeled in my line, waded back across the river, and clumsily scrambled up the bank and to the Explorer. I was hoping there would be shade, but it was about noon now, and there was no real shadow to speak of. I crouched in what little shade I could fit into, and took some deep breaths. I could hear Scott shouting my name from the river, wanting to give up his spot so I could get in on the action.

I decided to retie my flies again, and work my back down, but by the time I'd finished replacing everything, I saw Drew, then Scott, making way up the hill towards me. They'd just killed it on the river, over twenty fish each. They were beside themselves. I felt bad they were coming back because they didn't see me on the river, so I let slip I'd just finished retying. Drew offered to "guide" me down on the river, so I could get a few fish before we left. On the river Drew checked my rig, and put a little tungsten paste on my leader to get some weight on my rig, and showed me a few casts for tight quarters. It was obvious then that I'd been fishing in the wrong water. This spot was slow and deep, and pretty shady. We were fishing not 15 feet from where Scott had been scoring fish after fish, but I still didn't get so much as a tug. We probably made 20 drifts and finally on a missed strike, I flung my flies into a tree behind me. That pretty much did it for me, and I knew Drew had a schedule to keep, so we climbed back up to the car.

As frustrating as it was, I didn't really let it ruin the trip for me. It was hard to be bummed, as pumped as Scott and Drew were. They'd "mowed the lawn", as Scott says, and finished the trip off with style. All that was left was to get out of our gear, and climb in for the long drive home. A delicious sandwich, cookies and big bottle of water from Schat's Bakkerÿ in Bishop made the trip home more comfortable. I think I was already thinking of going back up to the Eastern Sierra before we left Bishop.

Mono County. Day 2 - 6/13/09

2009-06-19T12:24:00.001-07:00

Saturday I woke up a little later than Scott and Drew, but they had gone for coffees. They'd also visited a fly shop or two, and had decided we'd drive to Bridgeport to fish the East Walker river. We drank coffee and they sort of outlined the plan; wading, nymphing, tailwater, brown trout. Sounded great to me. Not to mention no hiking in, or float tubes to deal with.

We drove up to Bridgeport, and stopped in a local fly shop for paraphernalia and information. Interesting, if spendy, little tackle/gun shop, and I grabbed supplies; flies, strike indicators, split shot, and a few leaders. I was astounded at the price of the palm-full of odds and ends I'd purchased. We drove out past the reservoir and actually passed briefly into Nevada and back, looking for a spot Drew liked.

White, fluffy clouds gave way, periodically, to a thick, dark front and some big, substantial rain drops. The temperature wasn't bad at all, until the sun went down.

As we sorted out our gear, we watched a couple anglers catch an occasional trout in the river below us. It couldn't have been later than 9:45 - 10:00 a.m. when I first waded into the river. Drew, like Friday, was already in the water, and had caught fish, and Scott, like Friday, was still gearing up by the time I'd staked out some water to fish.

I've done some nymphing in the past, on the San Juan, in Navajo Dam, New Mexico. I've always found the two-fly rig, with indicator, and split shot to be more trouble than anything. The difference Saturday was the flies were reasonably-sized (the San Juan's flies are barely visible with the naked eye), and Scott and Drew introduced me to a new indicator, called a "Thingamabobber," which was easier to attach, to adjust, and wasn't as wind-resistant as yarn indicators. Also, in my past trips to the San Juan, I always got into trouble trying to cast my flies. Though I was warned/instructed repeatedly to swing or flip my line back up stream, my recent casting lessons kept me wanting to let loose with a cast, which always resulted in a horrible tangle. So, Saturday there would be no casting. Maintaining a drag-free drift, and keeping clean flies was paramount.
The East Walker is a tailwater, a river emanating from a reservoir's dam. Often a tailwater fishery draws water from a large, deep body of water, maintaining a constant-temp, cold-water fishery. The Bridgeport Reservoir is too shallow to maintain a year-round temperature, in fact, it can get so warm trout die-offs have occurred in the past. The San Juan, for example, is in the low 40s whether the air temperature is 20 degrees or 95, at least in the "quality water." Drew mentioned a variety of species that escape the reservoir into the river, and one of the fishing-regulation signs, near where we got in to the river initially, mentioned bow-and-arrow fishing for carp was allowed only during trout season. The terrain is high, high desert, I think the GPS said around 6500 feet. Foliage was pretty dense, but nothing very tall grew far from the water, and it was largely very pale gray/green sage-like plants.

After some coaching from Drew, and some persistence I managed to hook, and land my first river brown trout. Actually, it was my first brown ever. He was small but feisty, and it was my first fish of the trip. The skunk was off. Drew seemed to be hooking up pretty regularly, and I lost sight of Scott for a while, but his morning didn't go as well. I think it was around 12:30 p.m., when another light rain turned quickly into a fairly heavy rain, and when Scott and I saw Drew scrambling up the bank towards the car, we took it as a sign to "cut bait" and we slogged quickly across the river ourselves. Turns out Drew was just getting his jacket, but since we were all out of the river we decided lunch was in order. Of course, by the time we got to the car it had stopped raining.
Scott and Drew mentioned a San Diego transplant in Bridgeport served some good Mexican food, but I call shenanigans on that. It wasn't any different than any "Mexican" food I've ever had in Nor-Cal. It had lettuce and cheddar, harumph!I went with the guac bacon cheese burger. Vacations are for indulging. Being that getting in and out of waders is like preparing for a moon walk, we kept ours on, and ate lunch in them - another vacation-only decision.
Back on the water I pretty much began exactly where I'd left off before the rain drove us to lunch. Drew disappeared pretty quickly upstream, and Scott was just a little downstream from me. The little browns were now coming to hand regularly enough to make it fun. This was quickly becoming my best day of chasing trout on fly gear. Pretty soon, I reached a bend in the river I couldn't wade through, so I climbed up the bank and started walking, meandering through the scrub brush. I stopped to take a picture of an iris on the riverbank, and noticed Scott joined me. Fishing alone is fine for the most part, but when you're hundreds of miles from home, in such a beautiful place, and the fishing is turning on, it's much better to have one of your fishing buddies to share the fun with.
We fished a pretty good stretch of river with regular-enough success. Eventually Drew came walking downstream, and he and I headed back up to what's known as "The Miracle Mile," the supposed home of the bigger fish in the vicinity. Drew scoped out some favorite spots, to find anglers already occupying most of them. We came to a thickly tangled stand of brush, with a "tunnel" leading to the riverbank. We wove our way through, stepping over a downed barbed-wire fence, and carefully keeping our rods out the branches. We found the bank empty, and Drew gave me a little pep talk, and put me on a spot he knew to hold some lunkers. The initial toss to get the flies where they need to be continually got me caught up on some moss-covered rocks and submerged sticks, but they pulled free without breaking off. Finally, after a few adjustments, I hooked into my first fish at the new spot. It was another smallish brown, but a tricky battle in the swift water. I was more than a little surprised to see Scott arrive at the spot we were fishing, given the rabbit hole we came in through, then he mentioned he'd fished there a few times before. I had no idea...

Not long after Scott set up on a drift a few yard downstream of me, I hooked into a decent fish. Not a lunker, but my biggest so far. The water was pretty swift and the fish used it to put up a good fight. Scott was positioning himself to help with the net, and take some pics, when my fish charged up stream. Just as it passed in front of me, another trout, a little bigger than mine, jumped clear of the water next to mine. I would have thought it was mine, as Scott did, except I could still see mine charging upstream. After a little back and forth, in and out of the fast current, I swung him upriver of me, into the slower water by the bank, and let the current carry him into my net. That little trout was photographed more than a drunken starlet accidentally exposing herself.
After that I gave up my spot to Scott, and only fished intermittently the last hour or two. The clouds had rolled in and it was getting cold, and I was just wiped out. I did try swinging a woolly bugger through a calm eddy behind a boulder, and ended up landing another brownie - to everyone's surprise, especially mine. But that was the end for me, I was worked. I think it was after 8:30 by the time we walked all the way back to the Drew's Explorer.

The chatter in the truck on the drive back was of fish landed or missed, and of past success or failure on the East Walker. We drove into Mammoth, ordered the meatiest pizza I've ever seen, and split a pitcher while we waited. Mammoth Brewing makes some very tasty beer, drink if you can find it. We grabbed another 12 beers at Vons and took the pizza and beer back to the condo to celebrate the great day. We probably fit more celebrating into a short time than was wise. Sunday morning was a little rough, and very slow.

Mono County. Day 1 - 6/12/09

2009-06-18T14:14:00.000-07:00

I set my alarm only as a backup, I never really expected to be able to sleep. I did sleep a little, though I don't know for how long. I'd gotten off of work at 11 p.m., and had already packed for the most part. I had to be at Drew's place in La Mesa at 2:45 a.m. to meet him and Scott.

I was a little anxious about the trip, both excited, and nervous. I'd never fished the Eastern Sierra, I'd never met Drew, and I didn't really know what to expect of either. Scott and Drew were veteran Sierra trout fisherman, I was a rank beginner.

Scott and I got to Drew's about the same time, and we quickly got everything stowed in Drew's Explorer. As is seemingly traditional, it looked like there was about three times as much stuff as we ever used, especially in my case. I just didn't know what to expect, so I brought as much as I could. Ironically, I always seemed to bring too little once we hit whatever water we were fishing.

We got on the road, and I tried to get a little sleep in, but the fishing talk, and the little shuteye I got at home kept me awake. Working our way up the 15, 215 and 395 while the sun rose is a great way to start a quick trip of the mind-scrubbing variety, leaving work's messes behind. Stopping for food, gas, and urinating still put us in Bishop at 8:30 am. The flat, grey clouds obscured the time of day, and it felt like 4 in the afternoon. A very odd sensation.

I'd pretty much come home from work, threw the last of my clothes into a big duffle and laid on the couch in my work clothes, which I still had on when we arrived at the trailhead to Secret Lake around 10:30 a.m. My mistake that morning was leaving on the fairly tattered socks I wore to work, instead of changing into liners and wool socks I'd normally wear hiking, or tubing. The hike into Secret Lake was about two and three quarters of a mile, with about 500 feet of altitude gain. Not really a problem in a normal hiking situation. A few things we had against us were; the trailhead was about 7700 feet higher than where we live, and we had to put our float tubes, waders, boots, fins, and food, clothes and water, as well as, our fishing tackle on our backs to make this climb. The hike itself was as gorgeous as one could hope for on maybe 2 hours of sleep, under load, gasping for air, and waiting for our hearts to explode.

When I saw Drew standing in a clearing, with the unmistakable turquoise of the lake behind him I was pretty relieved, thinking the lake had to be much further. Drew mentioned the climb was about 1000 feet, and my GPS was showing we were far from that. It wasn't until we got back to the car we figured it was half that. When I approached the spot where Drew was pulling on his waders, and the full impact of the enormous, snow-patched rock faces framing the opposite end of the lake, with the pines and aspens surrounding the mirror-still water, I quickly forgot about the hike, work, and pretty much everything else. "Gobsmacked" is the only thing that describes the feeling of taking in the incredible sight.

Drew was zipping across the lake by the time I drug my tube to the water and waded in deep enough to collapse into the seat and float. Scott was still suiting up. The still water at the outlet end of the lake where we staged our gear was tap-water clear, and ice-water cold, giving way to a deep, dark aquamarine as one reached the deeper inlet end.

I knew my waders probably had a pin hole of two in them, but there's nothing like tubing in ice-cold water to help you accept it. About the time I reached the halfway point of my kick to the other end of the lake, large, widely-spaced rain drops splashed on the lake's surface, adding to the wild beauty of the surroundings. My mind was still grappling with that just 12 hours prior I was sitting in front of my computer at work.

By the time Scott joined Drew and I at the far end of the lake, thunder crashed not far away, and we all adjusted our positions so we could make for the shore, should lightning appear. Fishing was deep; large streamers on weighted lines. The idea was to make a cast, shake out pretty much your whole fly line, let it sink a while, then strip the fly back as fast as you could. I kind of like that type of fishing, it's similar to fishing the local bays, except the bay water we fish is a little shallower generally.

It grew windy and cold, and there were few sure bites to keep the adrenaline going. I assumed I had a substantial leak in my waders as numb as my toes had become, and soon enough everything; lack of sleep, the drive, the hike, the cold, and the lack of fish, caught up with me. I kicked back across the lake, stripped out of my boots and waders, hoping to dry my socks and warm my feet before we hiked out. I was pretty surprised to find my socks were barely damp. It hadn't been leaks so much as cold that numbed my toes. My nasty work socks didn't help much.

I changed back into hiking clothes, hung my wet gear, and set up my tube as a large inflatable chair and watched Scott and Drew fish, and took in the incredible vista. The hike out was next to nothing, and we made it back to the Condo in Mammoth for burgers and beers. Sleep was instant and heavy.

Lake Barrett 5/2/09

2009-05-04T11:21:00.000-07:00

Saturday Scott and I got a chance to fish the Barrett opener for the second year. The weather reports were all doom and gloom even up until 3 a.m. when I had to get up to be at Scott's house. All my usual Internet weather sites, and widgets, predicted rain and fairly high winds. It was going to be a down to the minute decision whether it was on or not. But not only did it not rain, at all, the wind was only bad for a short time, and eventually it was a pretty nice, hot day.

I'll skip the drama leading up to our arrival at the lake, barely in time to be the last vehicle in the first "train" in. But given the drama before we fished, the rest of the trip seemed all the more relaxed. We, literally, had all day to fish, and we weren't catching a ride on Mick's boat, so there was no rush to suit up and run to the dock. We parked on Pigs Point, with a bunch of other tubers, and kayakers, and began the process that goes along with an all-day tubing trip - waders, boots, rod assembly, inflating and stocking the tubes...

Barrett is known for it's large catch counts, so beside the regular pressure not to get skunked, there's the added pressure of making respectable numbers. Being fly fishermen, we really can't compete with the gear guys on numbers, nor do I care to, but it is possible to catch a much larger amount of fish than on most other local lakes.

I think Scott was the last person from the first train to get on the water, but neither of us were too anxious about the day. We kicked out, picked rods, and stripped off line. We hadn't even discussed a plan really. We just kicked out and started casting around in a pretty unfocused manner.

Eventually I suggested we make a pretty long kick over to a point at which we some success on our last trip. This area is point, cove, point, cove for hundreds of yards with plenty of great structure, like dead trees, boulders, reeds, weeds, and ledges. It's as though it was designed to hold fish. It didn't take long for the first fishes of the morning to come aboard. My second fish was my first ever crappie, he kind of gave up the fight pretty quick, but nice fish. Scott picked up a bass or two, maybe three, right off, and not too long after a big crappie.

My intention was to target bass on this trip, but first priority is getting the skunk off, and getting some fish on board. I was throwing toward a dead branch sticking out of the water, and kept feeling ticks on the retrieve. Since I was fishing a "meat whistle" with a good sized hook, I figured some aggressive bluegill were attacking my big fly. I switched to my bluegill setup and a #10 white woolly bugger. For about 25 - 30 minutes it was nearly a bluegill a cast. Scott came over and joined in. I decided I'd fish to 20 bluegill and spend the rest of the day hunting bass. It didn't take but a few more minutes to reach that goal.

I switched back to my bass rod, and the "crawdad meat whistle" and worked around a couple points, and coves to no result. I'd lost track of Scott. I thought he'd leap-frogged me and was a cove ahead of me, so I hurried around a point to try to catch sight of him. It turned out he'd gone back the way we came. I didn't get close enough to chat again until I met him at the truck for lunch.

I worked a little island with a frankenfly I had in my box. I'd lost the meat whistle I had on, and felt like experimenting. The fly had a cone head, a black bugger body, and a purple silicone curly tail. A real mutt. But I cast it toward the weedy island, and it got hit pretty hard off the end of a tiny point. I immediately kicked away from the structure to keep the fight in open water. The fish flipped out of the water and I could see I was dealing with a decent fish. I lead it back and forth, trying to wear it out, and it put up a dogged fight. I had too much line in my lap to try to wind in and get the fish on the reel, so I just had to give and take line with my hands. Eventually, I was able to lead the bass, an easy 3-pounder, to the side of my tube. It sat there, mouth agape, while I probably did the same thing. Before I could reach my thumb into its mouth, though, it gave a last head shake and threw my fly. It even stayed where it was, mouth open, and if I'd been quicker I might have been able to lip it, but just then it turned and swam out of sight. That would have been a day-maker if I'd been able to photograph it. Of course I worked that island for all I was worth, but only ended up with a couple bluegill for my efforts.

I lost the frankenfly, and Scott, so I tied on another meat whistle, and worked my way back towards where we'd launched. Surprisingly, the bass started to respond to my meat whistle, and I was able to make a steady pick of about 7 bass on the way back to the truck. This was a most satisfying development, as my intention this year is to work on my bass "game."

Lunch was a Trader Joe's sandwich, water, Linton Kwesi Johnson, and straight back into the water. We'd kind of missed our window to catch the 2 p.m. train out, so it was going to be the 4 p.m. train. I worked a cove near where we launched with all the gusto I had left, and nearly accidentally caught 3 more bass. But soon it was obvious I was out of gas. I kept losing flies in the reeds, and it wasn't long before my last meat whistle was gone. I grew tired of retying every few casts, and even though we had a good hour before the 4 p.m. train was to escort us out, I called it a day. At least we'd be able to break down and pack at a leisurely pace. Fish numbers ended relatively respectably - though later Scott told me his cousin and his fishing partner boated something like 186 bass - we were able to go home and collapse satisfied we'd had a good day. My GPS recorded 8 hours, 59 minutes, and 45 seconds of fishing time. From the time I left my house, to my exhausted return was bit over 14 hours.

Breakthrough at Upper Otay 3/29

2009-03-29T12:51:00.000-07:00

Last week I got a wild hair and decided to grab a fly rod and a chest pack and go walk the shore at Upper Otay to see if the fish were willing to cooperate. To keep it short; I hooked two bluegill, lost them both. But, while I was working one spot, 3 of my fishing buddies floated by in their float tubes. They reported solid numbers on bluegills. I decided it was time to break out the float tube for my return.

Once parked at the small, dirt parking area along Otay Lakes Road, I pulled all my gear out the trunk of my little Civic. I pumped up my float tube, struggled into my filthy waders, and loaded tackle into the tube's compartments. The road to Upper Otay's parking lot is still closed, so I clipped the backpack straps on, hoisted my tube onto my back, grabbed my rod and kick fins, and began the long trudge up and over the hill to the lake.

It was a beautiful, Spring day. A little warmer at the lakes than near Downtown San Diego, the mid-70s I'd guess. The sky was blue, and the flowers on the hills were all in bloom, but it was a bit windier than I like. By any account it was a near perfect day.

After paying the iron ranger, I launched, and immediately noticed the wind was going to be more of an issue in the tube. (I geeked out a little today and brought my GPS to track my meanderings around the lake. 1.2 miles in 4 hours, 27 minutes at a heart-pumping .3 miles per hour). I probably should have kicked straight over to the eastern shore so I'd have the wind to my back (in a tube you travel backwards, with the wind at your back you can maintain position by slowly kicking your feet), but there were two or three gear anglers working that side, and the western shore was deserted. I can be impatient, and indecisive, so the deserted shore meant I could tootle around at my every whim. Also, the density of the reeds and proximity of a hillside cuts down a lot on the wind once you get in tight to the shore. On top of that, the afternoon sun casts comforting shadows in which fish like to hide.

I worked my way up the western shore, moving north, with only one half-hearted strike. It was still early, so I wasn't getting the panic yet. About halfway up (I can give you exact coordinates) I got a text message from Scott, saying he was going to park and walk in from the north side to fish from shore. I worked the shoreline pretty intently, dropping a variety of flies as near the reeds as I could. I let the weighted ones sink slowly into the feeding zone, and slowly twitched them back to me. The floating poppers I cast as near the reeds as possible, left to sit, then twitched enticingly. When conditions are right, and that's what bass or bluegill are keying on, it can induce explosive surface strikes; it's like crack to a fisherman.

I rounded a little point, near a place informally referred to as "the drop off," which is where the 3 fellas from last week had reported some success. I could see an occasional flash off Scott's fly rod over the reeds now. I made a cast into the shallow water above the drop off, began a slow, intermittent retrieve, and glanced up to see if I could see what Scott was up to. Fish seem to know when I'm not paying attention. Maybe my laser concentration transfers down to the fly, I don't know, but as soon as I directed attention from the fly line to Scott I got a heavy strike. I set the hook and kicked away from shore a little. Bluegill have a distinctive fight, especially smaller ones, that's kind of wiggly. Meaning they don't make fast, straight runs, or leap out of the water, but they seem to wiggle, and race back and forth. This was a heavy, old, strong gill. I had stripped in my line to the leader and I still couldn't lift this fish to where I could see him. Scott had taken notice of the the fight, possibly because I was shouting "Dude! Dude! Monster gill!"

Upper Otay is known amongst local fly fishers to have a quality class of bluegill. The average size of these gillies is above the norm, there are a lot of them, and they aren't super easy to entice. It makes for a challenging fishery that can be rewarding but frustrating. In fact, all last year I found it frustrating. I was able to get a couple here or there, but I think 4 was my best day, and even that was a lot work.

This bluegill stormed back and forth, refusing to get nearer the surface. I was using a short, 4-weight fly rod I like because it makes the relatively small bluegill more sporting. It also makes horsing in a fish a little more difficult. Scott chuckled as I struggled to land the fish. Finally, after multiple attempts to bring the 'gill to the surface the fish wore out to a point where I could lift him to my hand. This was without a doubt my personal-best bluegill, easily covering my hand. I snapped a few pictures, slid him back into the green lake water to watch him bolt into the murk.

About this time Scott was hooked up to his first bluegill in the shallow water near shore. The afternoon was already a success, and it wasn't long before I had another large bluegill to hand. The Drop off was paying off, as long as I got my flies up near the reeds and kept the retrieve slow. Scott landed a small bass, and not long after, my third, then fourth meaty bluegill came aboard. I moved a little north and picked up a small, 10-inch large mouth bass.

Scott and I split up as he went to look for another spot on the shoreline, and the sun was getting close to the hilltops, so I needed to work back towards the launch area. I picked up a couple more fish while chatting with a bass fisherman. For once the bass guys were impressed with the frequency and size of the fish I was bringing in. It often seems they look with amusement at us fly fishers. I don't blame them.

The sun had set, and the temperature dropped significantly. I decided to skip a good portion of shoreline, and kick across the middle of the lake. I saw Scott wading an area ripe with fish-holding structure, and he was doing pretty well. A cool thing about a serene lake is you can have a conversation with someone hundreds of yards away without even having to yell. As I kicked by, dragging my fly behind me (BTW, all fish were caught on a size 14 black woolly bugger), I got a strike and landed a haggard, skinny, sickly-looking large mouth about 16 inches. This put me at 6 bluegills, 2 bass. My best day on Upper Otay. I don't think any of my previous bluegill on this lake were as big as all but one I caught today.

Not wanting to stop fishing a hot bite (the bladder only holds out for so long) I worked the area around the launch for 2 more bluegill, and a few missed strikes. That was more than enough to make my day, and I was getting pretty chilly. I thought my crusty waders had been leaking all day, but it was just the cold water against my waders. I got and relieved the pressure, loaded up and hiked over the hill to my car. I got some bassin' tips from the other tubers when they all got back to the parking area, shared my pics, and talked with a guy I'd run into a few times on the lake. Finally, a breakthrough on my favorite lake.

Prep

2009-03-19T12:16:00.001-07:00

For some reason during the work week, it takes me a good hour to transition from getting out of bed to coherent wakefulness. But on a Sunday, when that alarm goes off at 5 am, even if I've only slept fitfully, I snap to like a soldier at reveille. I do know that, for me, there is a big difference between motivating myself to go fishing alone, and knowing that in 30 minutes someone will be in my driveway, waiting, or at a launch ramp preparing their boat to take me fishing.

In those cases, I'm highly motivated and organized to get dressed, get out of the house with as much of the correct gear as possible. Most of the previous afternoon is spent with gear bags, rod tubes, my reel case, fly boxes, and appropriate chest packs or tackle bags strewn across my living room. Lunch is prepared (and car keys are put in the refrigerator, in with the lunch, so I don't leave it), the coffee maker is set up, or an open coffee shop is identified.

