Halibut Hal’s Fishing Trip November 24, 2012

 

Saturday night we arrived at CISCO Landing and boarded the “Mirage” prior to the 10PM departure. 

 

Joining me was Steve “the fishing machine” aka “Banana Steve” and twenty other anxious fishermen.  The boat already had two bait tanks full of live squid and the plan was to fish Santa Rosa Island. 

At daybreak we arrived at Rosa and the anchor line was dropped. Steve and myself fished the bow and had immediate hook-ups of big red snapper (vermillion rockfish),  I caught two more snapper before the boat moved to a new rock. 

 

Captain Joe always made sure that we were in the right zone to catch fish; and we  slayed the fish! (Actually Steve slayed em; but, I caught my share as well).  I ended the day with 4 big ocean whitefish, 2 ling cod (I caught and released another 9 short lingcod), and 10 quality rockfish (mostly big red snapper and chucklehead). 

 

And speaking of “chuckleheads”…Banana Steve, the fishing machine, kept everyone laughing and entertained with both his fishing skills and fun personality. Steve ended the day with 10 fish limits of rockfish, 8 ocean whitefish, and 2 legal lingcod (he also caught and released 12 short lings)! 

 

I have attached a couple of pictures of Steve with some of his catch.

 

 

 

I highly recommend Captain Joe Vilareal and his crew, including Ryan and Dan (the best deckhands around) and Andrew the “galley guy”. 

 

This was an open charter trip and the other passengers onboard were a great group to fish with.  We all had lots of fun and almost full limits of quality fish for all aboard. 

 

Steve and I look forward to our next trip on the Mirage, probably before the end of December… when the rockish season shuts down on 12/31 until March 1st of next year.            

 

Halibut Hal reporting…