Mid-Valley Crew Makes First Trip to the Salt

Four of us including NWKA member bb2fish, her friend and my wife all made our long-planned first salt water kayak fishing trip this past weekend. It's taken me this long (4+ years) to accumulate the proper gear and courage to do it and then also find time and others to go with. We had hoped to also get Tinker and his wife to go but she was not well and so Tinker contributed mightily to our efforts with encouragement, helping pack our stuff, and taking lots of great pictures from shore. He even gave me a push through the raging surf, thanks man! Actually the surf was pretty mild. Being cautious folks, we predetermined to fish only until 11:00 since the wind and swells were predicted to increase later on. Conditions were pretty good, a little bit of wind, a little bit of chop but nothing gnarly at all.



We never did find a red hot bite anywhere but everyone got a rockfish eventually once we located them. I also got a keeper ling and a greenling. There was one close encounter with a gray whale i.e., you could count the barnacles. No photo, unfortunately.





Here is our collective stringer for the morning.



We all made it back to land without any hulis although the surf had increased quite a bit. High fives all the way around. That is not the end of the story, though, as we had pumped about 100 sand shrimp on Friday for a proposed surf perch outing. Barb's friend who, lacking a radio handle, is now known as "Landshark" had recently purchased a surf casting rod and salt water reel  but had yet to catch anything off of a beach. The next day we headed out to a likely spot with our sand shrimp. My wife made the first cast and, a minute later, was reeling in a double. After a few minutes we realized that we might be filleting fish all afternoon and decided to limit ourselves to retaining just a limited number of the bigger ones. It was red hot perch fishing.



I'm sure we all exceeded the 15 we could have retained and spent a fun filled three hours catching and releasing perch until we finally ran out of bait.



It was a great weekend at the south coast, successful all the way around, and I am ready to do it all again.

Awesome report!  Sounds like you guys scored all around.

-Mark-

.

 great report Tinker,

 Nice haul of fish, water looks awesome, and everyone had a good time.
 Does it get any better

 Where was Barbs' new PA 17 ? couldn't see it in the pics.

 EDIT--- Oooops.... leapt before I looked. Still a cool report. Thanks C-run.

 great report Tinker,

 Nice haul of fish, water looks awesome, and everyone had a good time.
 Does it get any better

 Where was Barbs' new PA 17 ? couldn't see it in the pics.

Uh, Mark, it was C_Run's post.  I was the guy standing on the beach yelling "Go Team!"

I know they had a great day, but it was almost as much fun watching friends go out for the first time, and meeting them when they came back safely and successfully.

Thanks for letting me share your day, Chris.

This is a great report. This is what it's all about.

Awesome on the surf perch! I can't wait until it's my day to find a surf perch bite like that.

Looking forward to more!

Great report -  That's a pretty good first trip in the salt!

excellent.   on Monday, I also had a close encounter with a large Gray Whale while just out over the Siuslaw bar, getting some ocean practice on our Oasis, also no pictures but something I will never forget...cheers, roger

Thanks, guys. We had a fish taco taste test with the three species that night. The ling cod won. Barb had some good tips to improve my filleting skills and I got some good practice. She's a pro. 

It was also the maiden voyage of the new T-13 I got last year. I finally got it set up with a fish finder and anchor system. So, we now have two kayaks permanently stationed at our place near Bandon. We are hoping to get out to Sunset Bay this year and do some fall salmon fishing in the Coquille when the time comes.  That's one yellow and one camo in case any of you south coast folks see us around in the future.

Very nice report.  It looks like you launched at Port Orford?  I've wanted to fish there for awhile now.

Very nice report.  It looks like you launched at Port Orford?  I've wanted to fish there for awhile now.

Yep. The protected beach by the dock and short paddle to the fish make it nice especially for us beginners.

Nice job folks, something I'm still looking forward to, my 1st trip to the salt. Hope to try that this summer, way to go.

John

Sweet trip!  I look forward to the day I'm comfortable enough to hit the salt.  Now I just limit myself to lakes and bays.  Working on rivers.

This was my first trip to the open ocean in a kayak, but it wont be my last.
I was much more concerned about the wind and the possibility of fog dropping in over the head, but we were sheltered by the big rocks and easily navigated back to the beach.  Definitely a learning experience. 

The kayaking and fishing with friends was great fun!

Thanks for the pics at the launch, Tinker!  That looks crazy....but not another wave in sight!

That's one bad Mama Jama right there! Looking good Barb.