Depending on the situation; be it wading the surf, tubing, or boat fishing, clothes are put out to be yanked on first thing. Shirts are last so I can get as much 50 SPF sunscreen on my bald head, neck and arms as is appropriate. Not so easy when it's 60 degrees inside my place, dark outside, and the sunscreen is cold and thick. But if it isn't now, it's likely to be never, and that's not a good thing for a bald Scots/German like myself.

Finding something I can chew and swallow at 5 am is not easy. I'm not really a breakfast person, and at what amounts to the middle of the night, it's even harder. An old-fashioned from the coffee shop is usually about all I can stomach until I've been fishing for a while. Coffee is black, and either small enough to finish before the boat launches, or large enough to leave in the car and resume after the fishing is over. It's pretty nasty most of the time, but, I usually still finish it on the drive home.

Lunch usually consists of stuff you can eat by the handful, or something that will fit in a convenient pocket, so I can stuff some in my mouth while I'm waiting for my line to sink to the desired depth. Cliff or Lara bars are great fishing food, trail mixes, and my favorite; a baggie of cubed cheese and hard salami. If it's going to be a kelp-fishing epic, I'll pack a proper sandwich and chips, plus snacks because those trips can go 11 hours from launch to landing. Conversely, a surf fishing trip will be over before I'd normally eat breakfast, so I just grab a burrito on the way home.

Hauling gear can be anything from grabbing a rod and reel combo, a chest pack and bolting out the door, to pre-loading the car with my float tube, fins and pump, stacking gear by the door, and almost filling my car with tubing paraphernalia, wading gear, tackle, clothes, food, and water. It's broken down to ritual now, and if someone's waiting in the driveway it's a one-load rubbermaid overflowing with the day's needs. Either way, reducing prep time is the goal, and I've even considered driving the 20-odd miles to Barrett, in full waders, but haven't gotten to that point yet. Yet.

Once in the car, gear stowed, I can enjoy the pre-fishing conversation, or the long, lone drive to the lake or ramp, coffee and doughnut, perhaps some Wilco, or Tom Waits and anticipate the coming catch.

New Year's Day 2009

2009-02-14T11:58:00.000-08:00

New Year's Day was cold and foggy and it was still dark when we found a spot to park in Pacific Beach. Scott popped the latch on the tailgate of his Explorer, and we slid out to suit up. A nearby breakfast "bar" was loud and busy, I assume with people who had not yet gone to bed. In fact as we grappled with waders, boots and jackets, a couple in evening attire walked by - the girl wearing a paper tiara with glitter on it.

The scene at the beach at 6 a.m. was pretty much the opposite of what I was expecting. I guess starting the new year in the twilight at the beach wasn't so alien an idea. Beside the holdovers from the night's celebrations, there were dog walkers, joggers, and some meanderers. People actually gave us odd looks while we prepared for the first surf fishing trip of the year. In fact, people seemed bemused that we'd expect fish to be so close to shore. Later in the day a possibly demented woman first came straight up to Scott, within a couple feet, to ask if he was fishing. Then she came over to me and did the same, asking "Are the fish here?" I pointed out that it was, in fact, the Pacific Ocean.

Once suited up we crested the sand berm, meant to keep winter surf out of the local homes and businesses, and looked for signs in the shallow surf for holes, troughs or rips. These are the likely features on a beach for providing surf perch with an advantage over the energy-sapping surge of the surf zone. It was still very foggy, and the sun had not yet risen above the horizon. Walkers and joggers were still sparse at this point, but there were a few. Even the occasional girl in street clothes having pre-dawn cell phone conversations - likely rehashing the previous night's fight or fun. Scott had been to this beach just a day or two before and had an idea where some productive spots might be. Of course the surf is a very dynamic environment, and previously productive holes could be filled in, too deep to cast to, or high and dry. But we were able to find some likely-looking water.

Lining up Scott's previous spots to the buildings behind us was made difficult by the heavy fog. Luckily it was pretty obvious where the bottom features were. Casting in the surf requires timing the breaking waves, and giving yourself a nice flat plane to fish, while the perch dart around looking for food. Those flat, foamy spaces between breakers provide the perch with stirred-up sources of food - crustaceans, worms, and even small fish. It sometimes requires timing your back casts so as to not snag a jogger or labrador. But it also affords really letting loose on some nice long casts. There is really no precise target to hit, like trout or bass fishing. There are no trees to avoid to the rear. And the 250 grain shooting lines we use really load up a rod. It's almost an activity unto itself. I find it relaxing and even if I don't catch many fish, and early morning of casting (fishing) isn't too bad a way to start off a Sunday.

Scott probably landed 6 fish before I landed my first, but it was probably only 20 or so minutes after my first cast. I had a small black and brown yak hair clouser tied on, and it really seemed to be doing the trick in the low light. Scott was fishing a fly I tied when I was first learning to tie, it was my interpretation of a popular surf fly, the razzler, only this one was tied in a ridiculous color combination I must have thought would have been good in the bay. It also lacked subtlety and style. I have to wonder if Scott fished it to mock my tying skills. Whatever the reason, he was catching fish, 2 or 3 to my one. It would be maddening if it wasn't the norm. Our most recent trip he caught 13 to my one. I don't let it bother me. He picks me up in the dark, we have a good time and are usually home before 10 a.m., too early to even enjoy a post-fishing beer.

I was having a good day, slow but steady, and eventually beat my previous best day in the surf, in both quantity and quality. At one point a fish took my fly and put a deep bend in my rod. I was shocked by the strength of the fight and assumed I had a yellow fin croaker on. I got the fish close and in its fits flung itself out of the water. It was a perch, the largest perch I'd ever hooked, probably by three times. Then I got nervous. My previous experiences in the surf were not great, and the abundance of "belt-buckle" perch can be depressing. But this was a substantial, furious, muscular perch. It used the surge of outgoing water to pull against my line. Then it used the incoming surf and put some slack in my line, which I furiously stripped in to regain line tension. Frankly, I was too surprised by its power, and excited about the potential glory photos, and within about 10 feet of getting it to hand it came off my hook. It was depressing, and I thought about it for days after. But it also keeps me going back to the beach at 6 a.m. on any Sunday morning it's not too rainy to fish.

We called it a day after a few hours, went back to the truck, extricated ourselves from our gear, and rode home recounting the day, drinking tepid coffee, and probably listening to Tom Waits. I'm hoping the rain holds off until tomorrow afternoon, I'm ready to go again.

Two trips 11/29 & 12/1/08

2008-12-01T21:27:00.000-08:00

My fishing trips have been sadly unproductive lately. A few will remain unreported. I guess they're learning experiences, so it's not all that bad.

I will tell about one failure, last Saturday. I was feeling the jones, and wanted to throw flies at bluegill. Since it gets dark around 4:40 in San Diego these days, I decided to forgo the tube, waders and all that time it takes to get into and out of them, and just walk the shore at Upper Otay and get casts where I could. I think Upper Otay is something like 20 acres at full capacity, which I'd guess is a little higher than right now. There are some places to cast from on the shore, but they are few, and with fly gear, it's tricky.

I guess I got to the lower parking lot around 1 p.m.. Saturday was a really nice day; sunny, a light, white haze in the air that really punctuated that autumn had come. At my house it was kind of chilly, so I put on a fleece shirt, but once I started fishing I realized it was overkill for the weather 16 miles south east of my house. I was sweating head to toe by my first casting spot.

I'm not going to get into every detail. I'm going to leave out the family of geocachers standing behind me, while I was casting from my knees a yard from the water, saying aloud that there's someone fishing right where their GPS was telling them their trinket was. Also, the huge white dog named Gordo trotting towards me while its family implored it to come. Don't worry they said in accented English, he just wanted to smell me. He veered away at the last moment, probably repulsed by the stench of fear.

I was also wearing some extremely bright orange trail runners which I wanted to dirty up a little, so they wouldn't be so embarrassing to wear whilst I walked around the neighborhood. Now the right one is sufficiently filthy, from slipping off a board made from a 1 x 6, into a mud puddle. The left one could still use work.

I did a clockwise walk around the lake. Which means most of the spots I'd never fished from shore didn't happen until about half way through the walk. Just about at that point, I ran into a teenage boy who decided to bum rush my spot while I was changing flies. While all sorts of threats and comments, I'd never say, ran through my head he went back to from where he'd come. I fished the spot a little longer, for nothing, and continued on my way. That's when I saw he had 4 other buddies with them, and together they were occupying most of the good spots on this part of the lake. I trudged on past, nodding and half smiling, even though I knew they were poaching the lake, and continued on to parts of the trail I'd never walked before. Once I got around the part of the trail that ended the "out" portion of the trail, and started the "back" portion, it got steep, much bushier, and mostly off-camber.

I found access to section deep in the "Canyon Arm" of the lake I'd only been near once even in my float tube. By this time I had a damsel fly nymph on - the one I'd been tying on when the kid horned in on my spot. The clearing was decent, but back casting was a pipe dream so it'd be roll casting only. There were submerged branches, tulles, and a weed line. It looked fishy, and though the arm was pretty narrow, the kids couldn't reach it with their spinning rods from the other side. I had to fish from a near squatting position, and to even get my fly in the water to roll cast, I had to bow-and-arrow the fly into the water (Once I even just threw the fly, tippet, leader, and a few feet of fly line into the water with my hand). I nearly slid down the muddy bank into the water a few times. My right foot, the one that went into the puddle earlier, was sliding around in its shoe uncomfortably.

After a couple casts, a few snags, and a sliding a couple feet nearer the water, I got my first bite while fishing Upper Otay from shore. Clearly it was a small bluegill, and it promptly swam into the branches I was initially so happy to see, and came unbuttoned. Though frustrating it was also encouraging. I knew they were there, what they'd take, and where'd they go when they took it. Sadly I lost the fly on a snag shortly after that, and being it was getting closer to sunset, and there were a lot of spots to fish, I headed off.

This is where things went pear-shaped. It was a bit of a haul, up the steep, leafy bank to get back to the trail. By the time I scrambled back up to the trail, I was pretty out of breath, and after a minute or two of hiking along the trail, I rolled my right ankle, the downhill foot. It was pretty painful, but more than that it was scary. I was a long way from either nearby road, and had it been worse, I would have had to yell for those kids to help me. Being already out of breath, a little scared about how bad things nearly turned, and had a moment where I kind of felt like Henry Fonda in On Golden Pond. I stood there for a second or two, catching my breath, and gathering my thoughts. I could catch glimpses of the kids through the trees, and hear they were talking quietly. They'd heard me scrambling up the hill, and being that they were poaching, were probably a little wary of what I was doing across the arm from them.

My ankle was a little sore from the torque, but not so bad it hurt to walk, so I continued on my way, looking for clearish spots from which to cast. I don't have much experience with that type of fishing, and I was having a hard time getting any distance on casts, roll or otherwise. Near constant snagging was getting my blood up, and I tramped past a few good spots, to get nearer the dam before sunset.

I got to a a rock outcropping shortly after grunting my way through a barb-wire fence, and noticed there was surface feeding going on. Actually, near-surface feeding. I estimated I'd be able to get some casts off if I was careful, and I did. I was able to get a small, black woolly bugger a decent distance a few times, but not quite to where the feeding was happening. Finally, maddeningly, I stuck the bugger in a eucalyptus tree. Disgusted, I reeled my line all the way onto my reel and finished the hike over the dam and back to my car. A decent adventure, a frustrating fishing trip, but another learning experience. I'll get better at casting in tight spots, walking with a wet sock on precarious trails, and not getting angry when I put another fly in another tree.

That all brings me to today. That wasn't supposed to be so long, but it goes to illustrate the way my trips have gone lately. Next time, I'll walk the lake counter clockwise, the better spots are on the near, east side of the lake. My ankle has been clicking the past few days.

Today, I put together my saltwater 6 weight, and decided to fish a spot I frequent in Coronado. I saw a couple guys on garybulla.com had done okay there, and I wanted a break from not catching bluegill.

When I got to the beach and was getting my rod out of my car I realized I'd put a 9-weight floating line on my 6-weight rod. Without a fly it's not a huge deal. With a weighted, hairy clouser it can be a bit of a bear. I almost brought my 6-weight large mouth bass combo, because it's a cannon. It can throw big, wind-resistant, deer-hair bass bugs a country mile and accurately. But I didn't want to introduce it to salt water. Which I'm glad for now. The rig I took got some abuse.

The tide lately is pretty heavy, but it turned upside down a month or so ago and is now outgoing for the bulk of the daylight hours. That's not ideal, incoming is better, but the swings have been good, and that usually works in the angler's favor. When I got to the water, the tide was about halfway through the outward tide, and was already about as low as I've ever fished it. I had a good feeling. I saw terns plopping into the bay after bait fish, which is a great sign. If you see birds chasing fish, you want them to be terns. There were small fish jumping out of the water occasionally, presumably escaping from predators. It was "fishy." I initially tied on a light blue and white, yak-hair clouser. It seemed the appropriate fly, given the bait fish action. Unfortunately, it was hard to cast on the mismatched line and rod. Especially given the length of the yak hair fly. I switched to a small, shrimpy-looking fly. It was much easier to cast, though not ideal. I was able to get it where I wanted. The long, straight length of day-glo orange floating line made me optimistic. I kept a sharp eye on that line, thinking if anything so much as brushed it, it wouldn't be very difficult to see that line lurch.

The sky was similar to the other day at Upper Otay, but more white haze. The sun was already getting low, the sage and chaparral cast long shadows down the wide beach. Willets and whimbrels picked at the muddy flat for whatever they eat. Occasionally changing hunting grounds in mixed flocks. Because I'd drastically overdressed on two recent trips to Upper Otay, I toned it down a bit today. A t-shirt over a SPF shirt, and long johns under a pair of synthetic convertible pants. I didn't plan on wading, maybe ankle deep at most, so I just put on wading booties.

Soon enough a marine layer moved in, fast and thick. The sun was a defined, pale white disk, behind the clouds, and the temperature dropped quickly. I'd already been fishing for an hour or so and my previous optimism was waning, though the change in light quality is often a sign of better fishing. I walked down the beach to a point I've had luck fishing on occasion, hoping the varied bottom there might bring about a feeding situation on the big, out-swinging tide. The sky had darkened considerably and the wind was starting to pick up. I switched to a dark fly. A black and brown clouser. I worked it slow along a steep edge for a while, hoping to entice a spotty that might be holding tight to structure. In frustration I made a few longish casts into the deeper, open water, and stripped the fly quickly near the surface. I haven't caught a fish in three trips, and the thought of enduring the cold and wind to be skunked again was getting me down. I hadn't twisted an ankle, or snagged any flies, but the lack of adversity may have made it all the more depressing. Everything seemed to say the fish were ripe, but none were taking. I was not relishing the long slog back to the car in the cold wind, having not caught a fish.

I made another frustrated cast into the open water, and on the first strip the line came tight. Being so high in the water column, I knew it was not the basic, abundant spotty. It suggested, hopefully, a yellow fin croaker, a short fin corvina, or possibly a bonefish. This guy ran hard, and pulled hard, but I turned my rod to my side and turned it into the cove. I let him run a little to wear him out, and ran up the steep bank so I could pull him onto the sand. I saw him in shallow water, and though he looked like a yellow fin croaker, I saw no yellow. I thought maybe, I had a corbina, but no one lets themselves think that in the bay side. Once I got the croaker onto the sand the yellow fins became apparent. I took a few pictures, took the clouser out of it's lip, and put him back into the bay. Of course, as usual, even after two hours of not so much as a bite, one fish can keep you on a cold windy point hoping for that second fish. After I snagged my fly on, of all things, a rod holder some meat soaker left on the beach, I reeled in and walked as briskly as I could back to my car, only stopping to run my reel under some fresh water in a drinking fountain.

Being Monday, I happily dealt with rush-hour traffic, and grilled a burger and had a Full Sail Wassail as celebration when I got home.

Bluegill Drawering 11/18

2008-11-18T20:14:00.000-08:00

This is just a filler post. I haven't really had a reportable trip lately, but I got a burst of creativity after some friends asked if I'd help 'em out and design them a couple of postcards. It got me thinking about trying my hand at some painting or drawing or something else creative. All of which I've done; long ago. But after a few aborted acrylic "test" paintings, an idea came to me, and to help with planning out a painting I thought I'd use my Mac to block out the colors, and get a game plan. Well, that snowballed and I ended up doing a vector illustration, from a photo I snapped of one of the bigger bluegill I caught this summer. It's just fancy tracing really, and building color and detail, layer by layer, until I had something I was happy with. I'm sure I'll futz with it even more, I just thought it was worth posting up as is for now. I'll post up the original snap shot as well.

There it is. Hopefully I'll have actual fish to report on soon.

9/14, UO Bassin'

2008-09-16T13:32:00.000-07:00

Recently, due to some success using poppers, I've kind of geared my warm water fishing towards bass. Not that bluegill fishing lost its allure. I plan on focusing some trips on gillies. It's that once you've seen a bass, even a small one, blast a surface popper it's hard not to want more.

Itinerant Angler (itinerantangler.com) and California Fly Fishing have both recently had information on making poppers, both foam and cork. I'm currently working on some cork poppers. I'm also interested in tying some gurglers, Gartside Gurglers, is the correct name.

When I got a message from my fishing pal, Tom, that he'd be hitting Upper Otay both days over the weekend I thought it was about time to get my surface strike fix.

Saturdays aren't the best days for me, because I work at night, so I spent Saturday tying flies, gathering gear, and working on little cork poppers. I decided to take a bass combo only. I have a bass-specific combo I like, set up with a bass bug line, and a furled leader for tossing big, hairy, wind-resistant flies. It's 6 weight, 9 foot, fast rod. If it throws big bugs well, it throws a weighted streamer on an intermediate line a country mile.

I got to the lot at Upper Otay about a half an hour before the agreed-upon meeting time. It was a very nice morning. The sun was not yet over the foothills to the east, but the overcast sky was orange over the silhouette of the mountains. The recent humidity had broken, and it was a decidedly fall-like morning. I set about preparing tube and other gear to get on the water. Being that I have to jam my deflated tube, and tub full of waders, boot, fins etc. into my Civic, I take longer than your average truck-driving angler.

About the time I was pumping up my tube, another fly angler, named Cameron pulled up, and we chatted until I had one foot in the water. Which was about the same time Tom and Craig pulled up. I greeted them and told them I'd see them on the water.

I had a smallish, white slider tied on. A slider is like a popper tied backwards. The slider has the taper in the front, so when the line is given a pull, the slider makes a shallow dive, then returns to the surface. I like them because they still make commotion on the surface, without the loud pop, a popper sometimes makes during a back-cast. Which I can imagine scares the feces out of the fish. Bass also sometimes feed, as do trout, on insects just below, though not on the surface. At those times, a slider is a good choice. Another reason is that just seeing the fly on the surface is enough to cause interest, and a few twitches can induce a nice strike.

I started fishing the lake clockwise from the launch area, casting as close as I could to reachable structure. The idea was to hug the tulles, let the fly sit for a while, then twitch, let the ripples die, then twitch again. If something was there, and hungry, then it'd hit it. Often a small bluegill would rise to the fly, and nose it, or tug on the silicone legs, but weren't large enough to engulf it. Finally, as I was talking to Tom, while he kicked behind me, there was a splashy hit. Of course, I missed it, but it was encouraging. A few casts later, I was letting the fly sit near some tulles, and saw a nice bluegill rise to it and slurp it under, without so much as a ripple. He put up a good fight, and was pretty good sized, though not one of the green monsters Upper Otay is getting a rep for.

I worked around the lake for quite while, losing or changing flies, without much luck. I finally made it to an area a lot of the bass-gear fishermen frequent. This area is weed-choked, has a lot of stick-ups, deep, deep tulle beds, and a lot of little coves in the tulles that just holler there are fish here. On top of that there were huge schools of small shad, and little baby bass, as well as schools of baby bass up to 3 inches. Occasionally I'd kick up a debris cloud, and the shad would swarm in, eating the tiny particles of algae swirling around. This part of the lake is alive, and occasionally, frustratingly, a bass near the stick-ups would leap clear of the water to take a hovering damsel fly.

I tossed my hard-foam frog popper to the base of some tulles and let it sit while the ripples died out. This fly was kissing the tulles, as the gear fishermen had been recommending to me all summer. I gave it a twitch, without really moving it away from the cover, and let it sit again. I gave it a second twitch, lighter this time, and was a little surprised to see the water explode with a nice, though not big bass. I lifted my rod, and pulled the line tight. On my second strip, my hand slid, and I lost pressure on the fish, but he stayed on, and I recovered some line on him. This was tight, structure-heavy area, plenty of thick weeds, stick-ups and submerged structure. After a tail dance, the bass kamikazeed into some dense weeds. This often happen on this section, and I just had to kick over and reach in after him. He was a between one and a half and two pounds. He was hooked pretty deep, and after getting the popper out of his big mouth, I let him go without taking his picture.

The Charger game must have kept a lot of people at home, because for the first time since I started fishing this lake in the spring, there were only four anglers, and all four were tossing flies. There were two gear bassers, but they left pretty early.

I spent the rest of the day talking and fishing, but not catching. Tom and Craig had a little more "luck" than I, picked up a few more. We all got off the water around 1:30, and had some beers while we dismantled, and talked fishing some more. A pretty great day on the water. I got home in time to fall asleep during the second half of the Charger game, which is fine, I'm trying not to get too involved with football this season.

Jetty Nights 8/23

2008-08-24T11:40:00.000-07:00

I got a call Saturday morning while I was trying to shake off one beer too many from Friday night. A buddy of mine, Scott "Fishtricks" Johnson invited me for a night trip to Zuniga Jetty, at the mouth of San Diego Bay.

Zuniga is a long, semi-submerged jetty built onto the west end of North Island. It holds a lot of fish, and is home to a variety of birds, seals, and sealions. We even had a baby gray whale check us out, then swim right under the boat in about 20 feet of water once while fishing Zuniga. It's also a place we stop and throw some lures early in the morning, while we wait for the sun to come up. It's a dynamic, technical type of fishing; very fun, and usually productive.

I thought about trying some fly fishing, and even tied up some flies, but the thought of dealing with a 350-grain Streamer Express, in the dark, with no eye protection put the kibosh on that idea. I just gave the flies to Scott, and left the fly gear at home.

I met Scott at Shelter Island at 8 p.m. and we launched in the dark. The tuna hunters were all coming in, and the ramp was pretty busy. He idled out of the launch area and made our way slowly out to the jetty. It felt more like 5 a.m. than 8 p.m. as we'd made that trip quite a few times on early mornings.

The plan was to throw Scott's Trix Jetty Worms, close to the rocks to pull some calico bass, and near the the bottom for some barred sand bass. Scott wanted a taco dinner for his family. He'd laid out a selection of lures in the back of the boat for my use, and we bombarded the jetty for a few hours.

As I mentioned above, the jetty is at the end of North Island, which is the US Navy's first air base. Intermittently, some kind of fighter jets (maybe F22 Raptors?) would take off or land, passing the length of the jetty. It was shockingly, disturbingly loud, and sometimes there were two at a time. I can only compare it to seeing Dinosaur Jr. in Tijuana in the 90s, when the crowd slowly backed away from the stage and out of the room. Learned something though; it seems fighter jets have headlights.

The sport fleet was also constantly moving in or out of the bay. Something I will be doing next weekend... wait for the report. It'll be interesting.

We set up on the channel side of the jetty initially, but the wind, current and boat traffic kept pushing us into the rocks, so we went around to the calmer side for a while. Not before I negated any skunk smell by getting a decent sandie.

Picture are hard to take when you can't see anything in the view finder, and the fancy flashes that flash once, causing you to make a weird face, before the actual picture is taken don't help, so here's a series of odd pictures...

The fishing wasn't too bad, and at some points, pretty good. The fish were a mix of calico bass, barred sand bass, rock fish (brown, I think), and sculpin. Being dark it was hard to tell what you had until you bounced it into the boat. Often the fight is a dead giveaway, as sculpin just flare their gills and fins and you just drag them in.

We listened to Mexican AM stations most of the night, one was an oldies type thing, that was quite cool. It's always interesting fishing with Scott, he listens to anything, and keeps the boat entertained. He's also a wealth of fishing info, and I picked up some tips on upping my Large Mouth Bass game.

