Offshore Saturday 07-19-14

[chris138]

Short Version: 25+ miles, 13hrs, 2 bonies, no tuna.

Long Version: Launched at 3:30am from the shores and the wind was on it already. Ended up taking my x-factor and letting a friend use the prowler. Paddled out and made the NWC around 5:00am. Filled my bait tank with small spanish. Pinned a big greenback on my live bait rig and started out due west.

Water was cold and rolled in LJ. 67.5 deg F and green. About 6 or 7 miles out we hit the blue water and the temp bumped up to 71 deg F. There were dolphins and birds and blue whales all over this area. Put in the trollers and chased the ponies a bit for nada. Found a good paddy in this area but nobody home.

Kept heading due west and found water up to 72 at 9 miles west of bird rock. Area looked real good. Saw fish breaking under birds. Chased the terns for nada.

Starting heading SW as far a mission bay to try and reach the north knuckle of the 9. Went another 3 miles or so out and the water temp had dropped way down to as low as 67.5. Stained water and no life in this area so changed course due north and the temp slowly came up as we went north.

We got back up to where we were 12 miles west of marine st. The birds were all over this area and I saw breaking fish under the terns several times. Had good marks in this area. rapala got hit twice for small boneheads. worked the megabait, mackerel, and rapala all over this area and couldn't get the right kind to go. Started trolling in at 1:30pm. Found a huge paddy in 72 deg water, nobody home. Landed at the shores around 5:00pm.

Lessons learned:

1. You have to paddle way further than you think. Sure we only made it 10-12 miles out, but that's not in a straight line. We were zig zagging and circling and boxing and chasing birds all over. So I'm not sure the total distance. At least 25mi but it could've been as high as 30. I only used the GPS and VHF sporadically to conserve battery, so I didn't track the entire paddle. And it's not just cruising paddling. When the birds pile up, you have to sprint if you want to even get close.

2. If you're not paddling, a rapala does nothing. I tried to keep moving as much as I could, but there were some areas where i wanted to drift and work the jig so you have to clear your rapala and have a mack out. The hardest part was trying to decide whether to box a fishy area, drift, or just keep moving outside and not get distracted while staying on top of your spread.

3. Its totally doable, but la jolla launch is not ideal. I think I needed to get south of the chloro-band and temp break off LJ. Next time I would launch from tourmaline and head southwest straight to the bank, then work west from there. I should've gone further. I think about 40 total miles is closer to whats needed.

Side note is that there was no boat traffic at all where we were and there were fish around. VHF was pretty much worthless. Couldn't hail boats which were only a couple miles away. Cell phone worked all the way up to 10 miles offshore.

All that said, I'm ready to go again! Who's down for Wednesday?

[Pagzzz]

Awesome trip report! Even though it was a bust fishing, some valuable lessons learned it seems. Definitely seems that long chloro line break out to 20 mi from LJ acted like a fish wall. Launching from tourmo or MB probably would have helped.

A couple of questions for ya, if you don't mind:

1) What kind of speed were you able to maintain for trolling and what was your trolling spread setup? Enough speed for effective trolling?

2) Could you sneak up on any breaking fish without spooking them?

3) What did you bring with you to transport any caught tuna back without attracting the toothy kind?

PG

[romspacenut]

Thanks for the report and glad you guys made it back safe!

[blitzburgh]

You the man!

[5-20]

25 miles in a XFactor?! With a full baitwell?! That gives me hope!!!

Cool report. You gave it your best!

[Cbad Mike]

That's a hell of a trip....
Thanks for the report and I'm happy to hear that you did what you said except now I feel like kind of a puss for getting so tired just trolling back and forth along the kelp.

[INGRIDSDAD]

Great report, 25 miles on an X-Factor is a great training run for 40 miles on your Prowler.

[chris138]

Originally Posted by Pagzzz

Awesome trip report! Even though it was a bust fishing, some valuable lessons learned it seems. Definitely seems that long chloro line break out to 20 mi from LJ acted like a fish wall. Launching from tourmo or MB probably would have helped.

A couple of questions for ya, if you don't mind:

1) What kind of speed were you able to maintain for trolling and what was your trolling spread setup? Enough speed for effective trolling?

2) Could you sneak up on any breaking fish without spooking them?

3) What did you bring with you to transport any caught tuna back without attracting the toothy kind?

PG

1. About 3-3.5 kts. I was trolling a greenback and a sardine colored x-rap. seemed like the speed was good, but then again I didn't catch anything.

2. Fish, whales, birds didn't seem to care that we were there. The issue isn't sneaking up on them, rather it is being able to catch them as everything is constantly moving, sinking out and popping up elsewhere.

3. All I had was a gaff and a gameclip. Trying to figure out where you're going to keep all the tuna you haven't caught yet is kinda putting the cart before the horse IMO. If i had miraculously limited on YFT i would've probably put them in the front hatch of my xfactor i guess

[Pagzzz]

Good stuff!!

(I am so going in my garage tonight and starting to figure out this trolling from an OC-1 idea so I can head out with you next time!)

[walrus]

Sounds like a great adventure. I'm sure you got some people's juices flowing to do the same.

Next time, I hope you get better results fishing. Good luck Wednesday.

[Dannowar]

You guys have balllllllls


Sick journey

[momo fish]

Wow regardless of fish the fact that you were able to do the trip is great and gives others hope that it's doable. Good going.