San Diego Bay 8/15 Got butt kicked by a big butt

[Dail14]

Launched at tidelands and made the long paddle to the bait barge. On the way over I decided to troll a kastmaster and rapala shad rap to see if anything wanted to play on the surface and managed a few macks on the crankbait. I also caught a lizardfish on the kastmaster which kind of surprised me as I thought they were bottom dwellers. However what really caught me by surprise was that after I cast the kastmaster back out I instantly hooked up to my first ever halibut. Unfortunately he was about the size of a small pancake but its still a first and I took it as a sign of good things to come. I got to the barge and picked up some sardines that were in pretty good condition and decided to drift from there for some larger butts. Pretty quickly I hooked up to a good sandbass that came in a hair under five pounds. He went on the stringer and I sent another dine back down. For the next couple hours I got some interest from halibuts as I got constantly raked baits.I couldn't figure out why I could not get a hookup until I let a dine swim around the yak for a second and discovered that the hooks were getting buried in the sides of the bait. I started collar hooking and that changed things big time. At around noon my clicker starts to slowly go off. I hook up and a short fight later netted my first barely legal halibut who also went on the stringe. I sent another dine down and within two minutes I hook up to another much larger but. After about six minutes get him to the surface and my jaw dropped, This thing was bigger than the front hatch on my stealth12. I reach for my gameclip so its ready and managed to knock it into the water. I then go through the motions of what i have read online and go for the gaff shot. I got him in the gills and it held still until I attempted to get it on board at which point it went absolutely beserk. It almost capsized me and then proceeded to try to drag my gaff to the bottom with me holding on. I let the gaff come out thinking I have a good hookset and can bring it back up. However it goes two feet and . I had reeled in my swivel into the rod guide without realizing and the line broke there. After that I made the paddle back to the launch completely exhausted from the fight with the giant. Final fish count was two macks, 1 lizard, 1 sandbass and 3 halibut that I got my hands on with two landed. All in all a good day fishing and managed to break my hali cherry. Does anyone have any advice on how to handle large halibut like that when alone with no game clip? Once I lost the clip I had no clue how I could secure that thing. O well it really did not get to that point. Next time Im just going to powder its skull once in range.