Got home at 2 a.m. and could barely get through a whole beer before I fell asleep in my chair.

Tidelands tubin' 8/7

2008-08-07T17:32:00.000-07:00

I woke up real early this morning, so I thought I'd try tubing Tidelands for the 1st time. Tidelands Park is on the Coronado side of the Coronado Bridge. When you say you're tubing Tidelands, it means the boat moorings near the park. Strangely, if you type "Tidelands Park, Coronado, California" into Google Earth, you can see clearly what I'm talking about. The boat moorings provide structure, shade, and for the fisherman, cut down on boat traffic.

Until today, I had only tubed a couple of lakes, where you have only the wind to contend with, as a consideration for route planning. In the bay, you have the wind and the tide. The tidal swing is the key, in my opinion, to bay fishing. In a tube it both helps and hurts. It helps catch fish and cover area. But unless you're tubing point to point, it can make resetting a drift or getting back to your launch spot a real chore. My knees were feeling it as I was kicking back to the beach today.

I stepped in the water at 7:15 a.m., a little before the tide was to turn to incoming - moving into the bay. I kicked around, trying to decide where to set up, and how to plan for the tidal flow. I figured I'd just fish around, then once the tide was coming up for an hour or so, I'd go back to the "uphill" side of the boat moorings and ride the tide to the bridge pilings. I'd caught my personal-best spottie off of piling number 4 a few years back, on the last cast of a skiff rental period. So I never pass up the chance to make a few casts at the base of the pilings.

This morning, however, the wind also came up a little earlier than expected, and was blowing with the tide. This makes for a fast downwind drift, and a long upwind kick to reset. I made a short drift and picked up a few fish. But after a few fish and a snag and retie, I was well out of position, and kicked toward the pilings to make a few casts, and then reset the drift. I noticed the pilings had warnings about getting within 75 feet painted on them since I last fished around there.

After a few casts, I made the long kick "uptide" to set up a long drift. Kicking against the wind and tide can be very slow going, and unfortunately, it's not good fishing time either. When fishing the bay, you want to retrieve from the direction which the tide is coming. Partly because that's the direction from which food will be coming, and partly because you want the fly on the bottom where the spotted bass are. When you kick into the tide it's like letting your line flutter in the wind. The tide, and your movement combine to hang your fly in the water column. I didn't get so much as a bite on this long hard kick back uptide.

Once I got all the way to the eastern edge of the moorings, I swung a 180, cast into the oncoming tide, and started the drift back toward piling number 8. The wind had picked up, not too much, but so had the tide (in a 6-hour tide, the middle two hours have the fastest flow). I picked up a couple spotties, then snagged my fly, and lost it, so I tied on a Tim Borski Haystack, a tarpon fly I'd tied at home. Immediately I hooked a hard-fighting spottie of a respectable size. He really put up an outsized tussle. I've been fishing large mouth bass and bluegill so much this summer, I forgot the fight a little spotted bass will put up.

In the meantime, I'm moving pretty swiftly towards the bridge, and as fast as the drift started, I was in a spot where I had to decide to fight the current again or try something different. I thought, I'd work from piling 8 up to 4, making casts at the bases, and then decide from there.

I picked up a couple fish, one good one, at least it looked good at the time, the pics don't really translate too well, and decided around 11:30 to pack it in and find something to eat. I didn't pick up anything between the pilings and the launch spot, but was relieved just to be back on land, and not fighting the wind and tide anymore.

End count was 9 spotted bay bass, all but two on a saltwater version of a woolly bugger, the two largest both came on a Borski haystack. Good time on the water.

Tubing Barrett solo 8/3

2008-08-04T11:59:00.000-07:00

In the spirit of honesty, this isn't the only fishing trip I've had since the 4th of July, so here's a quick update. Last Saturday, July 26, while preparing to fishing on Sunday, I got a wild hair, grabbed my bay bass fishing casting combo and headed to Silver Strand. Being a nice day, my usual spot was packed with people, so I chose a spot further south. To shorten the story, I picked up 3 spotted bay bass on 3-inch swimbaits. Not a bad evening.

This is just a photo of an "iceplant" I saw while fishing. You don't see it too often. That stuff on the side of the freeways is actually called sea fig.

Then I went home and finished preparing to meet my fishing buddies, Tom and Craig, for a trip out to the La Jolla kelp beds, on July 27. I could go on all day about how cool kelp bed fishing is - and I'm sure I have in one of these entries - but this post is about Barrett, so I'll just say it was a good day on the water, but I only got 2 fish - a "Johnny Bass" and a Calico Bass (the type in my avatar). I still enjoyed myself, and learned a lot. I'd never fished out there with fly gear and it was a learning experience. Tom and Craig, both had much better numbers than I did.

OK, on to the topic of the day.

Yesterday, Aug 3, I took my buddy, James, up on an offer of a tube spot out at Lake Barrett. I wrote all about Barrett in two long posts in May. I declined the invite initially, because I couldn't get a pal to go with me, and because other plans came up. When the other plans fell through I decided to go for it. Solo.

I've been working on my freshwater fishing this summer. Specifically, "warm water" fishing, which is a reference to bass and pan fish lake fishing. I've made plenty of effort, put in time on the water, read, sought out advice, all of the stuff I could think of to up my warm-water game. But the bass part still hasn't come together. Bluegill I think I've figured out, more or less, and a good-sized bluegill on a 4 wt. fly rod can be a lot of fun. A lot of them can be even more fun.

After a fitful sleep, the alarm went off at 3:35 a.m. and I immediately started coffee. I'd done most of the preparation and car loading the night before, so I just have to eat a little, dress, get my lunch and rods, and not forget coffee. I did forget coffee, but not too late to run back upstairs. Even with all the prep, I left a little late and had to make the 35-mile, mostly country, drive, in the dark, as fast as was safe.

I got to the line, relieved not have missed the first caravan into the lake, and waited for the long dusty drive in. I'd decided to try something different, and park at "Pig Point." Pig Point is a spot a ways further into the lake than the general parking area, and a better position from which to start a float tube excursion; offering access to a wider variety of conditions.

I was in the water before the sun came over the hills, and already missed a couple of strikes in the first few casts. Most likely bluegill judging from the quick, ticking strikes. I guess I was a little preoccupied with my plan of attack because I sort of glossed over the area, intent on getting into some big Barrett bass.

The famous top-water morning bite never materialized. Unfortunately, my bassin' skills for locating bass are limited to seeing them crash the surface, or at the least boil the surface. So, without a top-water bite, I was left blindly running streamers, and working jig flies on the bottom. Both methods proved fruitless. Aside from 2 bluegill on green micro poppers, it wasn't until 11:30 a.m. that I was able to add to my 5-hour fish count of 2. I did get two violent strikes on a deer-hair frog popper, but it's a tough fly to throw, and at that time the wind picked up pretty hard. This was around 10 a.m. and it made putting the big, wind-resistant fly very hard to place accurately.

Micro poppers have proven to be pretty useful on the gills, and even small bass. Barrett's bluegill spend the morning pretty shallow, working the weeds and tules for whatever it is they feed on, and sometimes the feeding is pretty enthusiastic. So if you can get a surface fly to where the 'gills are feeding you can do pretty well.

Once the wind picked up it was like being on San Diego Bay. It was shockingly choppy, and I figured, since the way back to the car was into the wind, I'd better work back that way if I wanted to be in position to take the 2 o'clock train out. I switched my bluegill combo to a sink-tip line to negate the effect of the waves on the fly, and that proved to be a pivotal decision. I found some tules with space between them and the rocky shore (picture blow). This is the kind of thing I look for while fishing gills. Once I started getting the fly deep, I started picking up gills. Now 5 hours of tough, hot, windy, unproductive fishing melted from my mind as I concentrated on casting a size-14, black woolly bugger as tight to weeds, tules, and rocks as I could. After letting the fly sink a little, some slow, short strips usually drew a strike. Sometimes the fish hit within the protection of the structure, sometimes surprisingly far into open water. The first 5 casts into this protected pool produced 4 fish. These being fishes 3-7, I was relieved to have a number bigger than 2 to report. So far, in my experience, Barrett bluegill run on the smaller size on average, though I have seen a couple of pictures of absolute slabs. I've never caught one as big as those Upper Otay produces pretty regularly. I lost the bugger in the tules, and switched to a weightless damsel fly nymph. Since the protected area was pretty shallow, and I already had a sink-tip line, it was easier to keep from getting snagged. I ended up pulling a couple more gills off that section, and once, when the line sunk deeper than usual, picked up a small bass.

The bass taken "deep" lead to a brief rod switch, and I tossed purple bouface on a sinking line to see if any of the bass's buddies were holding deep. After a dozen or so casts produced nothing, I switched back to the bluegill setup and continued on my way. If the bass weren't going to happen, a large number of bluegill was going to be the way to salvage the day.

This must be what sparrows did before there were tract homes to build on.

I worked the steep, rocky shore line pretty hard for nothing, and I was getting hot and tired, so I decided to go fish nearer the car for a while. I saw another vast stand of tules and was just starting to attack it when James pulled up with his brother-in-law, Bill. They looked hot and worn out, as I'm sure I did. The conversation took place in the resigned tone of defeat. The way fishermen talk when the key to numbers just wouldn't present itself. We'd all decided the 2 o'clock train was the ticket out and they left to try another spot before it was time to pack it it.

I was left looking at a cove, protected from the wind, by Pig Point, and about 40 yards of continuous tules. This is in fact the same cove where I got my first two missed strikes first thing in the morning, 8 hours ago. I was immensely pleased when I hit a bluegill straight off, and set myself to rack up as many as possible while still leaving time to catch the 2 o'clock out. Much like the first tule honey hole, the strikes came both up tight, and in the open. It was a huge relief to have some fun, steady action for the last half hour. I ended with 21 bluegill, but just the one bass.

While not what I'd hoped for - I'd intended on doing some serious bass fishing - the day was salvaged by a steady bluegill bite in the afternoon. Barrett is a beautiful place to fish, and with all the huge birds wheeling overhead it gives the impression of being a lot further than 35 miles from downtown San Diego. The constant vultures, hawks, and ospreys, along with huge great blue herons, and big egrets really give Barrett a unique atmosphere. I even saw a little skunk cruising the shoreline early in the morning. Tough day, but well worth it.

Fourth of July Bassin'

2008-07-06T11:47:00.000-07:00

I know this is turning into a one-note tune, but I'm trying to figure out a couple species that are new to me.

I arranged to meet up with my fishing buddy, Tom, at Upper Otay for a little Independence Day fly fishing. Seemed an appropriate way to celebrate being American.

I got to the lot and parked next to Tom's car, around 6:45. It was already sunny at the lake, and I made a quick scan of the lake to see if fish were boiling on the surface, but didn't see anything. Tom and I talked about this later and thought maybe the boils were related to the overcast morning of Wednesday. I also talked to Peter Piconi at So Cal Fly Fishing Outfitters, who suggested those boiling fish on Wednesday were likely feeding on subsurface insects, and not bait fish like I thought. Perhaps a hatch related to the conditions of Wednesday morning?

I got on the water, spotted Tom, and worked a hare's ear nymph sporadically while I slowly kicked over to where Tom was fishing. He'd already landed a Bluegill on a white gurgler and was working around the reeds and stick-ups. I continued dropping my nymph at the base of stick-ups, water plants etc.

We worked up the west side through the fly-eating snags and into a corner. Tom picked up a gill and a bass on his gurgler, but I was still fishless. There were splashes of small bass in tight to the tullies, and in isolated pockets in the weeds. I saw one in a protected pool, tight against the tullies, and surrounded by a good ten feet of weeds. I tied on a micro popper and cast it into the pool. I gave it some twitches and pops, but for the first few casts, nothing. Finally I landed it in the pool again, popped it once, and a little bass made a splashy grab. I held my rod as high as I could and stripped fast, hoping to drag the bass over the weeds. I was too far from the weeds though, and it buried itself a few feet from clear water. I kicked over and dug him out with my hand. Not a huge bass, not even a decent one, but my first on a popper, and caught in a very bass-like fashion. Pretty fun stuff. To top it off I did it in front of a group of bass-gear fishermen.

We worked some more of these set-back pockets for a while, but nothing came of it. Tom picked up fish here and there. He's pretty consistent. I saw a guy kicking out of the Canyon Arm and asked Tom if he wanted to work back there for a while.

We kicked across, and started working the cover on either side of the narrowing arm. There's a narrow section that's just silly with structure; dead trees, tullies, water plants, shade, rocks, you name it. Tom and worked around in there. We noticed some bluegill dimpling the surface, so I tied on a Royal Wolf dry. I tossed it back there a ways and on about the third cast, it was slurped by a Bluegill. But the fight was short and my line broke. Must have been nicked from the frequent snags. But I learned another usable pattern for gills. Tom picked one up on a bugger, kind of deep.

While we worked there were splashes of a bass busting the surface, likely after some insect. Tom worked his way pretty far in there, but it was nightmare of snags and tangles. I cast a popper back there a couple of times, for naught.

Being the 4th of July, we both had obligations, so we started back working towards the lot. I decided to try some leechy patterns deep, and switched to my intermediate clear tip line. Unfortunately, on the second cast it snagged deep, and broke off at the leader when I tried freeing it. When I pulled out some tippet to tie on about 8 inches came off the spool. I unzipped the storage pockets and rifled around, hoping another spool would pop up. I knew there wasn't one. I told Tom what happened, and that I was just going to kick back to the lot. He was nice enough to give me some tippet to let me fish my way back to the car.

On the way back, Tom started working a section of dead trees. It's spot that can hold a lot of fish, but the weeds have filled in the real productive section. Suddenly he has a fish on, and it looks to be a strong one. I kicked over near him while he landed it, and it turned out to be fat, nicely-marked Bluegill.

That was about all the gas I had in me, and figured I'd better get home if I wanted to have time to stow everything, and eat before my ride for the afternoon's barbecue showed up. A pretty good day, despite only landing one fish. The lessons learned, and good company made up for my lack of numbers.

Upper Otay Bluegills 7/2

2008-07-02T18:38:00.000-07:00

Though I'd give the UO bass another try this morning. Got to the lot around 6:45 and was surprised to see about 8 other vehicles.

I got in the water and kicked to the eastern shore, mainly because the bulk of tubers were fishing the west side. There were boils everywhere from tight to cover to out in the middle of the lake. Fished a crease fly first, just casting around, then up tight to the structure, and twitching and popping it out. Nothing. I tried buggers, a minnow I got at Peter's shop, even a frog for a while, but even with boils all around, I wasn't able to entice any bass.

Eventually, I worked back into that arm in the northeast, where there were a lot of bluegill boiling. I switched flies to a bead-head hare's ear and got off the skunk in about 3 casts. A nice little gillie hit the nymph on the drop.

I kicked slowly out of the arm (I've heard guys call it Canyon Arm), casting to structure on either side, bit no more gillies up there.

I worked all the way down the west shore, but didn't get anymore hits until I was entering the little cove in the southwest corner. A gillie took another hare's ear pretty near the bottom (I'd lost a collection of flies working my way down the west side).

I kicked into the little cove and tied on a small bluegill popper - one of the gear guys told me the bass lit up a frog in there in the morning. I tossed it into a "pothole" in the weeds and it got hit. But not enough to stick, so twitched it and it got hit again. But no. So I tied on an even smaller popper, and tossed it in there. Same thing; hit, no stick. So I looked in my fly box and found a dry fly, a humpy I think. I tossed it in there and stuck, 2 1/2 inches of bluegill fury.

I called work to see if I could take the day off, but got denied, so I decided I'd better work my way back to the lot.

On the way out of the cove, I tossed to structure with another hare's ear, and got a hit on the drop. This one put up a tussle, and when I got him to the tube he was pretty decent. Likely one of the biggest I've caught there.

I tossed half-heartedly on the way to lot, but time was running short. Ever noticed all the bass fry by the launch area at the main lot? Tons of 'em.

Upper Otay Sunset Bass 6/28

2008-06-29T16:04:00.000-07:00

Ahhhh, another frustrating outing at Upper Otay. I tried a completely different tack yesterday, but one way or another, I end up with the same result.

The plan of attack Saturday was to fish the post-sunset top-water bass bite. Up to yesterday, I've been geared and hunting for bluegill. But I've put together a combo I intend to use specifically for Large Mouth Bass. A 6 wt Winston Vapor, paired with a Ross Rhythm 3. I've added a Rio Lake clear intermediate line, and an SA Bass Bug floating line to cover my lake warm-water needs. In addition, I've bought, tied, or been given a good variety of bass flies.

I parked my car on Otay Lakes Road and got my gear ready to make the hike up the road to Upper Otay Lake. The rangers lock the gate around sunset, so if you want to stick around and fish the post-sunset bite, you have to park outside the gate.

It's not a long walk, it's just uphill, and making the hike with a float tube over your shoulder, fins, and a rod, in waders in the heat of the day solidifies the resolve to stick it out as long as possible. The view overlooking the lake when you crest the hill takes almost the entire lake, less the "canyon arm." From there it's down to the lot and launch points, the iron ranger, and into the water.

Since I brought two lines, and the top-water action wasn't supposed to get under way until the sun set, I started going kind of deep. I figured fish would be holding a little deeper in the hot sunny afternoon, and a quick check with a passing tuber, who had a fish finder, confirmed fish were around 8 to 12 feet. Not that this helped, I didn't get any action plumbing the depths.

I talked to another tuber, one who I'd seen pretty regularly, about his lure choices, and the evening bite. He suggested something shad shaped and floating. I went with a crease fly, which is a surface popping fly, made of foam, and resembling a bait fish.

I switched lines, tied on a crease fly, and began tossing it close to cover and twitching, and popping it, hoping for a surface strike. It actually didn't take too long before a swirl engulfed my fly and I pulled the line tight. The little bass jumped a couple of times, and even did a quick tail dance. I had it at my tube when it wriggled off the hook before I could claim my first top-water Large Mouth Bass.

The sun had only just gone behind the nearby hill, and I figured this was a good sign. I was watching the other tuber out of the corner of my eye, and he seemed to be picking up fish here and there on various bass lures. I was watching how tight to cover he was casting (real tight), and trying to emulate his technique. But while he kept picking up fish, I didn't.

The lake got glass-smooth after sunset, and there were ripple rings all over, from what I initially though were bait fish, but later considered might be an insect hatch, because I'd seen one there before, and suddenly there were bugs everywhere.

Strangely, and we talked again later as we got out of the water, instead of there being more bass hitting food on the surface after sunset, the top-water action never really materialized. The gear fisher explained it was an odd evening, on an odd year. Great, I thought, my timing had been as poor as could be.

Around 9 p.m. it was just too dark, buggy and discouraging to stay on the water any longer and I kicked in, put on my headlamp, and humped it up and over the hill back to my car.

I'm not giving up on Upper Otay's bass and Bluegill however. I'm not going to stop hiking in with my bass combo, nor am I going to stop hunting Bluegill on flies. I'm going to have a great day at Upper Otay. It's too beautiful a place, with too good a reputation to leave it alone, and miss out when the action is "normal" there again.

Crown Cove 6/14

2008-06-16T10:30:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, after watching a couple soccer matches, I decided to head over to one of my favorite fishing spots for some outdoors time. I got a new digicam the other day, an 8 MP Olympus Stylus, which I brought to try out. Which is good, because the one fish I caught, wiggled off the hook before I could fish my camera out of its case. So I snapped some other shots.

On the path from where I park, near Navy housing, to Crown Cove, at the State Beach I usually, depending on time of day, I see cotton-tails and jack rabbits, mourning doves, hawks, and ospreys.

I saw this bush, the name of which escapes me (fire bush maybe?), and I gave the super macro a try.

I got to a spot on the inner part of Crown Cove, and started to cast around. Despite the fact that the tide was incoming, and it was only slightly windy, the bites weren't coming. In fact, sometimes when you get to a spot and start fishing you can just tell you're not going to catch fish. Something about the conditions just doesn't seem fishy. Yesterday I didn't see any bait fish in the shallows, none busting the surface, no croakers cruising the shore line. It just didn't seem to be happening.

I usually fish a point on the outside of the cove first. It has the benefit of being closer to the main bay, having a good 10 foot drop right off shore, and some good eel grass beds. I was just getting ready to reel in and head out there when a woman dressed in black, in her early 50s, comes strolling past me with her sandals clasped in her hand behind her back, and a sweater around her waist. She looked just like the retirees in the financial brochures we print at work; serene and comfortable and enjoying a long walk on the beach.

Unfortunately, she was heading to the point I wanted to fish. I'm too self conscious to not think how unsavory, or at the least creepy it'd look if, as soon as this woman passed me, I reeled in and followed her out to the distant, isolated point. Especially to the young, cute lifeguard I was fishing near for the last hour. I already imagine the lifeguards think I'm retarded for fishing there. Usually they see hot dog chuckers from the RV city across the street. I did reel in a silicone dive mask at one point.

So I sat down in the sand, changed trailers on my lure, applied some chapstick, and tried to get a pic of an osprey literally hovering over the cove. He was one camera-shy raptor though, as soon as I'd pull my new cam out, he'd fly off. He must have come and gone three times, I felt ridiculous.

I watched the woman in black to see what she was going to do. Poor thing was looking for shells I think. I'm almost positive the sand here is trucked in. The bay just doesn't create the conditions to produce sand. Any shells in this sand are pulverized or picked over. Eventually she worked her way back around, and I stood up and cast around, waiting for her to pass. Once she was five feet past me, I reeled in, secured my lure to the hook holder on my rod, and made the walk around the cove to the point.

It was much, much windier out there. The wind was from the west, and the long flat cove, exaggerated the wind waves. I still wasn't seeing bait fish, boils or anything else but the occasional mullet leap out of the water. I cast around, working the edge of the drop off as best I could, but given the height of the tide, getting a parallel retrieve was difficult. Eventually, I felt a subtle take, swung on it, and reeled in a small, darkly barred, sand bass. He struggled hard enough to get off the hook, while I tried to get my camera out. No matter, he was pretty small.

I'd had enough. I went over to the showers and sprayed the sand off my legs, sat down and had a Cliff bar, exchanged a few text messages about the progress of the Padres game and watched a cute young mom play paddle ball with her kids.

On the way back I had my digicam at the ready and got a few shots off...

Coronado Shore Outing 6/7

2008-06-08T11:34:00.000-07:00

I got up Saturday morning with two goals in mind, avoiding an HOA meeting and catching a few fish. This was a two-birds-one-stone opportunity if ever there was one.

The tide was a good, long incoming, and that bodes well for bay fishing. I was in no hurry to get up at the crack up dawn because the tide didn't swing to incoming until 8:30 am. I just had to get out of the house before the meeting started.

I grabbed Spottie Slaya, my shore-fishing day pack and took off for the Silver Strand State Beach. I was a little dismayed, as I drove over the Coronado Bridge, to see small white caps on the bay, and the palm trees in Coronado waving in the wind.

I got to my usual parking spot, between Navy housing and Crown Cove, to see the American flag at the Navy housing whipping in the wind. I though about packing it in, but I didn't feel like going to another spot, didn't want to go back and walk past the HOA meeting, and the Curado reel I was using today was casting well. I had a half-ounce lead head tied on, so I thought I'd give it a go.

I walked along the nature trail to the cove, looking for jack rabbits or hunting hawks. I only saw cotton tails and mourning doves.

The tide was still negative, revealing much of the shallow mud flats the ring the cove. Even the little spit by the point, and the shoal in the middle of the cove were covered with foraging shore birds. For me this is good, because there is a definite shelf at two spots in the cove, and one of them drops nearly 10 feet. When the tide is so low the shelf is just feet off the water line, making it much easier to fish. The high water line was clearly a good 5 feet higher, and would be again by the afternoon.

The wind has coming hard from the south, into my face. I would imagine it was a little better than 8 knots. The surface of Crown Cove was a miniature version of a rough sea; constant wave action and little white caps. I actually had to tuck my SPF shirt into the from of my shorts because it kept blowing up, exposing my six pack (from Friday night). In fact it was pretty uncomfortable to be in this wind.

If I kept my casts a low side arm, and didn't cast too far across the direction of the wind, I could get some good casts off, without backlash, or the line being picked up by the wind.

