Michelle & I traveled to San Diego for Memorial weekend. We were joined by my sister & brother-in-law. We went fishing on Friday and spent the rest of our time sight-seeing. Here is the fishing report.
My uncle who lives in southern CA joined us for a 3/4 day of off-shore fishing. We left from Mission bay aboard a large, slow boat. We stopped at a bait barge in Mission Bay and filled the live well before heading into Mexican territorial waters. The plan was to troll lures while the captain and deckhand looked for kelp paddies from the tuna tower.
After a two hour boat ride (~30 miles) we started trolling. We trolled for a long time before finally hooking a fish. Michelle reeled in this rather large bonita.
We trolled for a while longer before the guys finally found a kelp paddy. When we found a kelp paddy the captain would pull up to it and we freelined live hearings. If nothing happened in 10 minutes we would search for more kelp. This went on for several hours with no action.
On the way back to the dock the deckhand threw some bait at a kelp paddy as we trolled by and several big fish slammed it. The first bait we put in the water got hit instantly - Andrea was fighting a fish. The second bait in the water got hit - Craig was fighting a fish. We drifted off the kelp while Andrea & Craig fought a double. Craig's fish broke off but Andrea landed this yellow tail.
The captain maneuvered the boat back to the kelp and this time Craig and I had a double. Both of our fish went into the kelp and tangled our lines. Craig's fish bro
ke mine off but he landed his.
We went back to the kelp again but the fish had moved on or weren't biting anymore. We trolled back in but didn't catch any more fish. The captain saw a mako go end-over-end so we slow trolled a live mackeral in the area but no luck.
Our final tally was 1 bonita and 2 yellow tails. We cooked fish on Saturday night at my uncle's house. It was awesome. The bonita tasted a lot like blackfin tuna. The yellow fin was flaky and delicious.
