Pacific City 4-24

A few of us made a mid-week break for the Coast on Tuesday. The forecast looked good and it wasn't hard to blow off work for the day. As usual it was a great day of fishing in the salt. It wasn't as hot it was a month or so ago, but the Grey Whales on their way north put on one hell of a show. This was my first time seeing them in a kayak and the sight of one whale fully breaching up out of the water repeatedly was absolutely breathtaking. I feel incredibly lucky to have been able to witness it. Life is good 

Looking pretty flat!

Pelagic making it look easy from the start


Look, a whale! Okay, I'm pretty sure that's actually just a shadow but I swear there was one there a second earlier

Craig seemed to have a fish on every 30 seconds for the first couple of hours



Healed bite marks on both sides, probably from a much bigger ling.


My only keeper Cabbie of the day. I lost an absolute monster at the boat. It shook the hook a split second before I clamped down the lip grippers

Around noon the wind really started to kick up and Sinker was nice enough to radio me a friendly suggestion to head for shore. He took a little swim on his first time in and decided it was so much fun he'd try it again.




I think I landed 7-8 Lings, 1 Cabbie, 1 black, and lost a number of fish on the way up. I still can't seem to catch a greenling for the life of me. I thought a pink and white steelhead jig would be deadly, but still no luck.

The whale was incredible.  Pretty much whenever it was around all I could do was stare in its general and wait for it to come up again.  Fishing was good I probably could have come home with a limit if I kept any of my lings.  I didn't even take a picture of them because I wanted lingzilla.  This trip also set a  new chumless record for me of about 4 hours.  YAY scopace . 

I need to take more pic's   I get wrapped up in the fishing and don't even think about pics. These are from the paddle out before the blood bath started.  Best ling bite all year! Males are guarding nests and are very aggressive plus the big mamma's are around!

Thanks for the report, guys! Wish I could have made it out.

I need to take more pic's   I get wrapped up in the fishing and don't even think about pics. These are from the paddle out before the blood bath started.  Best ling bite all year! Males are guarding nests and are very aggressive plus the big mamma's are around!

So were all the 25ish inch lings I was catching not nesting? How deep are the larger ones nesting this time of year? I seem to be gifted at catching the small fish 

I need to take more pic's   I get wrapped up in the fishing and don't even think about pics. These are from the paddle out before the blood bath started.  Best ling bite all year! Males are guarding nests and are very aggressive plus the big mamma's are around!

So were all the 25ish inch lings I was catching not nesting? How deep are the larger ones nesting this time of year? I seem to be gifted at catching the small fish 

Those are the males, most likely on nests.   I was getting one nice fish 30" ish for every ten 18-24 inch male.   I sent back a bunch of chunky 28-30inch fish after bonking my limit (29" & 32").

I'm surprised there are any fish left over there. Great report and pics. Noah, try small stinky baits for the greenling. Mussel guts never fails, shrimp is good. The only one I ever caught on a jig was tipped with bait (all shore based ,still, of course).

Thanks Chris. Are you all set to give Depoe a try one of these days?

Thanks Chris. Are you all set to give Depoe a try one of these days?

Almost. Still lacking radio and air horn but that's about it now. Oh yeah, and seasick pills.

Nice report guys, wish I was there!

Fun times!

Nice pics! Seeing a gray whale up close would be quite a site to see.  What kind of trailer is that hauling the yaks?

That is Pelagic's sweet hauler. That is my summer project, trying to produce something half as cool. Here are some more shots of his handy work.

http://www.northwestkayakanglers.com/index.php?topic=4670.msg48347#msg48347

I had a blast out there.  I would have taken more pictures, but I was too busy catching fish!   That usually isn't the case.  Here is one of the whale breaching.  It was a tough shot to get because I kept dipping into the trough of the waves as the whale would breach.  I just held the camera up as high as I could, pushed the shutter button, and hoped I timed it right.  Apparently, I got lucky.  This was the first time I had ever seen a whale in the wild.

Here is Nate with his blue cabzilla.



Here are two cabbies I caught.  Both right around 21 inches.  I would have been happy any other day, but since they were not AOTY upgrades I was a little disappointed.  I do love how they fight.  The first one shredded the Big Hammer I have used almost everyday out on the salt.  After every use, I would melt it back together with my soldering iron, but I believe it is sadly beyond repair now.    Ah well, as you can see in the second picture, the large root beer grub made an adequate substitute.




Then, as you can see in the second picture below, I was molested by this ling. Since he didn't even offer to buy me dinner, I made him into my dinner.




An astute reader may have noticed that in the pictures posted of me throughout this thread there was something vital missing on my yak that is common to most kayaks.  Any guesses?

I will try to post a video tomorrow of my surf landing without said item.   Pelagic noticed on the way out but thought it was intentional on my part.  I didn't even notice until hours later a short time before heading back to shore. Then the pucker factor kicked in.

That is Pelagic's sweet hauler. That is my summer project, trying to produce something half as cool. Here are some more shots of his handy work.

http://www.northwestkayakanglers.com/index.php?topic=4670.msg48347#msg48347

As for the Yak trailer, it is a thing of beauty.  I plan to modify my current trailer by stealing some ideas from Pelagic's and Insayn's trailers.

Thanks again for the fun time guys. 

Humm....maybe a peddler without a way to become a paddler if the need arose ??