As usual, regardless of how far out I cast, or how much water I covered, the two fish I caught were holding close to the shelf. Real close. The first, a small Spotted Sand (Bay) Bass, took my lure as I fished it parallel to the shelf, just a couple feet from shore. I quickly shook the fish off the hook, and watched him tear back to the safety of the shelf.

The second fish came just a few minutes later, in a manner nearly identical to the first, parallel to the shelf, a few feet off the shore. But this was clearly a larger fish, and it put a healthy bend in my 7.5' bass rod. Spotties have a well-deserved reputation as hard fighters. They may not get big, but they put up a tussle. This was a relatively large yellow-chinned female. I should have taken her picture, but I'd taken off my day pack to change lures earlier, and my camera was in the pack.

The wind finally took it's toll, and was really beginning to wear on me. I decided to try a spot I've had luck at before, closer to the trail back to the car. When I walked up there were Jr. Lifeguard tryouts going on in a spot I like, but that had wound down a little. I decided it to take advantage of its more-sheltered position to make a few more casts. Aside from a couple missed hits, it wasn't productive, and a fresh group of young hopefuls has arrived. I called it a day at that point, knowing the HOA meeting would also be winding down by the time I got home.

Plus, Euro '08 was kicking off this morning, and Portugal vs. Turkey was getting ready to kick off. The World's Game is another addiction.

Upper Otay Lake 6/1

2008-06-01T23:34:00.000-07:00

So as to not waste anyone's time, I caught no fish on this trip. Read on if you want, I just want to write this down. It's part of the routine.

Scott and I arranged, via text messages, to meet at Upper Otay at 3:30 p.m. giving us time to watch the Padres play the Giants - or at least time for the outcome to become clear, and enough time to get plenty of fishing in before the lake closed.

I was trying to figure out where all the anglers who owned the other cars in the lot were fishing, when I saw a coyote about 50 yards from some shore anglers. While Scott and I geared up - float tubing is gear intensive - Adrian Gonzalez hit a 2-run home run to make the score 3-1 Padres. We turned off the radio and got in the water after Trevor Hoffman blew only his 3rd save of the season. We were in the water when the game ended, my phone rang once and I kept getting messages from Giants fans. They wouldn't call to congratulate me on a Padres sweep of the Giants, so I guessed the Giants won.

If you've read any previous entries on Upper Otay you know I've had a difficult time there. That's probably what keeps me interested. I've done a lot of research, bought flies, tied flies, tried different techniques, asked peoples' advice. Bluegill are something I'd never targeted before this year. Today, after about an hour, I thought I'd try something I'd read about in couple sources, but hadn't yet tried. After losing another white woolly bugger, I pulled one of my trout-fly boxes, and tied on a tiny bead-head nymph, called a hare's ear.

It wasn't three casts up tight to some dead branches sticking up out of the water, before I felt a very light resistance, and raised my rod to briefly find a small bluegill wiggling on my line. Sometimes when you hook a very small fish, it doesn't offer enough resistance to set the hook into its jaw. The little bluegill wiggled off the hook. This often happens while fishing surf perch. But, it was progress. A fly I'd never tried before, but that I'd heard worked for bluegill had yielded nearly immediate results.

A few casts later, after a very light strip of my fly line, I noticed the line tug lightly away from me, so again, I held the line and raised the rod tip sharply. This time I was sure the hook bit, but almost as soon as the fight started, the fish wrapped around an underwater branch. I could tell, from the fight, this was a bigger bluegill than the first. Using something I learned fishing for spotted bay bass off the rocks of Sand Diego Bay, I gave the fish some slack, hoping it'd get itself unwrapped. the fish did take off, line peeling behind it, but failed to unwrap from the submerged branch. Sometimes, flies get stuck in these branches and we can reach into the water and yank the fly out. I reached my arm into the water as deep as I could, probably mid-bicep, but couldn't reach the branch. Finally, I gave one last tug, thinking it'd either snap the branch and free the fish, or it'd snap my tippet, and also free the fish. Unfortunately, it broke my tippet. Two hooked, two lost.

I decided to stay in the area, because I knew there were fish there, and that my flies were working, but Scott was working further around the lake. On three more occasions in the next half an hour I saw a gentle movement of my line or felt the light tug of another bluegill, but again, they wrapped around submerged branches and either got off the hook or broke my tippet.

I cut off my tippet and tied on a new tippet from a different spool, and tied on a small bluegill surface popper. I'd been hearing and seeing fish break the surface. Of course, as soon as I started working the popper, I stopped seeing and hearing fish break surface.

I tied on a small, black woolly bugger, but got no bites for the rest of the evening. The ranger came by around 7:20 to sound the closing alarm to end our evening.

Though I landed no fish, the discovery of a productive fly for bluegill gives me hope for a more productive future at UO. No new bird species today, and there seemed to be fewer birds overall. The weeds are really starting to fill in from the edges out...

Upper Otay Lake 5/14

2008-05-14T13:47:00.000-07:00

This is going to be a quickie, I have to get dressed to go to work, and well, there's just not much to say.

I got to UO a little before 7 a.m., after stopping for a couple breakfast sandwiches in order to break a twenty for the iron ranger. I got in the water and kicked over to a spot I'd heard was good, and in a few casts had a decent bass on the line.

After that I continued to work the area, eventually kicking over to the cove where I had the most "action" last Saturday. But after working the little cove and up to another larger one, and back, I hadn't even another bite. I kicked back towards the parking lot, stopping to try a few places, as well as the spot I got the bass, but no. The sun had come out full-force, and the wind was coming up a little. I spent almost as much time watching the coots and moorhens feed their youngsters as fishing, and kicked to the parking lot around 11 a.m.

I was was home, making potatoes and eggs for lunch, by noon.

Upper Otay Lake 5/10

2008-05-10T17:51:00.000-07:00

I got a late start this morning. Not that I had any intention of rising early, I just hadn't decided to go fishing until I was up for a little while. It's only common sense that getting on the water at 10 a.m. isn't really ideal. In fact, as much trouble as I've had catching fish at Upper Otay in recent weeks, I figured this might end up a boating trip, more than a fishing trip. To drive home my hunch, a few of the bass guys on the lake were heading in already.

But I came for a relaxing day of bobbing around a beautiful lake, so I wasn't over-confident, nor was I discouraged. I also had a new fly line I wanted to try out. I got an Orvis sink-tip line for my 4 weight rod. Which helps me get flies down a little more and a little faster than the floating line I've been using. I brought the floating line as well, as I got the new line on a spare spool.

The reason I brought both is the west side of the lake's topography is shallow, while the east side is is steep. In case this isn't obvious, or you've just never had a reason to think about it, a lake, pond, bay or whatever generally follows the grade of the terrain surrounding it. In the most extreme examples on a lake, a beach or a cliff, if you look at a beach the dirt will continue into the water at the angle it has on the shore. It is unlikely there will be an abrupt change because of the water. Same for a cliff, if a lake has a cliff on one of its borders, the cliff generally continues down into the water. Of course, exceptions exist.

The western edge of Upper Otay is also heavily covered in foliage; trees, tullies, bushes. Even dead, submerged branches, that love catching flies. So much so it's hard even to see the water from shore in most places. The steep east shore is less heavily covered by tullies, but has more overhanging, and partially submerged trees.

Which brings me to structure. This little lake has a ridiculous amount of potential fish-holding cover. Common fishing wisdom says fish hold in cover. Smaller fish hide in cover, big fish ambush from cover (or structure). This lake is a catch-and-release, artificial-lure only lake. The lake is only open from sunrise to sunset, three days a week. This place ought to be frigging lousy with fish. Lousy!

So, why then in four trips have I only managed to scratch 3 measly fish? I don't have an answer. Talking to bass fisherman at the lake though gives me at least a little comfort, as they seem to be having a tough time enticing fish as well. Hopefully as spring continues, and the water continues to warm and clear up, the fishing will get better. It's a great place. The bird life is amazing. There are box turtles. I just bought a float tube, I like it so much.

That said, I did manage to catch a nice bluegill today. In a small, calm cove, where my buddy, Scott, caught one on our first trip this year. In almost the same corner of the cove. To be honest, I was a little surprised as I didn't land said fish until around 2 p.m., and like I said, I got on the water around 10. It's hard not to at least check this cove. It's snugged up against the west side of the lake, with heavy tullie coverage, and some trees, all of which help block the afternoon wind from the west. There were also two bird species I hadn't seen before at the lake; a couple Least Bitterns, and a few mating pairs of Ruddy Ducks. The American Coots were all over as usual, diving for plants and making a racket.

Not two minutes after I landed the bluegill, I hooked a small bass, but after a nice little jump, not 4 feet from me, it threw my barbless hook.

Two fish in two minutes lead me to believe the fishing was about to turn in my favor, but after another hour, and a few hundred yards of shoreline, I hadn't gotten another strike. So I headed in. I hadn't eaten anything but a chocolate old-fashioned, a cup of coffee, and a Cliff Bar, so I was craving the bagel and banana I had in the car.

Barrett Lake 5/7 Part 2

2008-05-09T10:42:00.000-07:00

After Mick and Joe left, and Scott and I got our acts together - it's not easy for fat guys in waders to reach the buckles and straps on kick fins while standing on a rocky shoreline - we hopped in the water and assessed our options. There was shore structure galore, and the sounds of fish busting bait close up to shore, as well as the occasional welling at the surface. The banks varied between boulders, weed beds, tullies, dead trees, and live tress growing a foot or two from shore - plenty of fish-holding cover.

Like I said, I was a little nervous that our fly rods-only policy might blow up in our faces, and it was going to be a long hard day of scraping a few fish here and there. But not long after we got in the water Scott hooked up, and announced it on the walkie. Now I knew flies worked, but would my flies work? It didn't take much longer for a wave of relief to come over as I felt the first subtle take. A large mouth bass. I got the fish to the tube and Scott was getting his camera ready, but the fly came out of the fish before I got him out of the water. Strangely though, the bass stayed right there, at the surface, with its mouth hanging open, so I reached down and lipped him. It was like he was saying "Come on, Buddy, work with me here, I can't photograph myself". I'll add more pics when I get them from Scott. He was a small bass, but it was the first of many.

From then on we worked whatever structure we found, often for numerous fish off the same spot - even bass and bluegill from the same spot. We cast as near into coverage as we could, taking away some lessons learned fishing saltwater bass with conventional bass gear. Often though the fish would strike well away from shore, making me wish my sink-tip line arrived on Tuesday, instead of tomorrow. In fact, later in the day, letting the flies sink, then a slow retrieve is what drew the bites.

Once it got going, and I'd move a little ahead of Scott in numbers, just a little, I had to get out of my tube to relieve my bladder. The bite was heatin' up, and the sound of fish breaking the surface was constant. I was kicking towards the spot where we were let off the boat, and as I was reeling in my line a bluegill took my fly. I laughed, showed Scott, and got out to leak. Then as I was getting back in my tube, and kicking out I let out some line, and not 5 feet from shore, another bluegill took my fly. Scott was beside himself. But after that it was fish-on, pretty steadily for the rest of the day.

Barrett Lake is very secluded, and the area we fished in the morning was beautiful, and wild, and after the 3 guys who were there when we got there left, we didn't see anyone else until Mick and Joe came to pick us up for lunch. I was a little surprised by how few water birds were around. Even relatively tiny Upper Otay Lake is inundated with ducks, coots, herons, and terns. But there weren't any noticeable water birds at Barrett. We saw a mating pair of mallard ducks in the afternoon, and a blue heron flying overhead late in the morning. But all day long turkey vultures wheeled high above, and swooped low through the contures of the hillsides. Sometimes they'd repeatedly swoop low into a cove where we were fishing, so that you could hear the wind rustle their wing feathers. They are very impressive in their size and grace. Occasionally we'd see a hawk up high, or perched on a branch. I kept hearing the unmistakable call of a loon in the distance. I'd never actually seen or heard a loon, except on TV, but the call is distinct. When Mick was hauling our asses back to the docks for lunch we saw the loon floating near us on the lake, but it dove when it saw us. We even heard the obvious rapid-fire knocking of a woodpecker a few times. Wildflowers were in bloom everywhere, and my botany courses in college still keep me interested in spring blooms. Once the clouds dispersed, it was a truly beautiful day to be fishing. I wish my camera was able to capture some of the birds and landscape a little better. On the other hand, I could try to take more time to stop fishing and take more pictures.

I used my newish Beulah 4 wt. most of the day. In fact I never caught any fish on my 6 wt. The 4 wt. made the bluegill more fun, and the bass real fun. Not to mention the Beulah is only 8 ft long, so it's a little easier to land fish from a tube. My two larger bass pulled so hard, I thought they'd break off, so I got them on the reel to let them wear themselves out on the reel's drag. Both times I hooked one of the larger fish I kicked away from shore to keep them from wrapping in branches and let them run around in the deeper water to tire a little. I lost a few bass throughout the day when they leapt out of the water and threw the barbless hooks.

Scott and I decided to launch our tubes near the dock after lunch so we could kick in when we felt like it and leave if we got worn out. We'd already been in the water for around seven hours, and the last "train" out was still 7 hours off. We made a loose plan of attack which was quickly scuttled when a father and son in a boat anticipated our path and cut off our route before we could kick over there. Bass fishing is weird and competitive that way, but I couldn't really blame the guy, 60 bucks to go fishing with the kid isn't cheap, and if they were fishing near the dock, they couldn't have been doing well. That lake is huge. It wasn't even until I got home and looked up the lake on Google Earth, that I realized that what I hadn't seen of the lake was more than twice as large as what I did see. Anyway, we kicked straight parallel to the dam from the docks and started fishing the steep wall to the left of the dam. By then the wind was blowing pretty hard, and in a float tube it's best to have the wind at your back so you can keep position by slowly kicking your fins. So the shoreline we were fishing worked out great.

Again the fear set in. The fear that somehow we wouldn't be able to catch any more fish. And for a while, for me, it was warranted. As usual, Scott got the first fish of the post-lunch session, making the fear more substantial. Fortunately it only took a few minutes to get my first afternoon fish. But while Scott settled into a ridiculously prolific hole where pulled bluegill out by the dozen, a hole I'd failed to pull anything out of, it took me quite a while to find even my second fish. Off to my right I kept an eye on Scott as he camped on that spot and just harvested fish after fish, and I was desperately trying to find my second. Eventually, I pulled another bluegill out of some grass. Then a small bass. But it wasn't until I calmed down a little, slowed my retrieve, and let the fly sink a little deeper did I settle in to a more steady bite. One cast I put right at the edge of a grass bed, which was one the edge of a drop-off, I let sink for a bit longer than usual. When I finally regained contact with the fly there was already something heavy pulling on the other end. I immediately pulled the line taught, and started kicking for deep water. This was clearly a large bass, that was obvious before the fish surfaced the first time. I hurriedly reeled in the line that was laying in my striping apron, and floating in the water, and got the fish on the reel. Which is a little scary because it means I wasn't necessarily keeping as much pressure on the fish as I should have been. But once the loose line was wound onto the reel, I let the fish wear itself out a little. Scott was too far away to yell at in the wind. So once the fish got tired and I hoisted him onto the apron, I snapped some pics and put him back in the water, swished him back and forth a little to oxygenate him a little and he quickly shot away. It was truly a day-making fish. And it was but 45 more minutes before we decided to kick in, so we wouldn't have to rush to catch the 6 o'clock train out.

All in all, well worth the loss of sleep and the next-day soreness for some fun and steady fishing, hanging out with Scott, enjoying a beautiful place, and not going to work.

Barrett Lake 5/7 Part 1

2008-05-08T11:47:00.000-07:00

Yesterday, May 7, I got to fish a city lake called Lake Barrett, that's only open 3 days a week for four months. The ticketing system is like a rock concert, where you get on Ticketbastards and if you have good timing and a little luck, you can get tickets. If you don't get tickets in the first few minutes, you're not getting tickets.

Luckily, and randomly, for me, my buddy Scott's cousin Mick is the all-time Lake Barrett ticket-getting champ. Apparently he even researched the process. Tickets come in four. When you finally get through the ticket process you get 4 tickets at a whack, including a rental boat. The rental boat is a little small for 4 adult male fisherman, so typically the ticket winner offers 2 people "tube spots." Meaning float tube spots. But kayaks, pontoon kick boats, walking, whatever, is acceptable. Mick offered Scott his two tube spots, and Scott offered me one. Luckily he did this two days after I'd just been on my first float tube fishing trip, and was still stoked from the experience. So I said hells yeah.

Since I got the invite from Scott, and we'd been on two more float tube trips since the, I'd seriously been bitten by the float tubing bug. It's a great way to explore a small lake or pond. So thanks to President Dumbass's Economic Stimulus Plan, I purchased a tube (Outcast Fish Cat 4) of my own, in time for a shake down trip to Upper Otay, and to gear it up for the trip to Barrett.

I set my alarm for 3:30 .am., as I was supposed to be at Scott's at 4:14 a.m.. That's officially the earliest I've ever risen to go fishing. I actually beat my alarm by 20 minutes as well. After loading all my gear, I got into the car and noticed it was bit later than I though, and cursed myself, because I've been late the last two times Scott and I fished. I pride myself on never being late. Tardiness is a pet peeve. Chronic tardiness is grounds for termination. I hadn't taken into account there would be very few cars on the road at 3:50 on a Wednesday morning, and made with 5 minutes to spare.

The whole rigmarole surrounding the Barret experience is interesting. Not only is there the whole ticketing thing, but the lake, like every other lake in San Diego County is artificial, a reservoir. This happens to be a very secluded reservoir, and the access road apparently transects numerous private properties. As a result, fishermen all wait at the gate for three specific escort times, and are then escorted to the lake, with the gate closed and locked behind until the next "train" is allowed in. Then all the vehicles create a huge dust cloud that covers every vehicle in the train. It's funny if you didn't drive. Then when everyone parks, there's a certain amount of people who just charge, balls out, to the doc to get their boat, so's they can get to their choice spot before any other yayhoo gets there. Bass fishing is very serious and competitive. Others, like Mick, know tons of spots, are organized, bring trolling motors and batteries, and food and drinks, and all sorts of stuff.

Scott and I had our fly rods, our float tubes, tackle and food, and after gearing up, hoofed down to the docks, so as to not keep Mick and Joe waiting. Mick was cool enough to offer us a lift to a good spot, away from the hubbub around the dock. The little boat with 4 grown men, and two fully-inflated float tubes (standing straight up) could barely muster the speed to create a wake. But we got to the spot, and we offloaded onto a bare spot on the bank, and Mick and Joe were on their way...

Bluegill on flies 4/20

2008-04-22T13:01:00.000-07:00

As I type, my forearms look like hairy prime rib. Saturday was cool and cloudy and not at all a nice day. I expected Sunday to be a similarly gray day. It was, however, a beautiful and sunny day. Had I known that I would have, at the least, put sunscreen on my arms, and probably worn long sleeves.

Sunday morning I went on my first float-tube fishing trip. The target was the large bluegill and large mouth bass that inhabit Upper Otay Lake. Scott Donaghe and I have been waiting for the water to warm up a little and for the discoloration to settle since our attempt in February (see the entry from 2/16). For the last couple of weeks we've been getting reports of some good numbers on bluegill, with the occasional large mouth thrown in.

Scott offered me his old float tube and fins, and we agreed to meet at his house around 8 a.m. I stopped at Starbucks for a coffee and an old fashioned, my typical pre-fishing breakfast. When I got to Scott's all the stuff was out by his truck, and after loading up, getting Scott a breakfast burrito, and suiting up, we were on the water by 8:30.

Upper Otay Lake is a pretty secluded and small lake in eastern Chula Vista. There are very few houses visible and those that are are expensive, and at least attractive. There are probably 6 or fewer visible homes. There are a good amount of eucalyptus trees around, and some sage brush. The lake itself is largely surrounded by tullies. All of these things make it pretty difficult to fish from shore, but makes Upper Otay a spectacular place to fish from a tube. The relative seclusion of the lake draws a large variety of bird life, terns, great blue herons, what was either a green heron or night heron, red-winged blackbirds, scaups and mallards, as well as the normal ravens, hawks, and the occasional osprey. Just the sounds of the different birds can be hypnotic, and really make for an excellent outdoors experience.

There were probably 6 or so other tubers visible around the lake, some were fly fishermen, and some were using regular bass gear. There were also a few shore fisherman when we first got there. It was already sunny enough that I wasn't wearing the light pullover I'd planned on, leaving my arms bare. We worked clockwise from the parking lot, and worked the tullies and other structure.

Scott picked up a nice bluegill in a little inlet, he said the fish hit is fly on the drop, he pulled taught when his lined jumped...

We eventually ran into a few friends; Tom, Larry, and Craig, and Kim was around somewhere, but I never saw her. We all hung around and fished and chatted, before Scott and I resumed working around the lake. It was couple of hours or hard work before I finally landed my first largemouth bass on a fly rod. Certainly not huge, but welcome regardless...

Not much of a fight, but I was using my newish 8 foot 4 weight trout rod, and at least that added some sport.

We worked our way up to the opposite end of the lake from where we launched, which I guess would be the north end. The bird and wildlife activity up there was amazing. Two very large box turtles were sunning on logs while ravens and red wing blackbirds fought loud aerial battles over territorial claims. Occasionally a well-camouflaged Blue Heron would dart its head into the water for its lunch.

Working our way back towards the launch site I saw a shaded section guarded by two branches that protruded into the water. I figured if there weren't fish there, then I'd give up fishing. I made a few casts, careful not to let my woolly bugger sink to far, as there was quite a tangle in there. On my third or fourth cast, I was counting the fly down, and on my first quick, short strip I felt the tug we fisherman live for. I started kicking backwards while I stripped the fish in to keep it out of the tangle. I was using 6x tippet and any contact with the branches would likely have got that fish off. I was hoping for a bluegill, as that would have been my second new fly fishing species for the day. Finally the fish came to color, and I could see it was a nice bluegill. I got it onto the apron of the tube and snapped a few pics. It turned out to be around eleven inches. Not bad for my first fly gillie.

We were pretty well past the time Scott told the Mrs. we'd be off the water so we picked up our progress a little. I would have stayed all day, I was loving it. Scott picked up another gillie near where I'd got mine.

After that it was pretty much a straight kick back to the parking lot, and the process of packing up. For a paltry 4 fish between us, it was an excellent day on the water. That evening, with Pacifico in hand, I began searching eBay and Craig's List for deals on tubes.

Random Entry

2008-04-12T00:00:00.000-07:00

Last week I was showing a friend around town, and as we were driving through downtown we saw a guy walking down the sidewalk with a ball and chain around his ankle. He had an actual steel, heavy, ball and chain, around his ankle. It wasn't black like in cartoons, and movies, it was mostly silver.

He didn't look amused by it. I imagine it was some kind of bachelor party prank that had gotten old. He actually had a perturbed, slightly desperate, and maybe slightly resigned look on his face.

The people he walked past on the street didn't pay much attention. I noticed he had a handkerchief or something under the metal band locked around his ankle. It was probably pretty painful.

2008 Spring Training Trip - Part 3

2008-04-07T10:46:00.000-07:00

I better wrap up the story of our trip to Tucson, before it's just another hazy memory. I left off at St Patrick's Day. That night I stayed in the hotel, while Bart and Wes went to the area around U of A for some St. Patty's fun. Part of the reason I didn't go was that last year we kind of got an early start to the first day of baseball, and late end, and I was next to worthless the second day of baseball. I didn't want a repeat of that performance, so I took the great day we had already had and called good.

Tuesday morning we needed to get breakfast and coffee before our second game a Tucson Electric Park, and decided to check out the Mexican food place our pizza waitress recommended. We had no idea what to expect, other than it was highly recommended by a cool waitress, and it was going to be "real folks'' food, not a tourist spot. Wes was getting pretty good at finding his way around Tucson, and we were at Birriería Gualajara in about 15 minutes.

Being San Diegans, Mexican food is part of life. Ever since I had my first carne asada burrito at Roberto's on Broadway in Chula Vista I was in love. San Diego's Mexican food is heavily influenced by Baja California, and largely by the cities along the border with California. Tucson's Mexican food is not. I wanted to see how different the food influenced by other Mexican states was.

Birriería Gualajara was similar to a lot of the taco shops in San Diego but also pretty different. The universal paint scheme of the taco shop was intact: red, white and yellow. Birriería Gualajara was also more run-down than the typical taco shop in San Diego, and that's saying something. It was almost like being in a Tijuana taco shop in its shabbiness. But just going down the menu, it was obvious there was a difference in the items offered. I guess a birriería is something that, though no longer unique to, is at least indigenous to Gualajara.

Why am I on the third paragraph about the taco shop we went to for breakfast one day? I don't know. Well, it was delicious for one: in the down-to-earth, hearty and satisfying way good Mexican tends to be. It was the kind of place you leave happier than when you got there, and you probably want to bring an extra taco with you to relive the experience later. I guess I could have just said that...

After breakfast we got coffee near the campus, looked through a consignment art store for souvenirs, then headed back to the hotel for sunscreen, ball caps, and tickets for the game. The weather Tuesday was considerably better than Monday, being sunny and staying around 70 degrees. We didn't get to the ballpark as early as the previous day, but I did need to scour the souvenir shop for a knick knack to take back to one of the salesmen at work who's a White Sox fan. I didn't find anything. It's the thought that counts. Right?

We found the same sassy beer lady serving the same delicious Nimbus Ale we drank Monday and got our first round of baseball beers then found our seats. They wouldn't serve a person more than one beer, of this type and size, at a time so we all three had to get up and go get beer together. This was called the beer train. It was kind of dumb, but there wasn't too much in the way of decent beer at this little park. Nowhere near the exotic array of fine brews offered up at Petco Park.

The Padres beat up on the Sox 5-0 with pretty much the same lineup as Monday, maybe a few new faces and Tony Clark as DH. The game went too fast, leaving us sitting there on a beautiful day just bit over 2 hours after the game started. A young woman had to ask to leave after we sat enjoying the sun, and watching the players sign hats and bats ands balls for kids. Spring Training ball is a great warm-up for baseball season. I'm not even sure you can get into Petco for the $15 we payed for seat 10 rows behind the dugouts in Tucson.

Here're some pics from the baseball park... Wes in front of Tucson Electric Park...

The Border Patrol Color Guard, with bagpiper...

Seven Dollars buys a lot more nachos in Tucson than Petco...

After begrudgingly leaving our seats, we decided to get some grub somewhere, and heard Lindy's made a good burger, so we headed back towards U of A for grub. Lindy's...

But, Lindy's was closed on Sunday. In fact a lot of places were closed on Sunday in Tucson. I don't know if it was just because it was Spring Break or what, but how does a burger joint at a university close on Sunday? Anyway, we found a promising Brooklyn Pizza place. When we walked in there, I think even Wes had 20 years on every other customer in the place. I don't often feel like an oldster, but in that place, at that time, I felt really old. Not only did Brooklyn Pizza have beer, but they made a serious pizza. Eventually more baseball fans trickled in, and we were no longer even close to the oldest people there.

After pizza we checked out a few bars, galleries, and pubs in the area. The first has a terrible sports bar, claiming to be a pub, and to boot it was out of most of the good beer from St. Patty's festivities the previous night. I can't remember its name, but that's as good as that shit hole deserves.

Wes was recommended a place called the Shanty, by a local, San Diego bartender. From the name I expected a shabby, rustic place, but the Shanty was neither. The Shanty was dark and cool, and had the best pool tables I've ever seen in a bar. The Shanty was old-school cool, and unfortunately for me, played a Rat Pack soundtrack most of the time we were there. We played a few rounds of pool, stole every pack of box matches we could get our hands on.

On the way back to the car, which was quite a ways by now, we ran into an interesting character. A local gent who almost immediately launched into a meandering endless story of his life, and misadventures, as a cowboy, drunk, lady's man, valet... did I mention drunk? He claimed to be Irish, Mexican, and Navajo and I'm sure he'd still be talking had we not excused ourselves after about 20 minutes.

At one point during the rambling story, a woman came out of the art studio we were standing in front of, and asked for a favor. I assumed she was going to ask us to take it elsewhere, but she asked if any of us had any matches. At any other time in the last 5 years had someone asked the three of us for a book of matches we would have to have said "no." But this woman caught us at the best possible moment, because between the three of we must have had 20 boxes of matches in our pockets. Bart chuckled at the coincidence until his face was red. Our new friend, the raconteur, barely even paused in his monologue to notice.

Birriería Gualajara had a sign up in the morning advertising hot dogs. In Tijuana they sell small bacon-wrapped hot dogs with hot salsa, so we assumed that's what these were. We wanted something more before we headed back to the hotel, so we stopped by. Unfortunately they were out of hot dogs, so we all got tacos. Delicious tacos. They came in threes so we ordered different ones and swapped. Damn. They make a good taco at Birriería Gualajara. I know it seems like Birriería Gualajara was the highlight of the trip, but I think it's just because sitting here, three weeks later, it's what I remember best. Or maybe it was the highlight, at least the meal highlight.

Bart woke up at 6 am sharp on Wednesday, which means we pretty much all got up at 6 am sharp on Wednesday, but that's not too bad a thing, as it gave us plenty of time for a good breakfast and coffee. We tried out a place called the Epic Cafe. It was the kind of bohemian coffee shop that's familiar if you've spent time in San Francisco, Seattle or Portland, or anywhere really; shabby inside, covered with band fliers, and lefty news weeklies. There were small tables in front and threadbare couches and easy chairs in back. The food was real good, and the coffees were big.

Wes pretty much hauled ass straight home. We got back to San Diego an hour and half quicker than the trip to Tucson. Which was good because I had to get home and prepare to make my sister and her friend Kirsten some dinner. Another good trip to Arizona for Spring Training.

Shore Halibut 3/30

2008-03-31T09:10:00.001-07:00

I needed to get out of the house, and hadn't been doing much fishing, so I thought I'd run down to my favorite downtown fishing spot. I gathered up my shore-fishing backpack, my favorite bay-bass combo, and found a hat.

Quick hat related side-bar: I have a lot of hats, mostly Padres hats, but they're old and pretty dirty. They've been worn on countless fishing trips, and have been on the bottom of boats, encrusted in salt, and just generally mistreated. The type of hat I like, the New Era 3930 batting practice cap, has been kind of ugly the last couple of years. I only have old ones. So, I grabbed two grimy hats out of the closet, and chose one to wear. The other I took into the bathroom, put it in the sink and filled the sink with water. When I got back from fishing, the water in the sink looked like tea. Nasty. That was the cleaner of the two hats too, I wore the other one.

When I got to my spot the parking lot was full, so I circled a couple times until someone left. The plan was to work around the perimeter of this park. One side is a calm, wind-sheltered marina, and the other is the bay. The bay side is more exposed to wind and boat-traffic turbulence. I've been doused a couple of times by rogue boat wakes. I even took a nasty fall a couple of years ago because the dry, grippy rock I was fishing from became wet and slimy when a rogue wake doused me while I was landing the fish. Got a nice gash in my shin. I wasn't ready to quit fishing, so I stopped the bleeding with a dirty bandanna and went on fishing while blood trickled down my shin into my sock.

I started fishing the marina side because I'd had more luck there, an it's not as affected by the elements. In fact I had a big heavy fish break off a couple trips back. I started tossing my lure as close to the boats across the channel as I could. The bottom slopes towards the boats, and the slope and the shade of the boat provides something for the fish to hang near.

This spot is in the middle of a tourist destination and oddly, people are often surprised to find someone fishing there. Yesterday I overheard a little girl and her father talking. The girl asked her father if he thought I should be fishing there. He father replied that he was pretty sure it was ok. Then the girl explained that she was worried I'd fall in if I hooked a big fish. Pretty funny. I turned around and looked at the father and he just smiled and shrugged a little. That sort of stuff is not unusual when fishing downtown.

I kept getting nibbles and short, sharp hits, but not sticking anything. It was a little discouraging but also showed that fish, some fish, were biting. I thought they might have just been defending territory. Eventually though, I felt the dull pull of a spotted bass. He put up a surprisingly good fight once he got going. Considering how small he was, it was a great fight. He was quickly released.

Often, especially during spawning season, when you hook a spottie, there will be a couple followers. Normally other spotties. When I caught this first little spottie, I was standing a little higher in the rocks than normal, and had polarized sunglasses on, so I could see the bottom pretty clearly. This spottie had a follower that wasn't another spottie, I'm not exactly sure what it was, but it was bigger, sleeker, and faster. It looked like a croaker or mullet; long and silvery.

I worked my way down the rocks towards where the bay flows into the marina. I decided I'd give the outside a go, because the tide was starting to flow, and that's usually a good trigger to feeding. Unfortunately, it was very windy on the exposed bay side. Even more unfortunately, the wind was coming from the same direction as the tide. If I was in a boat, that wouldn't have been too bad a thing. But it's hard to cast a light lure upwind with a baitcaster. I threw low sidearm casts to keep the line from bowing out in the wind, but I wasn't getting much distance. I did have my picture taken 3 times though; another thing that happens a lot downtown. Japanese seem take a particular interest. I eventually tired of the short casts and line management issues, and returned to the shelter of the marina.

Once I got back into the marina, I started getting more hits. It wasn't too long before I got a dull, heavy pull, followed by the rhythmic pull, pull, pull that makes a shore fisher's day, the unique fight of a halibut. Luckily I'd set my drag to something other than complete lockdown. Spotties don't often pull drag, and you have to keep them from burying their heads in the rocks - which, since you're standing on them can be difficult - so no drag. Since I snapped of that big fish a month ago, I use drag on the marina side now. This hali pulled drag quite a few times, before I let him dart back and forth for a while, so I could reposition myself on a rock closer to the water. Luckily there was a spot to "beach" the toothy bastard as well. Just as I was getting the halibut to the rocks I tweaked my back a little. So, hoisting the fish for a pic went right out. Luckily I positioned him, and he stayed.

That is my best shore fish in quite a while. Since the corvina I picked up in Mission Bay last year.

I picked up a nice spottie after that, but really, it was anticlimactic after the halibut. So, nursing my back, I packed it in and headed home, thinking about the lamb pitas I was making for dinner.

2008 Spring Training Trip - Part 2

2008-03-23T11:50:00.000-07:00

I was still pretty haggard when we got to our hotel; Quality Inn, I think. The hotel had apparently redone the facade of their building, because it had a pleasant faux-adobe look and some nice landscaping, but once you got past the office this was obviously a run-down hotel. But, it was cheap.

Wes and Bart were pretty anxious to check out Tucson, and I was a little anxious to nap. So they went out and had a couple beers and shot some pool, I napped. I asked them not to eat without me, so they came and got me so we could track down a Mexican food place someone recommended to Bart.

The part of Tucson where the hotel and ball park were was kind of an industrial area, and pretty nondescript. I should also mention that I spent the entire trip in the back seat of the Explorer while Wes drove most of the time. So, most of the time I just got out when he parked and didn't learn much about getting around Tucson. What I'm trying to say is we couldn't find the Mexican place we were looking for. We spotted a pizza place and gave that a try, which is good because not only did they make a mean thin-crust pesto but we got a recommendation on a taco shop from our waitress. The waitress even drew a map for us.

Monday was St. Patty's Day and we headed up to U of A campus for some breakfast. We cruised 4th Ave looking for a likely spot, and settled on a place called the B-Line. They make a great breakfast burrito and serve good coffee. I'd recommend it for the atmosphere alone, but the food was good too.

Part of our mission in visiting Tucson was trying as much local grub as we could. Aside from Grimaldi's, the chain pizza place from Sunday night, we tried to hit only unique, local eateries; and to not repeat spots. I figured Tucson would have a different style of Mexican food than San Diego, which is influenced by Baja California's food. The first taste was the chorizo in my burrito at B-Line. Not the red, juicy chorizo I'm used to in SD, but a dry, lighter-spiced mixture. Definitely delicious though

Since it was St. Patty's Day, we decided to have a Guinness at a pub called the Auld Dubliner. It was 10 a.m. after all. Our waitress, though cute, looked like she was about 16. Don't they have laws about that sort of thing? Since it was getting near game time, and the Auld Dubliner was serving Guinness in a plastic cup (blasphemy!) we went back to the hotel to sunscreen up and grab hats etc.

Sunscreen wasn't really necessary, as it was in the 40s and threatening to rain all day, but it's habit. We picked up the tickets at Will Call, and went into Tucson Electric Park about 40 minutes early, to check things out. Those Spring Training parks are pretty small in relation to Major League park, so 40 minutes is about 25 minutes longer than necessary to check the park. I lined up at the first bratwurst stand I saw and covered it in sauteed peppers and onions, and threw some jalepeños on there for good measure. After that we got some beers and found our seats.

The Padres and Dodgers went to China to play a couple exhibition games, and only a half squad was left in Arizona to continue the Spring Training game schedule. That meant some of the stars and starting pitchers wouldn't be in Arizona during our games. It wasn't all walk-ons and bench-warmers thought, as Khalil Greene, Josh Bard, Tony Clark, Tadahito Iguchi and Brian Giles all started the St. Patty's Day game.

Beside the typical beers and ballpark grub, it was a fairly uneventful game. A few dingers, hit batters, some nice double plays turned by the Padres, but they still went down 8 - 4 to the Arizona Diamondbacks. We had these three guys behind us who didn't not stop blathering the entire game. It was ridiculous, they must have been on speed or something. Not really, but it was just obnoxious. However, they did help us find a brewery called Nimbus.

After the game, we decided to check out the brewery and hopefully get some food and a beer. I'd found the Nimbus online whilst looking for places to go and eat. It was mentioned as being a little hard to find, and not till we bought a map did we figure it out, and even then it was a few missed turns and U-turns before we stumbled upon it. It's in an industrial area, and the outside is a little nondescript. I was expecting a tasting room, and a souvenir rack, but when I opened the door, there was a full dining area, a bar, pool tables, and an upstairs eating area. The back of the room had a chain-link gate that looked in to the brewing and bottling plant. Just kind of lace we beer nerds love. As we snaked our way through the dining area to a table, I noticed the special was corned beef and cabbage, which is a no-brainer on St. Patty's Day with two Irishmen. We ordered some dark, smokey pints of beer and looked over the t-shirts while waiting for the chow to arrive. The corned beef wasn't the thick, fatty slabs I prefer but sort of shredded and dryish. The cabbage, however was delicious. The beef was good to, but just different than I prefer. That's all. After we devoured too much meat, we thought we'd better get up shoot some pool lest we doze off or something. I think Bart got the better of us, overall, on the billiard table that night. Then we bought souvenirs and headed back to the hotel.

This is where I got the most shit of the weekend, because when they wanted to go back up to U of A for some more St. Patty's beers, I was still a little wary from Saturday's St. Patty's celebration, and chose not to join them. Instead I stayed and watched Anthony Bourdain until I fell asleep. Their description of the night didn't warrant any regrets on my part.

Yes, there's more...

2008 Spring Training Trip - Part 1

2008-03-20T23:22:00.000-07:00

I'm still trying to wake up this morning, but here we go... Yesterday, around 1:30 p.m., we pulled up in front of Wes's place after a pretty fast drive home from Tucson, Arizona. I came home, sort of straightened up the place, and prepared to make my sister, her friend Kirsten, as well as our friend David, some carne asada tacos. I was pretty exhausted, but we had a good time and they left early.

Backing up to Sunday the 16th, we left Wes's house around 8 a.m. to go to Tucson. Wes And I have been trying to make annual trips to Arizona to watch the Padres play Spring Training baseball. It started in '03, I think, when I went to visit my friend, Laura, in Phoenix. She used to live in San Diego, and we'd go to Padres games together. Work opportunities took her to the Phoenix area so I flew out to visit, and we took in our first Spring Training game, did some dining, hiking, and goofing around.

I missed a year, after that first trip. Then, in '05, Wes and I decided to go meet his brother, Brad, and Brad's girlfriend, Jenny, in Scottsdale to watch the Padres in enemy territory at the Giant's park in Scottsdale. That was a rather infamous trip, that I will not expand upon.

We skipped a year, I think because my new home was bleeding me dry. Then last year Wes and I returned to Phoenix & Peoria (the Padres' home field) for a pretty fun trip. That one's blogged in April 2007. That was a doozer.

This year we asked a few friends, and all of Wes's brothers to join us. Not surprisingly, none of Wes's friends took us up on it, but surprisingly only Wes's oldest brother, Bart, accepted the invite. I've known all the Ryan brothers since around 1976. I think Wes was about 5, and Bart was around 16. I was 10. I've shared a home with 3 of the 5 brothers. Bart was my realtor when I bought my condominium. So I was pretty happy when Bart accepted, then he admitted he'd been waiting for an invite since we started going. Bart was also talked into driving, since he has a Ford Explorer, and Wes and I have what amount to two-seaters.

Sunday morning, I woke up at 7 a.m. still tired from a nearly sleepless night, and a little, um, dehydrated from the St. Patty's Day party in Balboa Park. I was not feeling good, but knowing all I had to do was keep moving until I climbed into the back seat of Bart's Explorer kept me going. The night before we had a pretty intense storm, which is kind of a St. Patty's Day tradition, that included thunder, lightning, hail, and we came to find out, snow in the mountains. San Diego County's mountains had a beautiful, if thin, layer of snow for many miles while we made our way east on I-8. I tried to snap some pictures as we sped by. This about the best.

I pretty much dozed on and off the whole way to Tucson, which is about 6 hours away - depending on who's driving, and how many exits they miss. Bart is a slower driver, but Wes misses more exits obsessing over perceived wrongs dealt him by other drivers. I think it's called road rage. Six hours is a guess between Bart's 7 hours there and Wes's 5 and a half home.

Somewhere east of Yuma, Arizona the Border Patrol had a checkpoint set up. I think we got off to a bad start when Bart charged down the empty lane for semis, then realizing he fucked up, nosed his way into line about 30 cars ahead of where we should have been. When we got to the front of the line, the drug/alien-sniffing dog yelped and we were sent to secondary. I should mention that Bart had to wrestle his Explorer from is 18-year old daughter to use for this trip. I think all three of us, simultaneously, thought "I hope Lacy isn't a stoner." We were asked to get out of the car, and to empty our pockets. Then questioned pretty pointedly about drug use, arrests, how long we'd known each other, all while the drug dog was lead through the car, and our bags were rifled through. Still, we stood there under the gaze of three BP agents about half our ages, thinking, "Damn, I hope Lacy isn't a stoner." When they didn't find anything - and not only did they try hard, they seemed both baffled and disappointed when they hadn't caught three middle-aged drug smugglers - they turned very cordial, and we chatted about Spring Training ball, and the relative merits of Peoria vs. Tucson. Buh-bye, Border Patrol. When we got back under way, Bart called Lacy on his cell phone and thanked her for not doing drugs.

More to come...

Moscas Español

2008-03-01T11:53:00.000-08:00

Finally, the, seemingly pointless, hours of surfing the webs has paid a little dividend, I mean beside all the nice folks I've met.

A while back I thought to myself, I wonder if the Japanese have any particular methods for tying flies? I'd seen a few origami sites, and a few different sites with Japanese arts and crafts, and thought fly tying seems to lend itself to the Japanese way of simplicity and elegance in creating art, etc. It turns out that yes, there is a little difference in Japanese fly tying that I found interesting. One thing is, they often tie in the eye of hook, out of monofilament, as the hooks they use don't often have eyes. Some of the more important aspects of fly tying also have their differences from western styles, but honestly, they use a lot of the same flies. They're also not too well represented on the web. Not to mention, they haven't really gotten on board with the English yet.

But the title of the blog is Moscas Español - Spanish Flies. Not the stuff you drop in your lady's drink to get her all randy. But actual fishing flies, made in Spain. The Japanese connection here is that these particular tiers use aspects they learned from Japanese tiers during a fly fishing World Cup.

I found this site, Moscas Órbigo, and had a look around. The first thing I noticed were a lot of foam-bodied flies with hard-shell finishes. They were pretty realistic. Much more so than the hair bombs I tie for the saltwater fishing around here. They were interesting and well made.

Tricóptero Rubión

But the real reason I posted the link was because on my regular fishing message board, sdfish.com, there was discussion going on about fly fishing for carp, and what flies might be effective. Well, Cholo (that's what he goes by), had a couple of carp flies on his site that were kind of unique; a corn kernal, and a bread crumb. Carp fishing is very popular in Europe, and is gaining popularity in the states as well. So I posted the link in the carp fishing thread.

Cholo, his given name is José, must have tracked his website hits or something, because a few weeks later, I got an email from him. He was thanking me for posting the link, giving his site some exposure, and said that if I send him my address he'd like to send me some flies.

José lives in Leon, Spain and it looks like he's making a living tying his flies. His lower-priced flies are around 2.40 euros (about $3.65) and they go up to around 5.50 euros (a whopping $8.50). To put that in sort of perspective, if I go into a fly shop and buy, say, a biggish saltwater fly, it's going to run me around $3.00, but if I go to eBay, and bid for a half a dozen of the same fly I can get them for about $1.00 each. For trout flies, I can get them on eBay for as little as 39¢ a piece. But that's as much an illustration of the quality and realism of Cholo's flies as anything. These aren't a few wraps of thread and a feather. They're sculpted, painted and often have legs and/or wings. If you stuck one in your shirt, someone would surely try to brush it off for you.

A few days ago I got an envelope from Cholo, with some flies, and explanation as to the use of each fly, and some business cards. Here's some pictures of the flies. My macro is a little underwhelming. I guess I could have tried a little harder... (EDIT: Super Macro seemed to be the ticket...)

Moscón Azul - Blue Fly

I guess if you look close, you'll notice the hard metallic-blue, and metallic-gold flies, the blurry one in the left foreground is a dragon fly or damsel fly-type thing. The numbers on the hooks correspond to the sheet he sent me, detailing each fly's use. I really would have liked to get better pics, but any closer and they wouldn't focus. But if you want to have a look at the flies in all their glory, go check out http://www.moscasorbigo.com/ (you'll have to select the address and copy to you browser). It's worth a look.

Hormiga Negra - Black Ant

Efémera salmón

Thanks to José (Cholo) for the flies, and I promise I'll pick up some nice trout on them this summer and send you some pictures. Go Real Madrid!

It's not called catching... 2/16

2008-02-16T20:34:00.000-08:00

My buddy Scott and I thought we'd try to pull some bass and/or bluegill out of Upper Otay lake this afternoon. We thought wrong.

Upper Otay is semi-secluded, near where Scott and I grew up. Kind of nestled in the foothills. When we were in high school, we used to jump off the dam at one end. Since then the dam's been chopped in a V-shape in the middle. We assumed it was to keep kids like us from jumping off of it. Now almost the entire dam is covered in graffiti. Kind of lame.

Scott suggested we walk in from the road. That way we could catch the sunset bite, and not be booted out of the parking lot by the ranger. We parked, and went about getting our waders and boots on, grabbing packs, and rods, and headed off up the trail. I was pretty intrigued to see what this was going to be like. I'd never fished there, but Scott's been there quite a few times, and had done well. He's even had an article about it published in California Fly Fisher. So you'd think we would have caught a fish.

We went to a spot that was conducive to fly fishing, and set about it. I'm not real experienced in a lot of freshwater fly fishing. I stick to the salt for the most part. But I have fished for bass, and know that fish generally like to hang near structure. The weather's been kinda cold the last couple of days, and the nights have been in the low 40s. Bass and bluegill are known as warm-water species. The water was stained a red-brown, presumably from the recent rains. It was pretty tough to see a fly much below the surface. Still, we were there to fish, and began working any structure we could get near.

Like our trip last week, we were largely left watching the birds who use the lake. Many of the same birds that frequent the bay also use the lake; egrets, scoters, herons, as well as mallards, and redheads.

At one point we split up, and I walked around the lake to find another spot to fish. Found a protected little spot, kind of messy but just big enough to get off some roll casts. I took a step in, and saw a turtle working its way under some floating sticks. I took another step in and figured it heard me, it was working pretty hard to nestle itself through the sticks. I felt my way to another step in. The turtle poked it's head above the debris, and when it saw me it bolted.

The little cove was surrounded by birds; the ducks, red-winged blackbirds, an occasional egret. The sound of all their songs was incredible. It really made the fact that we were less than a mile from sprawling suburbs a little hard to believe. The golden light of the setting sun, across the lake from me, really set a serene mood.

I made as many casts as I could, frequently getting snagged, to not so much as a strike. I could see across the lake to where we'd started. Scott had made his way back, and I could see him working the area again, so I carefully waded out to head back around the lake. After answering Nature's call, I made the walk of abut a half mile back to where Scott was.

I picked a spot away from where Scott was, but close enough where we could hold a conversation. I was asking him about what he'd caught there, and what species he thought might be in there. As I was mentioning bluegill, he kind of started laughing. I looked over and his rod had a little bend to it, but we'd been getting caught up in grasses all afternoon. I thought he might have a bluegill on, and was laughing because we'd just been talking about it. But it was a turtle. It was hooked under the chin, in the part of the neck that gave the name to ugly cold-weather shirt.

Scott asked for some help, thinking it may have been a snapping turtle, and the first thing that came to mind was, "I hope you debarbed that hook." I pulled my forcepts out of their "sheath", unclipped them from their retractor, and tried to get a grip on the fly without giving the "snapping" turtle a chance to get me. Fortunately, the fly practically fell out, and we escaped any "situation" with an innocent turtle.

It was about then we decided to call it an evening. We hit a few spots on the way back, but it was obvious by now that the fish weren't biting. We made our way back to the car as the ranger was pulling in to escort 3 float tubers out so she could lock the gate.

3 fishing trips - Feb 9, 10 & 12

2008-02-14T23:46:00.000-08:00

So we had a kind of brief spell of really good weather, and as you can see by the title of this entry, I took advantage of it to stalk fishes. It had been pretty, um, cold here. Yeah, I know, cold in San Diego? Don't be such a Nancy! Hey! I don't have the wardrobe to cope with it.

After my fly fishing trip on the 6th, I was psyched about chasing fish. But the impromptu day-fishing trip often means using bass gear from downtown rocks to find spotties - spotted sand bass (Paralabrax maculatofasciatus).

Here's one from a while back.

Spotties are possibly the most abundant fish in SD Bay. Of course, they may just be the most willing to fall for a red, sparkly, fish-shaped lure.

On Saturday morning, the 9th, I woke up, and as usual checked my computer for new emails, my usual websites, and eventually popped up my "dashboard" on my iMac to check weather & tides widgets. I was pretty shocked to see that at 9 a.m. it was already almost 70 degrees. I'd been used to seeing something near the mid-50s. I walked back through my room and threw open the curtains and it was beautiful out. I picked two bass rods out of the fishing-rod tee pee that occupies a corner of my bedroom, grabbed my yellow shore-hopping daypack, and quickly filled it with lure boxes, tools, Cliff bars, and whatever else I had handy, and got ready to head out.

The absolute closest spot where I can get a line in the water happens to be right smack downtown. It also happens to be a spot that's a pretty well-kept secret, as well as a place a lot of people just aren't willing to try out. You fish literally in the shadow of San Diego's high rises... and you have to feed a parking meter. I've actually gotten a 25-dollar parking ticket, trying to add my tenth fish to a real good two-hour meter period before work.

I'm going combine my Saturday the 9th, and Wednesday the 12th trips into one report, because they aren't worth addressing separately, and these get too long anyway. These trips both started in the morning, around 10, and the two-hour meter gave me until noon. I caught 2 spotties Saturday, and three Wednesday, and worked real hard for each one. The only difference is Saturday, I walked back to my car and saw that there were still 15 minutes on the meter, so I walked over to the calm, marina side of my spot, and cast a ghost shrimp-colored swimbait as far as I could, let it sink until it hit bottom and bounced it back to shore. Reel, reel stop, reel, reel, reel, stop, reel, reel, strike! I picked up my second spotted bass. Sweet. As I was releasing it, I saw a boil on the surface, about 15 yards straight out in front me. Something large had chased its prey to the surface. I cast in the vicinity of the boil, let it sink a couple feet and burned it back to me, hoping to induce a strike. But, no. Most of the time, that moment is gone before you ever get a chance to cast, much less twice. I threw again anyway, I only had a few more minutes on my meter, and as soon as I put my reel in gear, and started to reel, it gets hit, and my rod bends hard toward the water. I was a little taken aback how heavy the fish pulled. In fact I got a little too excited, and set the hook like a TV bass-fishing host, and my line snapped loudly. I never saw the fish. I reeled in my line, walked to my car, and drove home, a little disappointed in myself for losing such a great fish. But it's early in the season...

Sunday the 10th, I had plans to fish with my buddy Scott. He's got a fun 14-foot aluminum boat. Typically, when we take the "S.S. Rat Turd" out it's usually a fly fishing trip in the deep south of San Diego Bay. The deep south bay is a lot different than the rest of the bay in that it's very shallow, there's much less boat traffic, and there's a serenity that makes it a different experience than the sailboat regatta nearer the bridge, or the chaos up towards the mouth of the bay.

The shallow water, the distance from the mouth of the bay, and a warm-water outlet from a power plant lead to the speculation that the deep south bay holds exotic species not often found in the more pressured parts of the bay.

Right after the above sentence, a power outage left me sitting in dark silence, wondering where I'd put my flashlight in case of this eventuality. As I resume, at 9:30 the following morning, I'm sipping coffee, not Pacifico.

In a way it hold true, as some species seem more likely catches down there. Bone fish for one, seem to be a more frequent catch in the warm south bay.

I agreed to meet Scott at 7 a.m. at the J St. Marina, our usual launch site. I made it about 5 minutes late. I didn't see Scott, so I tried to down as much coffee as I could before he showed up, so I wouldn't have to deal with coffee on the boat. I got my stuff out of the car, and enjoyed the nice weather. (by the way, it was in the 40s when I came home from work last night, and it had been raining all day) I saw a woman get out of her car and we started walking toward the launch ramp at the same time. I noticed she had a rod tube in her hand and asked if she was going to be fly fishing. She said, Marc? And I realized it was a woman named Kim, who I know from an interweb fishing site, and we'd even split a skiff once. Duh. I just hadn't seen her in over a year, and her hair was a different color.

We explained who we were each fishing with, and her ride showed up while we talked; also some internet fishing friends. I shook hands, and assured them I wasn't hitchhiking a ride. Then I went to score an early fish off the dock. But didn't.

Scott showed up, I did a poor job of backing the trailer down the ramp, and we were off.

Fishing with Scott is pretty fun. We've known each other since we were in high school, and have a good time together. We're two out of only three of our group of friends from the old 'hood who fish. We also both fly fish. Which is what we typically do on these trips. The thought of an exotic, like a bonefish, or a potentially large shortfin corvina, on a fly rod is too enticing to pass up.

We hit a variety of our usual spots, I traded back and forth between light bass gear, and fly gear, catching most of my fish on bass gear.

Scott stuck to his guns, and caught a good bunch of spotties, and a yellow fin croaker on flies.

We checked in with Kim, Tom, and Craig a couple of times throughout the day, to find out they'd been doing a little better than we had. Craig got a pretty big spottie.

We kept ourselves entertained talking about old friends, checking out ospreys, herons, egrets, and waterfowl.

All in all a great time on the water, and though not as productive as we'd have liked, it's a damn fun way to start a Sunday.

First fish of the year. 2/6/08

2008-02-06T16:02:00.000-08:00

Finally, I got my first fish of 2008. Well, I've only tried twice, but I usually do a little better than .5 fish per trip. So, here's the gist - one small spottie, on a shrimp imitation. Read on if you want.

I took today off, because it's my friend Michelle's 40th birthday. But she's working anyway. So I thought I'd get out of the house, and put in a real effort to be outside, catch some fish, and just enjoy a day fishing, without having to rush to do anything - like go to work.

It'd been a while since I mounted any kind of decent fishing outing, so I drug out all my fly gear last night, swapped a fast sinking line for a floating line, loaded my saltwater chest pack with flies, tippet, an extra spool with intermediate sinking line, and my digicam, threw my wader, belt, and boots in a duffel and went to bed.

Now my place has fly fishing debris all over it, and as soon as I'm done writing this, I'm going to have to do some cleaning.

I got up around 8 a.m., high tide was at 8:45 so no real hurry. By the time I drove over to Coronado, parked, put on my waders, and boots, got everything in order and walked the few hundred yards to the water, it was about 9:00.

My plan, which unfortunately I'd made some time a while back, was to fish a floating line and a fly called a green zima at a bay-side beach, over some real shallow eel grass. I 've seen this beach so shallow the eel grass was high and dry (not actually dry). Not this morning. High tide this morning was almost 7 feet. Which is pretty high. That made my shallow-water fishing plan a bust. I tried for a while, but never felt like the fly was near the bottom. For a while there were some birds about 50 yards off the beach, occasionally plunging after bait fish. I noticed a few boils from beneath, but not enough to get excited about. I tried a few long casts, with fast retrieves, hoping to attract the attention of some feeding fish, but no luck.

I moved slowly to the south, towards the little bay at the state beach. When I got to the baylet I switched to an intermediate sinking line and a clouser, to be sure I was in the eel grass.

The weather was great! A little chilly, but I was dressed appropriately. The sun was out, and there was very little wind, even at noon when I quit. There were also a lot of bird about; egrets, scoters, willets, terns, and even a redtail hawk, and an osprey. Strangely, there were a few dead birds along the high water line. I think they were cormorants. Possibly a result of the last storm. I don't know.

With the intermediate line, and a small surf fly, I finally enticed a small spotted bass into being my first fish of 2008. He was a little guy, about 9 inches, but he took the fly, and he swam off when I turned the fly out of his lip.

There's nothing that keeps an unsuccessful fishing trip going like a small fish an hour and a half into it. Being that the tidal swing was so big today, in the time that I fished the little bay and caught my little spottie, the tide had dropped a few feet. I thought maybe I'd try the orginal beach, but didn't get so much as a nibble. As a last ditch effort I thought I'd try the extreme inside of the baylet where I've caught some nice fish. By this time the wind was coming up the little it was going to, and this spot is a little protected from the wind, not to mention it gets wind from behind, so if you can control your back cast, and keep it out of the sand, you can often get off some nice, long casts. Again though, this spot fishes better when you can see the shelf, just off shore at lower tides, but today the tide was still pretty high, and it wasn't long before I decided enough was enough.

I have to admit, I'd have been pretty bummed if I hadn't got that spottie, and even that was kind of meager. Over all it was a beautiful day, and a real nice day to enjoy some "nature."

First fishing report 2008. 1/19/08

2008-01-23T01:37:00.000-08:00

I finally got my 2008 fishing license. Those things are getting expensive. I went to Squidco and Joey knew exactly what I'd walked in for, I didn't even have to ask. That shop kicks ass.

I got my act together later in the afternoon, grabbed a rod that had a Trix Spin Bomb already tied on and went to South Shores Landing in hopes of picking up a fat New Years spottie, halibut or corvina.

I had a good incoming tide, the sun was going down, and I worked every inch of about 200 yards of shoreline, but went home not having felt the addictive tug of a live fish wiggling at the end of my line. In fact here wasn't anything "fishy" about that stretch of shoreline that evening. No baitfish breaking the surface, no boils, no interested birds, nothing. It just didn't feel like the fish were biting. I held out into darkness a little hoping for a nocturnal predator, but it was cold, and my bladder was singing.

So, I have yet to land my initial 2008 fish. Stay tuned.

Tying Desk II, Tie Harder

2008-01-08T18:39:00.000-08:00

So, yeah, I haven't been wetting lines much lately, so my latest fishing-related "project" is my new tying desk. My previous entry has about as much about that as you need to know. Until now. I made a visit to the container store and picked up some organizational things - bookends, hook boxes, and a drawer divider - and my took caddy came from Renzetti. That's all, here's some updated shots.

The tool caddy

Desk, 2.0

My New Tying Desk

2007-12-29T16:19:00.000-08:00

I've been wanting to have a "permanent" tying station for some time. I'm tired of having to drag all my tying tools, vice, and materials out onto my eatin' table to tie. Once everything was spread all over I was reluctant to put it away until I really felt I'd tied what I needed to. Which could be a few hours, to a week. Then I'd have to vacuum all the trimmings, tinsel, feathers and thread off the table, chairs, and carpet.

Shortly after Christmas, pumped up by some fly-tying books I got as gifts, I decided to explore some options for the little space I have for a desk. I looked at all the super-deluxe custom tying-specific desks. I looked at the catalog stores' websites; like Cabela's and Orvis. I looked at cheap options like Ikea and Staples. I even thought about asking the guy who built my custom CD rack if he'd be up to the challenge. Then, on a whim, and because it's an amazing resource for cheap stuff, I checked Craig's List. I saw a heading that said "Secretary's Desk, $30." This picture was in the ad.

That might work. I don't think it's technically a Secretary's Desk, as those usually have a fold-down work surface that covers the hutch, but it does look a lot like some of the tying-specific desks I saw. I sent an email and they still had it. I sent another and said I'd be there Saturday. They replied that a few people had inquired, and it was first come first serve. Fair enough. I lined up my pal, Wes, to help me in his truck with the promise of lunch.

In the morning - this morning - I woke up and turned on English soccer, as I often do on Saturday morning. In fact my favorite side, Arsenal FC, were playing Everton FC at 9 a.m. PST. During half-time (Arsenal down 1 - 0), I walked up to Golden Hill Liquor, and withdrew $60 for the desk and lunch and crossed the street to Starbuck's to get a black coffee and to be sure I had a ten for the transaction. Then I went home to wait for Wes to clean up after surfing and pick me up. By the time I sat down with my coffee, Arsenal had tied it up. It was 2 -1, Arsenal, by the time Wes called from downstairs, and Niklas Bentdner had gotten tossed with second yellow card. So, with ten men, 20 minutes to go, and a 2 -1 lead, I reluctantly left Arsenal to go on the desk mission.

While I was loading my pockets with wallet, keys, phone and cash, I realized I'd lost a twenty somewhere between the market and home. The desk had cost me $20 and I hadn't even left the house.

Michelle, the desk's current owner, lives in Santee, and said she would be available around 11 a.m. for a transaction. We were within 5 minutes of her house when I called her at 11:02. She had a cheery voice. I asked if the desk was still around, and yes, it was. She and her husband were in the process of moving and were clearly getting rid of nearly everything. When we rang the doorbell at the open front door, she asked what item we were here to get. She asked which desk, and I pointed to the desk I saw on Craig's List in a room in the back of the house. They had another desk about the size of a twin bed. It was gigantic. I had a look at what I'd come for. It was a little smaller than what I'd imagined, and not in as good of shape as what she said; which was "good." But for thirty bucks (now $50) I thought I'd give it a try. Plus the tree hugger in me liked the idea of recycling a desk instead of buying some pressed wood piece of crap new.

Wes's truck is 12 years old and in remarkably good shape, but the motor seems about to die, and he's a little stressed about it. So he gets extra karma for driving me on a 32-mile round trip to pick this desk up. When I asked him where he wanted to eat, he said Crazy Burger (on 30th, it's awesome) I had no problem. Crazy Burger is run by this German guy, and they have great burgers, sausages, beer etc. I got a Dansk, cooked medium. The Dansk is a regular burger with a pile of crumbled bleu cheese on it. It's toe-curling delicious. Wes had the blackened Cajun Burger. We both had pints of Black Butte Porter, from Oregon. Delicious lunch, and it was one dollar, with tip, more than the desk. So my 30-dollar bargain was now an 81-dollar desk. Fine, worth the money, and I probably would have bought lunch today anyway.

We actually put the desk in my place before lunch, checked the outcome of the Arsenal match (4 - 1 Arsenal, with both teams having finished with 10 men), and went to lunch. So when I got home I wiped the desk down, assessed its condition - not too bad really, and got out my fly-tying vice to check how much space I'd have. It's a little on the small side, but if I manage and organize my tying materials I should do okay. I have a Renzetti foam tool caddy due to arrive any day now, and that'll get my tools in easy reach. Here's a preliminary shot with the CD rack next to it.

If you look at the back, left leg, you'll see a largish white object. That's the transformer for that tiny light on the desk. Ridiculous. It's a little halogen lamp I bought at Ikea today. I hate halogen, I'm going to replace it with an LED when I get a chance. It won't get hot, it will use way less electricity, and it will cost as much as the desk. I also need a book holder so I can follow the instructions in my new tying books.

And a close up.

I'm pretty happy with so far, we'll see after some long tying sessions. Anyway, that's that. I may update this when the tool caddy shows up, for full effect. If you've made it this far, thanks for reading my ramble. Peace out, yo.

No reason 11/21

2007-11-21T22:30:00.000-08:00

It's the night before Thanksgiving, I'm watching a bluegrass thing on PBS, drinking beer, and surfing the web. Like the last entry, this is sort of random rambling. Self indulgence. Creative outlet. Speaking of, I used to draw a lot. Constantly. Uncontrollably. It was an impulse. (This bluegrass show blows. I love bluegrass, but this is watered-down crap) When I was a kid, I filled sketchbooks. My mom used to ask me if I needed a new one when she went shopping. I was advised to do something other than art in college. Ill advised. But that's not important. For some reason, I don't draw anymore. Not even during down time at work do I doodle. I don't feel the urge or impulse. I have the tools. I have sketchbooks needing filling. I'm around writing implements all the time. I even have two sizes of yellow pads at work. Paper that begs to be doodled on. I have a few theories, mostly to do with too many outside stimulants (internet, television, other hobbies), and laziness. I think it's partly the digital era (other than the internet). Adobe Illustrator. Instant gratification. Digital photography (that's another ramble). Maybe even blogging. Just being able to think of something and making it happen. Whatever. I don't draw. I need to work on that. Now that I think of it, watching TV, surfing the web, and drinking beer leads me to believe attention deficit disorder is a possibility.

Random Bloggish 10/30

2007-10-30T00:58:00.000-07:00

10/30/07 12:30 a.m.

Well, I haven't been on a reportable fishing trip in a while. I was invited on one last week, but turned it down, due to the fire being in full effect. Took a little bit of guff for that too, but you gotta make up your own mind, and fishing just didn't seem like the thing to do at the time. So, this is a filler. A holdover blog.

San Diego County had the worst fire in its history last week. I guess there are still fires burning, actually. My sister sent me a text message last Sunday morning, from Annapolis, MD, asking me where the fires were. I had no idea. I turned to a news channel and it was Malibu. We made a few dumb jokes back and forth, via text message, about our Malibu homes homes, and the celebrities we had watching them. A few hours pass, and I'm flipping through the channels and it turns out a couple of fires have broken out in San Diego. But they hadn't when my sister asked, and weren't yet big enough for Annapolis to have heard about them. But the big Santa Ana we were having was fanning these brush fires into a serious threat. I actually walked to a grocery store a block or so away to get some stuff I needed for beer brats, and by the time I got back my throat was sore from the smoke in my neighborhood.

Quick side story: As I walked up to the front of the grocery store there was a cashier, and a customer out front talking about the smell in the air. The obvious, inescapable, smoke smell. The cashier asked the other woman if she smelled the odor. The woman said "the smoke?" The cashier said, "No, it's something else." Then the cashier asked, "Is there a fire?" and the other woman said... No. What-the-fuck-ever. I resisted the urge to bring them up to date. I'm trying to live by a less-is-more philosophy these days. Let. It. Go.

Back to the fire. I texted my sister back, to let her know of the coincendence, of our earlier messaging, that in fact there were fires in San Diego now. By now the local channels were starting to devote their time to the fires. I had shut up my doors and windows and focused on the news of the fires. Many friends of mine were pretty close to the Cedar Fire in 2003, and "The Witch Creek Fire" wasn't too far away from where the Cedar started.

The morning the Cedar Fire came to my attention, I had just shuffled out of my bedroom to an orangish glow in the living room, and my room mate and his girlfriend staring at the TV. Another Santa Ana, 3 days shy of 4 years earlier than this one, had funneled all the smoke and ash from the Cedar Fire through downtown, where we lived, and turned normally mild, beautiful San Diego into a horrible, sooty city.

Amazingly, San Diego (the official, municipal San Diego) had taken heart, and learned from the chaos of the Cedar Fire, and something now known as "Reverse 911" warned people well in advance to leave their homes. Evacuation shelters sprung up immediately, at schools, shopping centers, and eventually, most famously, Qualcomm Stadium. Luckily, and probably due to the opposite natures of fires and hurricanes, it wasn't a gruesome fiasco like the Superdome turned into. The evacuation shelter at Qualcomm was well organized and efficient. Within hours donations and volunteers poured in. It was pretty impressive. Lessons learned.

The entire city of Ramona was evacuated on Sunday night. 40,000 people. Including three families of close friends of mine. All three sheltered in different place, safely, and were eventually allowed back to their homes, on Friday I think. It wasn't until last night that water was available in Ramona, and they still can't drink it.

My friend, Eric, took his oldest son, Brendan, and snuck up to the house to see how it weathered the fire (there hadn't been any reports of damage in his area). He text messaged me that the house was "full" of ashes.

I'm going to go to bed now... I'll pick up later. I just felt like putting something down.

7 hours of sleep pass.

10/30/07 10:00 a.m.

I'm awake now, have coffee, and having just reread part one realized I don't have a lot more to say about the fires that raced through San Diego County last week.

Though many, many families lost homes, people perished as a direct, or indirect, result of the fires, nobody I know lost a home, or family member. Which is great. On Saturday, the 27th, we even got a little unexpected rain and cool weather. When I say unexpected, even the weather folks on TV were caught off guard. And here on Tuesday morning, the weather is cool and cloudy, and comforting.

In a case of cyberspace being intruded upon by actualspace, a fishing/smack-talking message board I used to frequent lost its server in the Witch Creek Fire and the site was down for a few days. Now it's slowly rebuilding from scratch. Which, for that site, is a good thing. A lot of stupidity was erased from existence. But so were some good reports and articles. The founder/owner/creator of that site, had sold a house two months ago that burned down in the fires last week. That's timing.

Being that the Cedar Fire of 2004, and this 2007 fire didn't have a heck of a lot of overlap, let's hope the long-standing, explosively dry fuel has been expended, the ecology of fire can do its thing, and there isn't too much more to burn so massively next time. There will be a next time. It's not getting wetter in Southern California. Santa Ana winds aren't going to stop. Fortunately, it looks like the county has systems in place to deal with it.

So there's that. Fire.

Quick Shore Trip 9/20

2007-09-20T13:28:00.000-07:00

This is going to be real quick... Still feeling the itch, after landing that corvina yesterday, I ran out about 10:30am, to Harbor Island to see what I could hook. I threw the same Spin Bomb lure I threw yesterday, and on the weekend. I got a spottie almost immediately, out in front of the Hilton. About 5 casts later, I landed two spotties in two casts. Things were looking good. I scraped up one more at that spot, and decided to try my luck elsewhere.

I'd heard "Liberty Station" had opened, opening up some shore fishing that hadn't been available previously. I found it a little shallow, and after a few fishless casts, I moved on to the Shelter Island boat launch.

I've got some decent bass from the outside of the launch's breakwater - my first legal barred sand bass (from shore) came off that spot. Unfortunately, there was a lot of suspended grass to foul my spinners, so I moved to the other side of the launch. I found a spot near some sialbaot moorings. First cast was a winner, a decent spottie. Nice. A few casts later a dink spottie, and that was enough for me...

I had to get home to get ready for work. Had to fit in a trip, as it's supposed to rain for the next couple of days.

Corvina 9/19

2007-09-19T13:26:00.000-07:00

Woke up to a gloomy day, fiddled on the internet, had a while to wait before a soccer match I wanted to watch came on. I decided, around 9:30 a.m., to go toss some lures to see if I could pick up some fish due to the weather change. It's recently been sunny, and the water very clear, a tough time to fool fish. But the clouds, and light wind seemed worth trying.

I packed pretty light, filling my pockets with lures, camera, phone, pliers, and wallet, hung my license around my neck, grabbed a combo that had a Spin Bomb already tied on and hit the car.

I'd wanted to go to a spot downtown (literally) where I've had good numbers and variety, but there are airplane races down there this weekend, and my spot is home base for just about everything that goes on down there. So I went to a spot in Mission Bay, where I've caught most of my biggest spotties, and recently hooked and lost a decent halibut.

I got there to light wind, and dark skies. I locked up the car, and headed to the nearest patch of shoreline. The Spin Bomb I had on was the 1-oz version, and I had 12 lb test on. That means I could really let loose, and get the lure out where I needed it, to cover as much area as I could.

Not long after I took my first cast, probably 15 minutes, I tossed a long one, into the wind and made so I could retrieve with the slow incoming tide. Almost as soon as the big lure hit the water I felt a tug, and swung on it. Fish on. I knew it wasn't a spottie, not only because it hit so quickly on a lure near the surface, but alsu because it didn't put up the wiggly fight of a spottie. It was more of a back and forth swinging fight. I saw some flshes of white, and thought maybe Yellow Fin Croaker. But once I got it near enough, I realized I'd gotten a personal double first... 1) a corvina in Mission Bay, 2) on a Spin Bomb.

This little fish was photographed more than Lindsey Lohan lying on a sidewalk. I even sent off cell phone pics, before I returned it to the bay.

After that I got a medium-sized spottie, but didn't feel it was pic-worthy. Then it started to rain, so less than an hour after arrival, I was on my way home... a short, but very rewarding, trip.

Finally, fishing! 9/16

2007-09-16T20:26:00.000-07:00

I finally have some fishing worth reporting. Sort of. I've recently been experimenting with some new fly patterns. I saw a tier in a magazine, named Tim Borski. He's in Florida, and fishes for tarpon, snook, bones etc., and ties great, simple flies which I thought might work in some of my local waters. I posted the results on SDFish, and that resulted in a couple of invitations to fish over the weekend.

Here are the flies I tied, from a DVD I ordered from Mr. Borski.

The Green Zima

The Haystack

I got the invite to fish with Scott "Fishtricks" Johnson in Mission Bay, halibut being the target, but bass, croaker, bonito or barracuda also being acceptable. I met Scott at the South Shores Landing launch ramp at 6 a.m., and off we went.

Without turning this into a novel, the fishing was tough, the weather was great, the Thunder Boat races were going on in an arm of the bay, Scott got "pulled over" for speeding (and let off), and we had a great time.

We mostly fished with flies, but occasionally threw some of Scott's "Spin Bomb" spinner baits.

My first catch on one of my new Borski flies was a new species for me - fly or otherwise...

I got a decent spottie on a brown deceiver I tied for calico bass. Scott thought I was "playing" the fish like a TV trout fisherman, and let me know it. I just found it heavy fighter, and didn't want to break it off.

Scott picked up a nice spottie on a Spin Bomb near the Quivera breakwater.

In summary, we threw flies and Spin Bombs for nearly 10 hours with hardly a break, hit spots all over Mission Bay, had a good time and even caught some fish - not specifically what we were after, but still some decent fish. I even picked up a small calico on a fly off the breakwater.

Quit Faking!

2007-07-15T11:28:00.000-07:00

One night in New Mexico a couple of weeks ago we were hanging out in our motel room, drinking beers, and talking with some friends while kids came and left the room. My buddy Eric brought up that his son, Sean, had been sick one night and that Eric had given him a hard time, assuming he was faking, for whatever reason, then felt bad when it turned out he wasn't.

That lead to each of us sharing stories of when we were kids and getting sick, and our parents not believing us. Everyone had one. Getting sick on the way to CCD, on car trips, before school...

Here's mine... "Chinese Restaurant Syndrome"

When I was a kid, we didn't really go out to dinner all that much, but occasionally we'd head into Chula Vista and go to The Teapot Inn on Broadway - it's long gone. Not Hom's Teapot Inn, by the DMV in Chula Vista.

This was probably 1978ish, I was 11 or 12. Anyway, we get tea, our first course etc. and are doing our family eating and talking.

Pretty soon, I start getting kind of hot, and sweaty. So I mention it to my parents, and they basically say deal with it. Then, the muscles in my neck start getting tight, and I'm really starting to feel odd. Not like sick to the stomach, or a headache, not like anything I'd ever experienced, just really odd, and uncomfortable. So I mention again that I'm going downhill fast and my mother finally feels my head and is a little surprised. I don't remember a habit of acting dramatically in restaurants for no reason.

The only other time I refused to eat something at a restaurant was once I ordered a lobster somewhere, and when it arrived it smelled bad, and I wouldn't eat it. My dad was pretty annoyed, thinking it was because I thought I was ordering crab and when lobster came I didn't want it. So I sat there with no food to eat, my dad was pissed because he was paying for a lobster that wasn't being eaten. When our waiter stopped by to check on us he noticed my lobster smelled awful, and got me a new one. My dad felt pretty bad about that one.

But, since I was a pretty adventurous eater - especially compared to my sister, who didn't really eat raw tomatoes until she was in her thirties - and I never complained about food, it's still a little weird that my folks basically gave me the keys to the car and told me to go outside and cool off.

We had a mid-70s model Buick Century station wagon, in lovely metallic rust. I loved that car. It hauled us across country to Ohio and back. I drove my buddies to Hollywood to buy Doc Martens and other accessories to our high school obsessions. At the end of its life, my mom told me if I could sell it I could have the money to help finance a road trip me and some buddies were about to take. I called Ecology Auto Wrecking in Otay Mesa, and they came and got it, and gave me $87. I'm not sure that's what Mom had in mind, but in 1986 that bought a lot more gas than it does now, and that rotting old station wagon with a bad transmission no longer sat in front of our house.

That station wagon had big, wide, vinyl back seats and they felt nice and cool on my forehead as I slid into the back seat, and eventually fell asleep, waiting for the family to come out and take me home. Of course they stayed and finished their meal first, and again, felt bad when the waitress mentioned "Chinese restaurant syndrome" and that some people had a reaction to MSG. That detail wasn't shared with me until much later in life. I probably would have done the same.

That's all, just something that struck me while I was cleaning my house for another soccer match/BBQ this afternoon, and thought I'd share.

Wedding trip to NM & CO 7/1 - 7/9

2007-07-12T01:05:00.000-07:00

I just spent 9 days in New Mexico and Colorado. A thorough blog would be long, occasionally boring, and not necessary. So, I'm going to touch on some highlights.

Day 1, Durango, Colorado. I really like Durango. I didn't really take many pictures, until dinner.

Day 2, still Durango, we had a great breakfast, then went to Ska Brewing (http://skabrewing.com/). Yes, it was a little early to sample beer, then drink a few pints, pick up a t-shirt, get some stickers, and coasters, then grab a six-pack of ESB, but hey, hair of the dog. In the afternoon, we went to the Sportsman in Navajo Dam...

...for nachos, Negro Modelo, and pool.

Really though, there's pictures posted where I post pictures and, well, I guess nine are a lot of days to report on. On the other hand... this is the third draft of this blog and I could just paste one or both of the others below...

(Attempt 2)
It would be too long and involved to blog my whole vacation, so here's a summary. At 5:30ish a.m., July first, my pal Wes picked me up and we went to the airport for a flight to Durango, Colorado. Wes's brother, and my oldest (longest, not most aged) pal, Brad picked us up and had a motel room booked in Durango. In short, we lunched at a brewery called Carvers; I had an ahi sandwich and a couple pints of a cask ale. Then we trudged back to the motel for a nap. In the evening (I think I slept for about 2 hours), we walked through a beautiful neighborhood to another brewery called Steamworks for a Cajun Boil and a few more pints.

Cajun Boil pic (It would go here, but it went up there)

We hit a couple more bars on the way back to the hotel. Durango is a great town - an outdoor sports mecca. Luckily, also home to 4 breweries. My favorite being Ska Brewery. It's just a brewery with a tasting room, but they make great beer, have cool swag, and staff is great. We went two Mondays in a row; once on the way in to town, and once on the way out. And just coincidentally, Monday is dollar pint day. They even hosted Bad Manners for three days of fun.

After breakfast and our visit to Ska, we headed down to Navajo Dam, where Brad and his fiance, Jenny Lee, live. Navajo Dam seems to exist for the sole purpose of catering to fisherman. The few businesses are combinations of lodges, restaurants and fly shops. Or just fly shops. If you stand a few minutes in front of the Sportsman, Abe's or Rizuto's you'll surely see a pickup truck with fly rods clamped under the windshield wipers, pull up and expel a bunch of sweaty, hungry fisherman.

The Sportsman was the site of our first meal the first afternoon in Navajo Dam. The Sportsman is a fixture in Navajo Dam. The walls are covered with dollar bills with messages scrawled on them, fish mounts, trophy-fish photos, and vintage lure ads. It's cool and dark, serves hearty food with a southwestern touch, and even has a few pool tables in the back. We ate there 6 or 7 times in 8 days. And nearly drank them out of Negro Modelo.

Tuesday morning, we got up, bought 5-day fishing licenses and hit the San Juan to try our hands at some San Juan trout. I think Brad, being a resident, was the hot stick with 3 or 4, and Wes and I each picked up one. Nymphing is a tough way to entice trout, especially being that I've only done it twice, and haven't a clue how to match the hatch. Fortunately, I love fishing, and wading the San Juan is one of the most pleasurable way to spend a morning (well, mid-day)

Wednesday was the 4th of July, and Wes and I moved from Brad's to Chuck Rizuto's San Juan River Lodge, a fisherman's motel where Brad had reserved every room for wedding guests. We met the bride's father, Rich, and sister, Melissa over lunch at the Sportsman. Nice folks. In fact everyone I met attending on the bride's side were good folks.

Wednesday evening we headed to "beautiful" Farmington, New Mexico where Jenny Lee helped organize the 4th of July Parade. We had dinner at the Three Rivers Brewery, sampled beer for the wedding keg (Papa Bear's Golden Honey Ale was the winner based on broad drinkability), then headed to Three River's Tap Room, a pool hall with a lot of beer and my favorite bar accessory, a shuffleboard table.

The parade had a little too much churchin' involved for my taste, so we spent almost the whole time shooting pool, and waiting for the shuffleboard table. We took turns going outside and "entertaining" Bart's daughters. They didn't speak to me for a couple of days after I forced them to look at every picture in my cell phone.

Bart's daughter drove us home, and we had her stop at one of the numerous fireworks stands that line the highway between Aztec and Farmington. That may or may not have been a good idea, but it sure lead to a lot of entertaining moments. Strangely, in New Mexico you are not allowed to FIRE any fireworks that go over ten feet into the air, but you can BUY amazingly cool fireworks that come with firing mortars and are like mini versions of municipal fireworks displays. So we did. We also thought it would be good idea to start firing them off in Rizuto's parking lot at 11:45 pm that night. The bride's sister didn't didn't agree. Nor did the two octogenarian couples staying next to her, or Chuck Rizuto himself. So, when the bride to be pulled into the parking lot moments after we'd been asked to stop, we thought Melissa had called her sister to put a stop to July 4, 2007's festivities. But no, it was an unrelated, spontaneous, midnight nagging.

By Thursday afternoon the Ryan clan began rolling into town in full force. Something like 22 of them. It was a sight to see them all gather on Brad's lawn. Que the fireworks! Yep, we retrieved the fireworks arsenal from our room at Rizuto's and put on a show for the chilluns at Brad's place.

Friday was a recovery day, we may have fished, and in the evening we resumed use of Rizuto's billiard room. Jenny Lee's sister Rachel, and her fiance Barry put on a little concert, dueting and soloing on acoustic guitar. It was quite impressive. I snuck out around ten for the comfort of our room and watched a Man vs Wild marathon until I fell asleep.

Saturday was wedding day. They held it at a winery near where they live called The Wines of the San Juan. It's a rustic, and fairly funky place not far off the banks of the San Juan - and across the road from an elk farm. It was pretty fun. weddings are weird, but if you have enough allies, they can be just like any other party...

See? So, there's a blog and half on my "Mind Scrubbing" vacation, and I didn't even mention the last two days.

Saturday Fishing 6/16

2007-06-18T12:43:00.000-07:00

I woke up Saturday with a plan in mind. I searched Google Earth for some new spots I could fly fish on the Silver Strand and decided I was going to try a spot I'd never fished. I had to drive through an uppity housing development to a park. And park. Being that the tide was still kinda low, and it was a shallow beach I only caught weeds on the few casts I made on my fly rod, but I'll be back, at a higher tide, with a floating line, and some surface flies - Corvina hunting.

With the tide in the second half of its swing I had to make something of it, so I hit 'old faithful' and set up camp inside the baylet, near the bathrooms. I took fly and bass gear. I also took some freezer burned fish that was in my fridge, killing two birds with one hunk of frozen fish. I wanted it out of my freezer, and hoped it'd chum something up. It didn't. My intention, again, was to get croakers of larger size than I have been. It was a beautiful day, and sadly, I'd forgotten to put on any sunscreen before leaving home. I got righteously sunburned.

I picked up one dink, um, mini-dink spotted bass not to long into the morning. No pic. Not long after that fish a trickle of teen-aged lifeguards turned into an encampment about 15 yards to my right. Which would have been fine, except most of them got into the water. Before it turned into Beach Blanket Bay Watch, though, I landed a pretty stout spottie, causing two of the younger, less self-composed life guards came running over to see what the heroics were about. Again no pics - it was a spottie, and I guess I was a little embarrassed about posing the little fish for a pic. I guess they were giving potential junior life guards a swim test - apparently by appointment, because they'd show up one at a time, with mom in tow and take their shot. One kid failed so miserably I thought he was going to puke when he got out of the water, and I heard one of the less-sensitive kids in the water make a snide remark. And I was about three times further away than the kid and his mom were.

A while longer, and after hearing the kids in the water (actually the same kid) wondering aloud why I don't fuck off and let them splash around in the whole bay, I headed around to the point I often fish. As I was following the waterline around the bay, I noticed a sit-com version of middle American family shadowing me on my left - with fishing gear. I was hoping they'd stop at one of the picnic gazebos, like they're supposed to, and toss their bait from there. But nope, they got in line behind me, and trudged along to where I wanted to throw flies. I was encouraged when the boy yelled, "Dad, did you bring the hot dogs?" I have yet to meet anyone from the RV park across the street who doesn't throw hot dogs into the bay for fish.

That kind of ruined my mood, plus fly fishing near a bunch of unpredictable meat chuckers is dangerous and irresponsible. I've chucked meat, don't get me wrong, it's just never been lunch meat. Okay, I'm a little snobbish about what I'll use to catch fish. I prefer artificials to bait. So I walked back around the bay to a point near where I'd started. Plus the Life Guard camp had quieted down. I should have been honest with myself, packed up, and went home. But it was a great day, the tide was still moving, and I was having fun. But I didn't catch anything else.

I was out on the sand, launching flies, for about three and half hours, and just got worn out, so I called it a day. I needed food, and had chores to do. Not the greatest day of fishing, but not a bad way to start a day. I went home got groceries, barbequed some chicken and veggies and watched The Last King of Scotland.

Do the Strand 6/14

2007-06-14T16:42:00.000-07:00

Quick report. Woke up, felt like crap, been a little sick. Coughed up a lung, got dressed, and headed for my regular spot in Coronado to get another Yellow Fin Croaker. I guess I got to my spot around 8:10 am. It was overcast, a little chilly, and for some reason standing barefoot and underdressed in the bay didn't seem like a dumb idea. I cast a crease fly for a while, thinking it was more baitfish-like and would stay out of the weeds (they float). But no. Nothing. I switched through a few flies I got at the fly swap. Finally the sun came out, and my first fish was the target species... a smallish YFC.

After that I picked up a small spottie that went unphotographed. I also saw a guide pal, Spot, looking for fish for his client. Then I went home.

6/1 Flies flung in Coronado

2007-06-01T12:18:00.001-07:00

Got up, got out, got coffee and got my arse to Coronado for a little fly fishing. Hit a favorite spot, tried a few flies, starting with a green deceiver, then a black curly-tail bay fly (it was real overcast), then an orange non-curly-tail bay fly, and that seemed to be the ticket. As much as there was a ticket. First fish came as somewhat of a surprise, as I'd been fishing for quite a while with not so much as a bump. A small spottie. I tried to get a pic, but the digicam was buried too deep in the waist pack. So I moved the digicam - the famous digicam - to a pocket in my shorts. Then I moved my arse to different spot. I got a strong hit, followed by a good fight, and in short time I beached this nice Yellow-fin Croaker, one of my favorite bay fish - especially in as shallow water as this that this guy came in.

A few casts later, and as I'm about to lift the fly to recast, it gets hit and I see a small fish streak from left to right in the two-feet of water in front of me. But, as small as it was it only took a swing of my fly rod to beach this little halibut for his close-up.

Nice day on the water, haven't flung flies in a while, and it was nice to have a little success.

Equipment Blog

2007-05-25T11:06:00.000-07:00

There's no real point to this other than I was thinking about going fly fishing this morning but didn't because the tide sucked. But as I was gathering my fly gear together, I was looking at my camera. It's a mess; dinged, scratched, dirty and just generally worn.

I bought this camera in 2004 (seems older than that), it's an Olympus Stylus 410, 4MP weather-proof digital. Nothing special. But for the beating it's taken over the years, the drops, dunks, dings and general neglect it still takes pretty nice pictures.

I bought it as a fishing camera. Something I could keep in my pocket, or backpack, or tackle box, to capture the big fish, great scenery, and just weird stuff on a fishing trip. The 410 had decent reviews but what kinda drew me to it was it was advertised as "weather-proof." Splash-proof is another term they use, meaning you can't submerge it, but taking pictures in the rain or or other wet situations shouldn't damage it. Well, I've had this thing in a chest pack while surf fishing and pulled it out of a puddle of water and taken nice pictures with it.

Here is its self-portrait. Taken in my bathroom with the remote.

The abuse is clear to see. Most of the painted-on icons and lettering have worn off long ago, it makes a noise when the lens comes out like it's got sand in it, which I'm sure it does, and the back looks twice as bad as the front.

The view screen is tiny compared to the huge screen today's digitals have on them. The battery is a big lithium that lasts forever, I take the charger on trips, but have never had to use it. It's not as compact, or light as Olympus's current Stylus line - which are now all weather-proof (the 410 was the only weather-proof Stylus when I bought it), but it's all metal, which I don't think the current Stylus line is.

Here's few pictures I've snapped over the last few years... (click them and they'll get bigger)

That's my buddy James at Torrey Pines State Beach.

This is a knoll in Cuyamaca State Park I thought looked interesting.

This is an early morning at a marina in Bradenton, Florida.

That's it... just real happy with my camera and this is my tribute to my 2004 Olympus Stylus 410. Have a great Memorial Day weekend! Maybe I'll have something better to share by Monday.

Two-bay shore stomp 5/12

2007-05-14T11:58:00.000-07:00

This is long. I only caught one fish.

I woke up Saturday morning a little earlier than expected, shook the fog of sleep off, and grabbed my shore-fishing gear. After a stop at the coffee shop and gas station ($32 to fill up my Civic - 9 gallons of gas) and I was at my spot a little after 8 am. I decided I'd try a spot I really like in Coronado. It's on the bay side of the Silver Strand State Beach, and a nice spit of sand. I'm kind of tired of hopping rocks in the bay, so fishing barefoot from sand is nice and comfortable, and I didn't have to worry about taking a spill. In the past, I've stretched out on the sand and taken a breather. It's a pretty nice place to fish. there's also the bonus of no passersby.

The short story is, I worked the point with small swim baits and Trix Spin Bombs, fan casting and working the dropoff that sits right off the beach. But no. I got, and missed, a hit on my first cast with a Spin Bomb and that was it. If I'd hooked and landed the fish, then obviously the "first-cast jinx" would have been the clear cause of the eventual skunking.

I've had luck with spotties there, I landed a bone fish once, and even have two halibuts off that spot, one was legal. The wind was kind of tough for throwing spinner baits on a bait caster. Even smeared with Hot Sauce and bumped slowly along the bottom, my go-to swimbaits didn't produce a tick.

A halibut from the spot, April '06

I worked my way around the baylet to a spot that's also produced. It's another small, abrupt ledge that gives shelter to small fish. I've seen schools of mullet patrol the edge of that baylet, cruising for food.

On the walk back to my car I saw these ants beginning to dismantle this potato bug.

Since I wasn't feeling like reporting a skunk I stopped at the new Coronado City Hall and made some casts around the unfinished marina. Nope. Nothing. A bunch of empty slips that can be cast to from shore is pretty much a shore stompin' dream.

Soooo, one last deperation stop, I didn't want to go home smelling of skunk, but I was getting hungry. I stopped at the sandy beach next to the Coronado Ferry landing, tied on a small Kastmaster jig and cast around. I eventually lost the jig to a mooring line under whatever restaurant is over there and packed it in. Lame.

Went home, ate, fell asleep on the couch, got up went to the coffee shop again, came home grabbed my gear and headed out again. This time Mission Bay. Mission Bay is known to anglers to hold a larger class of spotted sand bass than the big bay. Not as plentiful, but larger. Once on a fluke, I caught my largest spottie to date off piling number 4 of the Coronado Bridge, but barring that, I've never come close to matching some of the toads I've pulled out of Mission - at the spot I was heading to; South Shores Landing. South Shores is another rock hopping spot, right next to Sea World. It's very shallow and weedy. It's a tough spot but it holds some big spotties. I broke off a halibut there a couple weeks ago, which stole my last old-model Spin Bomb. That hali went berserk, full-blown mental. A fish like that in 12 inches of water doesn't have much choice, I guess. I had my drag too tight and my six-pound test gave.

South Shores. Trix Spin Bombs are large saltwater spinner baits made by a friend and local angler. They're heavy and have a big spooned blades that make a satisfying churn you can feel all the way to the cork grips on the rod. I love fishing them. Why fish attack these things is a mystery, but they hit them with violence and rage. I wanted to get a big spottie or halibut so I stuck mostly with the Spin Bombs, though I also threw another rod with a small fish-colored swim bait.

I worked all the way to the fence guarding Sea World from the riff-raff, and in disgust, worked back toward my car. I tried to remember the spot that hali was chillin' in before it wanted to mangle the shiny, spinny, noisy thing clattering through its turf. I made a couple of casts before I felt the thing we all go out there for... and I wound as fast as I could to tighten down on whatever I dealing with. The cool thing about South Shores is that as you work from the parking lot towards Sea World, east to west, the water gets deeper. Being that I was nearly back to the lot, the water was pretty shallow. Nothing like a desperate fish, fighting for its life in 18 inches to 6 six inches of water. There is plenty of long, thick eel grass and other sea weedy things for a fish to bury itself in, and this damn thing came to hand covered in grass - as do most fish in this spot.

Damn, this has gotten long. Sorry.

And now it's probably going to get anti-climatic. So I landed it, a large spottie, and the skunk smell from two consecutive shore trips went away. It was the biggest spottie I've landed in a couple of years, measured 17 inches. Then it got its picture taken more than Brittany Spears in the midst of an emotional break down. Digital camera, then camera phone, then quickly transmitted across town to a group of disinterested fishing pals. And even more disinterested non-fishing pals. The skunk is off, I can return my head to its full upright position.

Then I went home, got a torta, a six pack, Wes came over and we watched the Padres lose. Then went to the Whistlestop and accidently drank too much. Good Saturday. Bad Sunday.

4/23 My Neighbor, Joe

2007-04-23T23:41:00.000-07:00

Last Saturday morning I was awakened from a disturbing dream at 8 a.m. by the tinny blast of "Fat-Bottomed Girls" from my cell phone, which was on my night stand. It was my buddy, and coworker, James, asking if I was still coming to work, and if so, could I stop and pick up breakfast burritos, for him and Steve, another coworker, from a taco shop in my neighborhood. I said I would, made old-man noise as I got out of bed, put on some jeans that happened to be where I left them, found a clean t-shirt, brushed my teeth, grabbed my work bag and went to my car...

This isn't the story I wanted to tell, but it explains why I was napping at 3:30 on a Saturday afternoon when someone rapped on my metal security screen. Since I was tired, unexpectedly napping, and I knew it'd be my chatty neighbor, Joe, I didn't answer it. We have a secure building (eliminating the chance of pop-ins) and nobody but Joe has ever rattled my black, iron gate. But then the rapper rapped again, I knew Joe wouldn't shake my gate twice unless he needed something so I rolled off the couch and answered the door. Normally, Joe would be a good 12 to 15 feet from the door by the time I answered it. He says it's in case I come out shooting. But this afternoon he was right there, on the opposite end of my "welcome" mat. He had a VHS tape in his hand. He asked me if I knew how to re-spool a VHS tape on which the tape has broken and disappeared into the cassette housing. He said he'd already asked our crusty and slightly intense neighbor. I told him I didn't know how to fix his tape, and that I was sorry. Joe said "I really wanna watch this tape right now." He said he'd let me get back to nappin' - he saw that my throw blanket was on the couch, and then turned the tape so I could read the title before he went back into his place - "Tush Ups."

Spring Training AZ, 3/29-31

2007-04-01T08:19:00.000-07:00

Got a little time out of town this week. My old friend, Wes, and I drove out to Arizona, on Thursday, to see the Padres play some of their last spring-training games. The drive was great, weather beautiful, and we made real good time.

An F-14 on a truck in Gila Bend.

I think we rolled into Phoenix around half past noon. Our hotel was kinda lame, but the staff was nice. When some cab driver tried to charge us $15 for a mile cab ride, the manager got on the phone and gave the dispatcher an ear-full. Then I mistook a Phoenix cop car for a taxi.

We got lunch at an Irish pub in downtown Phoenix. A couple Guinness and some corned beef and cabbage put me in the right frame of mind and took the edge off the drive. I’d forgotten the smoking was still allowed in restaurants in Arizona - charming state. So, luckily I stunk like cigarettes at three in the afternoon.

In the evening we took the cab ride into downtown for a baseball game at Chase Field (formerly the Bank One Ballpark, aka the BOB). First, though, some more beer and hot wings at Alice Cooper'stown. The staff there all wear the signature Alice Cooper eye makeup. Good wings, fair selection of beer, and a butt-load of Alice Cooper and sport memorabilia.

The park was only a block or so away and we wanted to get in early so we had time to check it out a little. The BOB is one of the new, fancy, baseball-only parks. There's pool in the right center stands; rentable for up to 35 people for the sum of $6500.

I bought my first ten-dollar beer at the BOB. Ten bucks. It was nuts. Ballparks are getting ridiculous. I was so taken aback, I had to buy two more to get over it. At least they were big.

The Padres had a good game, and we got to be the obnoxious away fans for a change.

Bud Black, our Padres' new manager, thought I was David Wells and tried to get security to make me take the mound.

Somehow Wes talked a nice bar owner named Denise into letting us into a sorority party her bar was hosting. This is Denise.

Denise.

I don't know why she'd consider letting our mugs into a party for a bunch (250) sorority girls and some dates, but she did. Beside staff we were the only people they let in. Go figure. The staff of Tiggos in Phoenix was very cool, and very good to us. The party was pretty weird, but the girls were friendly, and drunk. Strange night. Painful morning.

We had to get up and out of our hotel, and head to Peoria, AZ for the next game, at the regular Spring Training facility. We were both a little shaky, and a little tired. The hotel in Peoria was nicer than the one in Phoenix, and right across the street from the ball park.

We met our friends Laura and Donna at the park, for the game. I've only been to one Spring Training game in 4 years Laura wasn't also at, that was the game at the BOB, Thursday. She's a friend I used to work with at my current job, but a while back she transferred to a Phoenix office. I was pretty tired, and not in the mood to have much beer. The game was fun, the Padres got their butts kicked, but at 14 - 8, there was a lot going on. The weather in Peoria was excellent, kinda hot and sunny, but once our seats were hit by the shade, it was baseball heaven. We didn't want to leave.

But the game ended so we did leave. Being in Peoria, there wasn't a huge choice of places to go, so we ended up at Hooters, for beers and wings. And butts and boobs. Laura and Donna are pretty funny, and that's the kind of place to go with those two. Makes for some interesting conversation. Friday ended a little early, I was kinda wiped out and we didn't want to drive with them back to Phoenix to continue the party.

I think I slept 10 and a half hours. We got up had a great breakfast at some strip-mall cafe, some coffee, and were back on the road home. Great trip, blew off a lot of steam.

To be, or...

2007-03-22T00:48:00.000-07:00

Okay, here it is... is there anybody out there? Do I continue? Do you want something else? Do you have any suggestions? Domain Registry of America would like a payment on April 27, 2007. That gives me a few weeks to figure out whether or not to continue. Email me, leave a comment here, whatever... Opinions requested, you give them to me unsolicited all the time, now I'm asking.

St Patty's Shore Fishin'

2007-03-17T13:15:00.000-07:00

My non-weekend started with a trip downtown to do some fishing. I had to avoid the St Patty's celebration in Balboa Park so I could get to work in appropriate condition.

I made it to the fishing spot around 9:30 am, put a couple hours on the parking meter and headed to my traditional starting spot. I threw small swimbaits to start, but not so much as a nibble. I switched to rod I had a Trix Spin Bomb tied onto. It wasn't long before I hooked into a small spottie. It's amazing how big a bait a small spottie will attack.

The next fish, and all but one of the rest, was a decent-sized spottie; more in line with the size of the lure. Some of these fish put up a game fight, and having to keep them out of the rocks wasn't always too easy. The last and biggest fish was really trying to bull his way into the rocks, but I could see him in the shallows down the shoreline, and kept a lot of pressure on him. Actually, he was probably a she, judging from the size, and how yellow her chin was. I didn't get a picture of her because the hook set was a little precarious, and looked a little uncomfortable for the fish, so I flipped her off of the hook ASAP.

Overall, I ended with seven spotted sand bass, and the average size was very good for the area.
HAPPY ST PATTY'S DAY! Off to work.

No pics, they were not too good.

3/4 Shore Stompin'

2007-03-04T19:45:00.000-08:00

I finally dragged my arse away from my new TV long enough to get some shore fishing in yesterday. Yep, I left the Mythbusters behind and headed downtown to a favorite, and typically productive spot in the shadow of the big hotels. It was a beautiful evening, almost summery. It’d been so long since I’ve hopped the rocks on a shore-fishing trip I forgot to bring my digicam. I did have the Spottie Slaya with me finally, after a long spell in the shop.

I fished around the edge of a marina and on the bay side of a park, mostly for naught, but once I slathered on some Hot Sauce and slowed down the retrieve a little I picked up a halibut around 16 inches. I was missing some taps here and there before landing my first dink spottie. My second spottie got off the hook and fell into the rocks. Just when I was kneeling down to get him out a big boat wake got me. Everytime I’d get a hand on that little spottie he’d wiggle until his head was under a rock and flare his gills so I couldn’t pull him out. Finally I plucked him out enough to hand under him and fling him into the water. I hate losing a fish in the rocks, or leaving a lure in a fish, so beside getting a little wet, I was pretty relieved to get that fish back into the bay. I was on my way back to the car when I got my last fish, witnessed by a couple guys from Arizona, who were asking me about lobster trapping. So I headed home after three spotties – all dinks – and a small halibut.

This morning I got up and headed out to South Shores Landing to try for some big Mission Bay spotties. My back was a little out of whack in the morning, and after trying a couple lures lost interest in South Shores. I talked to a fella who’d landed 6 spotties in about 45 minutes. I’m guessing he was a tweaker, because once I asked how he was doing, he wouldn’t shut his yap. I just had to keep backing away, and yell “Later!” at the end of a sentence.

I thought I’d try the same spot I fished last night but couldn’t get a parking spot, so I parked near Joe’s Crab Shack, and worked the rocks around there for nothing. I think that area’s been dredged since my last visit; it was much deeper and there didn’t seem to be any vegetation. It used to be a tough spot to keep the grass off the lures. Today I couldn’t pick up anything. I kept working around the park, and it wasn’t until 3 hours had passed since I left home, and one of those “one more cast” moments that I finally avoided a skunk and picked up a chunky spottie from inside the marina.

Not a bad weekend to ease into some fishing.

The New Year etc. 2/1/07

2007-02-01T23:47:00.000-08:00

So far, the New Year has been kinda weird for me. My car’s in the shop because while I was in a pub, someone going to church clipped the front passenger fender and headlight. She left a note, and now it’s being taken care of. Meanwhile, I’m driving around a wholly uncool Ford Festiva or Focus or something. I’ve managed to lose a ring, and trusty pocket knife, a week apart, both of which I’ve had for near 10 years. I feel naked without those two impressive hunks of metal that I took everywhere. Unfortunately, I took them each someplace I shouldn’t have, and now they’re gone. I don’t know… things are changing, and it’s probably good. I ought to embrace it, we’ll see. I’ve had a couple of adventures recently, that I won’t elaborate on, but have sort of changed the way I think about things. They were dumb adventures, misadventures I guess then, but they taught me to be flexible, and not always worry about the small things, life’s fun, don’t hold it at arm’s reach, enjoy it. So, I hope things are going to be a little different this year, more open and positive. The first year of mortgage is behind me, I’ve got a handle on it, let’s enjoy 2007. Maybe just a little less than I enjoyed January though… I want to last the whole year.

I know she won’t ever see this, but I want to say thanks to Annette, the woman who hit my car, for being an honest, stand-up individual and leaving that note. That was big. I don’t think a lot of people would have done it.

Finally, a friend, fellow fisherman, and honest-to-goodness good guy, Paul Sharman, is leaving San Diego to return with his family to England next week. Paul sold me my kayak, and is leaving me a TV, but I’d give ‘em both back if it meant Paul and family could stay. It’s been great, Paul, you’re a hell of a guy, and an even better fisherman. Keep in touch me old muckah (whatever that means).

An atypical Sharman catch, unfortunately we were tournament fishing. Happy Trails, Paulie.

Crappie Trip 1/20

2007-01-20T18:55:00.000-08:00

This morning I met Eron Armour at his house to go crappie fishing at El Capitan Lake, in Lakeside. El Cap is about 20 miles from my house, so for a 6:00 a.m. meeting I left my house a little after 5:30. It's been remarkably cold in San Diego for the last week or so, but I was encouraged by the relative warmth when I walked down to my car. That evaporated when I parked at Eron's and his truck had a sparkling layer of frost covering it.

We said hello, shook hands, and he invited me inside while he finished up some preparations. I played fetch with his Jack Russell, named Moose, and Eron brewed me up some coffee. Intentionally-weak coffee, assuming I was lame, I guess. But not as bad as I imagined it was going to be.

Eron lives pretty close to El Cap so a we hopped in his truck, which was hauling his boat, made a pit stop at 7-11 for supplies, and launched a little after 6:30 a.m. The launch ramp at El Cap is the longest I've ever seen, it's almost funny, and there was actually a female ranger standing at the bottom, in hip-waders, offering to hand line people's boats over to the dock for them. When she asked Eron, being a city boy, I immediately assumed she was a homeless person doing this for tip money.

Eron, as well as others, warned me the run from the dock to where we were going to fish would be bitterly cold. In preparation, I wore some long johns, nylon pants, a thermal shirt, with a t-shirt over it (hesher-style), a fleece, and a gore-tex jacket, ski gloves, and a beenie. But when we started to make the run across the lake, my face got so cold, I thought it'd crack and fall off. It was probably in the 30s to begin with, but with the boat doing 20-odd knots, well... it was painfully cold. My blackened nose will forever be a reminder of that frigid run across El Capitan Lake.

El Capitan is a munipal reservoir, like all San Diego County lakes, and is situated in a steep valley. It took quite a while for the sun to rise enough to reach us directly while we fished. I tried to fly fish to keep warm, but ended up having to sit on my hands a couple of times to warm them up. So the crappie drift was more finger-friendly.

Eron got a strong pull early on but it threw the hook, and that was about it until it was near quitting time. Another crappie came unbuttoned near the boat, towards the end, but we took a skunking in the end. It wasn't so bad, it's a beautiful lake, a beautiful, if chilly, day, and the conversation was lively. It was actually one of the more pleasant skunks I've taken in a long time. Eron's on a special diet for a few days, so talk of delicious food was especially torturous for the poor guy.

I ended my trip with the now traditional carne asada burrito, from Bennie's on 30th, a nap, and later (right now), some Pacificos. Thanks, Eron, for a cool trip. Look forward to a merciless revenge on El Cap's crappies.

Oh, Winter 1/13/07

2007-01-13T18:00:00.000-08:00

Made plans to meet a group of kayakers in the deep south bay (see two previous posts). The weather reports had today being clear, mild winds, and on the cold side - in fact there were frost advisories across the county. Which to me means, really, really cold in the morning, sun comes out, everything is warm and happy.

Since the meet time was 6:30 am, a little before sunrise, I loaded my yak and all my gear after work Friday, to avoid having to do it in the cold, dark pre-dawn morning. Then I put my car in my car port and locked the gate behind. Perfect.

In the morning, I downgraded my previous clothing choices, figuring the sun would come out, and I'd feel like an idiot, over-dressed and sweating through my clothes. I brewed up some coffee, put on sunscreen, grabbed some stuff I didn't want sitting in the cold all night, and headed out.

I pulled the car out, checked the tie-downs and roof racks and headed out. Because I've only had my yak on my car once before, worrying about its connection to the car kept me from noticing that it wasn't clear, it was cloudy, really cloudy, and in an ugly, it-could-rain-any-time way.

When I pulled up, a few of the guys that came from further away were already rigging up, or just standing around bullshitting. Eddie, the guy who sort of organized this meeting, and who's virgin kayak-fishing trip this was, came from Palm Desert - three hours away. Seth, who I met for the first time, came from Winchester. I'd never even heard of Winchester. But according to Google Earth it's 78 miles from where we launched. Three guys came from Oceanside, which is 46 miles away. I came from a measly eight miles away.

Once everyone was accounted for, rigged up, and ready to go, we set off through the marina to the bay. As soon as I was afloat, a big sterling ring, someone made for me many years ago slid off my finger and plopped into the water - never to be seen again. I shouldn't have been wearing it, but it's habitual to put it on when I put my watch on. Damn. That thing weighed about a half pound, and really got people's attention when you rapped it on a window. I'll miss that thing.

Once outside of the marina it was pretty obviously going to be a cold, ugly, windy day ill-suited to fishing, or outdoors fun of any type. But, we're supposed to be rugged, sturdy outdoors types, and actually fish began coming aboard kayaks pretty quickly and fairly often.

It was damn cold, and suddenly the wind bore down and decided it was going to get serious. Then people started saying, "Did you feel rain?" Luckily the rain never materialized, but we fought wind until we finished fishing, about 4 hours after we launched.

Seth and I made a long paddle into the wind, to a channel I know to hold fish. By the time we got there, my arms were burning and except for my stiff, numb feet, I was pretty warm. We drifted the channel a couple of times, a bat ray Seth caught being the only success down there.

Since both of us were losing contact with our feet we headed back into the Marina, thinking the others had already packed it in. We ran into Famous Drew and BigDerel fishing the boat slips in the marina, and apparently doing well. We fished around the marina a little, but I'd reached my threshold for numb, painful feet and Seth and I called it a day.

Breaking down and loading my yak was more miserable than in the morning as I had to remove my booties and slip into flip flops, which didn't help the cold numbness.

I got home, unloaded the gear, changed, went and got a six pack of Pacifico, a carne asada burrito from Bennie's on 30th and after having lunch, napped for 3 hours on the couch. Not a bad trip, not a great one, but sometimes the nasty ones are the most memorable.

Last fishing trip of the year 12/31/06

2007-01-02T10:05:00.000-08:00

Well, well, Christmas booty allowed me to pay off the kayak, get roof racks, and outfit my yak a little. Now I'm officially self-sufficient on the kayak front. I can transport and fish from my yak solo.

Being that I only had a fishing license for one more day, I decided to take the jump, and try out the roof racks. I used to think preparing for a boat-fishing trip required fore-thought, nope, getting all my fishing and yakking gear in/on my car is a bit of a chore. I'd put the yak on the car, in order to adjust the kayak saddles on the roof rack, but I'd never used all the straps, and tie-downs. It turns out it wasn't too big a deal, it just happened it was the first time.

I finally got down to the J St. Marina, unloaded the yak, outfitted it, and launched by about 10:15. That's pretty late by fishing standards, but, I was out to kayak almost as much as to fish.

It was a beautiful winter day in SD, probably in the mid to high 60s; warm enough that I got hot sitting there in a t-shirt (sorry Grandma). There was very little wind, and the water was still smooth as glass by the time I reached my fishing spot. Look...

Fishing was pretty slow, even though the tide was in the middle of a nearly 7-foot swing. The fish finder was metering plenty of suspended fish, and I threw the kitchen sink at them, but nope, a few here and there but nothing to brag about. All spotties, all but one on grubs and swimbaits - the one came on a crank bait, but all those hooks took so long to get out of the fish I took it off and put a swimbait on.

When the wind finally did come up, it blew me back towards the marina, so I fished in there for a while for a couple more spotties. My first cast in the marina was at an empty end slip. I landed the grub right at the dock, let it sink, and as soon as I began the retrieve, it was nailed. I love it when there's fish where you think there'll be. All the learnin' pays off.

Now, I'm off to Squidco to get my 2007 license, so I can try some new spots in the yak.

First kayak trip. 12/2/06

2006-12-03T07:06:00.001-08:00

Today I took my new fishing kayak out for shake down in the deep south end of San Diego bay. I got this kayak from my friend Paul, who for unfortunate reasons, had to unload it. Paul's an awesome angler, though, so this boat's got some extra mojo.

I wasn't sure what to expect as far a fishing from a kayak goes. I'd never been in any kind of kayak. In fact, I'd never even laid eyes on my kayak until Scott pulled into the parking lot with our kayaks in the back of his dad's truck. So we strapped and clipped the seats in, stowed gear, put the wheels on them and pulled them down to the launch ramp.

These are very stable kayaks, they're called Fish n' Dives, so they're expected to remain upright while swimmer climbs into them. So kind of pushed off and climbed in, but didn't push off far enough, and was still grounded. No big, just a good push with the paddle and I was floating. Once clear of the launch ramp I tossed a little crank bait into the water to troll on the way out of the marina.

Today's tides were a pretty broad swing with an early-morning high tide around 7 feet, and a low of -1ish around 1 p.m. That means when we launched the tide was a little below its high mark, and when we returned it's be a little above its low mark. Here's why I bring this up. As we rounded the short rock breakwater my trolling rod suddenly bent over near double, but it obviously wasn't a fish. I'd snagged on one of those rocks from the jetty. The lure broke off and it was too deep to reach. So I left it, and didn't troll anymore until later.

Being an inexperienced paddler, I was glad to see Scott tossing lures when I rounded the jetty after sorting out my snag. So we threw swimbaits in the shallow water outside of the marina for a few then slowly started working our way towards a bird sanctuary in the south bay. There's a channel that runs almost all the way around it, and we've caught some decent fish there in the past.

On the way out there, I scored my first kayak fish, a little spotted bay bass. Fishing was a little tough for a while after that, not for Scott, just for me. Scott found a couple of pockets, where he was able to land a decent count of spotties. Of course he had a depth finder and was able to stay over the channel, where I was farming eel grass in the shallows.

Kayak lunch.

Scott eventually set out for a spot a ways away where birds had been crashing on bait. After a few more spotties, I reluctantly made the paddle to join him. Pelicans were crashing into the surface with explosive splashes after baitfish. It was quite a spectacle. Scott was picking up spotties feeding under the birds, and not long after I labored up near him, he hooked up on a nice fish that pulled his kayak around a little before he got it to the surface. It turned out to be what I'm sure is his personal best short-fin corvina. It was actually one of the nicer ones I've seen in the open bay. Not long after that he picked up a nice yellow-fin croaker, one of the harder-fighting fish in the light tackle fishery.

We eventually had to make the long paddle back to the marina. Stopping "to fish" a few times along the way. When we got back into the marina, I swung by the rocks where I lost the crank bait on the way out, and there it was a few feet above the water line, embedded in an organism somewhere between plant and animal, that squirted water on me when I applied some pressue to the lure. Once on the landing ramp, it was pretty tough lifting the yak to put the wheels under it, and haul it up the long low-tide launch ramp.

The rest of the day was spent in a state of exhausted bliss, drinking Pacificos, and making and eating carne asada tacos...

11/22/06

2006-11-22T12:13:00.000-08:00

Ahhh, the joys of auto shop visits. I'd been a little wary of taking my Honda to get its timing belt changed because of what I thought was going to be an expensive procedure. I recently found out it's a relatively inexpensive bit of work. So, I made an appointment, expecting the worst - the inevitable call, outlining all the other stuff apparently wrong with my vehicle. The initial estimate had been for $165, which I though reasonable, given this Honda hasn't had much wrong with in the 7 years I've had it. Of course, while I was having coffee, waiting for my ride, I got the call - the water pump is leaking, the belt tensioner needs replacing, two seals need to be replaced. Sweet. At least the order of things remain constant. $500 later, I'm sitting here typing, waiting to pick up the car. Hey, at least I didn't put it off until cataclysmic failure - as I have done twice in the past. Cheers! Happy Thanksgiving.

Oh, on a better note - due to very unfortunate circumstances - I've come into a fishing kayak, for a very nice price. Details after maiden voyage...

11/18/06 Late...

2006-11-18T22:50:00.000-08:00

So it's late Saturday night. I worked this morning then really didn't do much else except buy and make dinner. Anyway, I was thinking of something I could do to add content on a regular basis. Since the music page has been pretty static lately, I was thinking of doing some reviews of albums. Not really new albums or anything, just some of the albums over the years that have affected me, or defined a time period of my life, or of popular music generally. I don't know, just seemed like something that might be fun. I'll think about tomorrow, I have a 5-year old birthday to go to, then I'll try to come up with the first record to review. One a month? Every payday? Whenever I get to it? I think I'll get into this. We'll see...

Oh yeah, any feedback would be appreciated. Thanks.

11/9/06

2006-11-09T09:34:00.000-08:00

Quick post-election blog. Well, I guess the people have spoken. I think only Arnold's born-again enviro stance saved his butt. Then again, Mr. Angelides didn't really set the state on fire either. Rummy "stepped down," though it seems a little like he may have been invited to do so. So, the corrupt, arrogant bumblers have been ousted and we'll see what's going to come. Good times...

Random photo to pretty things up...

Have a nice future...

BTW, I find it very funny that the rest of the world let out a collective "Hell Yes!" when the election returns came in.

10/28/06

2006-10-28T18:59:00.000-07:00

I beat my alarm this morning, by about 10 minutes, which is good because it gave me some more time, but bad because it meant I wasn't sleeping well. Oh well. Most of my gear was ready, my keys were in the refridgerator, in the grocery bag that had my lunch, snacks and beer in it. That's my sure-fire, never-forget method of making sure my food makes it out to the boat with me. I must say it's brilliant. If you don't mind cold keys.

After getting coffee, an old-fashioned, and a sandwich at Starbucks, I met Bryan at his slip around 6 am. We're having a pretty good Santa Ana right now, so it was clear and cold this morning. By cold, I mean I had to have more than a t-shirt on when we left the slip for the kelp beds.

Our official quest was to bring home some legal ling cod for tacos, then move into the kelp beds for some "big boy" fishing. Without going too into fishing the kelp beds for calico bass, I'll just say, to me in the inshore realm of fishing in San Diego, there's not much that compares with working swimbaits and jetty worms in the forest for big, strong calico bass.

So the ling leg of our morning was a total washout. We each picked up a Barred Sand Bass, which is not too great, but it is a bass.

So we moved into the kelp and for all of our work were rewarded with a few calicos, luckily of good size. Drifter was first...

He's pimping a product called "Uni Butter" or "Goop Butter" for a close pal of his.

I'm just going to load the rest...

It was actually a pretty beautiful day, with varying winds, and damn warm at times. I was hoping to lure a Phoca vitulina near the boat for some photos, but this one was shy - and if I hadn't for the hundredth time, left my SLR at home I would have had great shots. Another thing I need to buckle down on....

Anyway, great day on the water w/ derfter, per usual, and some decent fish. Thanks, silly bastard.
Here's Bryan's lysergic report from Saltwaterbastards.com... http://www.saltwaterbastards.com/showthread.php?t=3235

Blog?

2006-10-26T00:21:00.000-07:00

So I thought this might be an easy way to keep up-to-date info flowing on my page. It's a little confusing, thanks to the usual suspects for helping me figure this out. As I write, I'm not eve sure how it's going to integrate into my website but it should be fun figuring it out.

I plan on posting general personal news, as well as the stuff on my site that interests me. So, there might be (will be) info on green automobile technologies, fishing, Arsenal FC, and politics. You know, stuff. Feel free to join in. This may only go on for a little while. Or not.