Sucia 2012 Reports

Outbound crossing was rough, but really quick.  Less than an hour.  Coming back was a nearly 2 hour battle.  I swear there are half mike wide eddies in that channel.

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How was the fishing?

How was the fishing?

I'll let the others chime in on this.  Marie and I fished maybe 3 hours total the whole trip.  Even with the small amount of time fishing, it was an awesome trip.  I'll post pics and my trip summary tonight.

Oh and while it's fresh in my mind:  If you cannot force yourself to paddle/peddle at a 5 mph pace for 2+ hours, take the water taxi.  Ideally, we would have crossed around 6am yesterday morning, but circumstances didn't allow for it.  For most of our return we were pushing near our max pace and making headway at 1.2 mph.  One particular area of interest was where the current between Little Sucia and Sucia dumped into the main current south of the island.  It was 150 ft deep and looked like whitewater rapids. 

How was the fishing?

We had to work hard for our dinners.  But in the end we ate well...thanks in part to Spot "the campfire meal-gician".  It was awesome to hang with Zee, Spot, Lee and Marie.  Great folks and great anglers too.  I learned alot.  Marie had by far the best "time spent fishing to keeper ratio."  Well done.

Zee and Spot have most of the photos so I'll look forward to their official reports. 

Man you guys are all teases!  Pics dang it

Here is a picture of the view from the awesome campsite deepcolor snagged for us.



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Friday morning we woke up around 5:30 and put the finishing touches on packing.  Got some caffiene and gas, and headed north.  Got a call from Andrew around 7, saying things looked rough.  Thought "well I'm driving up there and seeing what it's got" and kept going.  Got to Anacortes Ferry Terminal around 8:30.  Ferry left for Orcas around 10, and after arrival we drove straight to the north beach parking lot.  All 11 spots were empty.   We loaded up the yaks and started our crossing around noon on Friday.

The crossing started smoothly with a nice tailwind pushing us and we were averaging around 5mph with minimal effort.  About halfway across there were wind-wave swells from at least 3 different directions and it turned into mechanical bull riding session. 




About 45 minutes later I see Andrew's yak around the corner of little Sucia Island.  On Wednesday night I met him and Mark at the grocery store and passed off a tote and a cooler.  That was pretty sweet and made crossing a LOT easier.  Thanks again!  To top it all off, Andrew picked out a really sweet camping spot for us.  (I like to use real names but I'll stick with forum handles since I don't know other's preferences)

Here was the entrance to Shallow bay and our campsite:






We took a really short break and then setup camp, then it was time to fish.  Peddled back out to where the guys had been working all day.  Yeah working.  Currents are no joke here, and fishing wasn't easy... yet 30 minutes into it, Linglady caught her limit.  Being tired from the crossing she requested we retire, so back to camp we go, I gotta fish to clean.



Dinner is served!



So we ate our dinner and around 9 Andrew, Mark and Bryce come over in the dingy.  It's super windy and we got a good fire going.  Andrew starts up the music and breaks out some scotch.  It's at this point that things go a little south.  Before I realize it, the Nalgene bottle full of Sailor Jerry, is missing 18 ounces.  Marie and I were the only ones drinking it, and it hit me way too late, that I had WAY too much to drink.  Somewhere in there we both had some of Andrew's red label too.  Needless to say, the next day I was absolutely useless.  Determined to fish, we finally hit the water around 4pm.  Great timing, (insert massive amounts of sarcasm here)  Current is pumping at least 3mph and Marie snags up about 5 times in 20 minutes.  I'm already going on fumes, and between helping her un-snag and keeping pace with the current, my hangover is destroying me.  Mark says something about how lucky I'm getting with the snags (I suspect he has no idea that a mirage drive makes it much easier to free a snag )  and like a dumbass I say "yeah, that's like 6 in a row!"  He gets out of earshot and I snag again.  Damn!  broke off!

That's it for that day, I realize it's not safe to be out there in my weakened state, and we head back for the safety of the bay.

The wind dies down to nothing, the sunset starts, and it's breathtaking.




But what's this?  The boat sleeping crew (or was that bro crew?  Remember this kids, if Spot starts talking o-ring, you better head for safety) was approaching.  They look cute in that little dingy huh?



Chef Mark gets to cooking, and he's throwing ALL sorts of tinfoil wrapped and bare skin fish on the fire pit.  A few minutes into it, Andrew comes and grabs us to go see the moonrise on the other side of the island.  I should mention, that at this location, the island is perhaps 200 yards wide from bay to bay.  Alas, the moonrise was spectactular.



The ship on the far left is a coast guard cutter.  Looks a bit small next to all those huge yachts huh? 





After a few pictures we head back to camp.  Dinner is finally done!  From left to right: skin grilled greenling, asparagus, lingcod topped with asparagus, potatoes, garlic bread. Yeah, cooked in a campfire.  He wouldn't fess up to it, but I swear there was unicorn meat in there somewhere, because my hangover was finally gone!



We had planned to wake up the next morning at 530 and cross at 6am, when the slack tide was occuring.  The night's festivities lasted until 11:15, so an early rise was not in the cards.  We got up around 7:30, had some breakfast, and started packing.  We were out fishing again by 8:30 or thereabouts, but again, the fishing was slow.  We tried a few drifts and decided we should head back before we got tired.  Something told me that the crossing wouldn't be fun.  I figured the current would be rough, and heading out the channel we were faced with whitewater rapids in 80-150 feet of water.  It was absolutely nuts.  We quicky skirted next to the main island and paddled east for about a half mile.  I figured we were far enough east to compensate for the main channel's current and head straight across, so we started out.  Going at first was easy, but about 1/2 a mile out, our cruising speed of 4 dropped off to near nothing, and the GPS told me were heading southwest.  That wasn't going to work.  "baby, we gotta pick up the pace, a lot".  We pushed it up, and started making some headway, but it still wasn't enough.  After a quick check for the reef's location, we pushed hard, and steering southeast we started making progress south, at 1.2 mph.  Yeah, 1.2 mph.  There were boils and eddies that were hundreds of yards across.  Several times the yak tried to take a spill, fortunately no swimming.  In order to eliminate the swimming aspect we peddled side by side and I held the side handle of Linglady's kayak.  There were also multiple occassions where I would be peddling and the resistance of the water would not be there.  No problems with the drive, the current was just that strong.  2 hours later, we arrived at the North Beach parking lot.

Loaded up, drove to the ferry, had a big ole double cheeseburger and a redbull.  I was better.  On the drive home from Anacortes Linglady says "hey, I figure Tuesday we should have enough time to go to (secret spot) and get some lings."  She's hooked.  Can't say I blame her!

Sucia Island is an awesome place, and I plan to go again on the next run.  I'll probably be lazy and take the water taxi though!

Link to all my pictures:  http://www.facebook.com/media/set/?set=a.10150734487376531.396955.587471530&type=3&l=445942984d

WOW!! great story,awesome pics(loved the moon),danger,...epic trip.Lee,you are a lucky man to have a partner that can do all that and then ask for more. Thanks for sharing...

Beautiful pics Marie & Lee. Glad the fishing was okay and that you made it back thru the rips. I've spent time in Ewing Cove,Shallow Bay,Echo and can't remember the other bay(brain fart,Fossil Bay) and the whole island is gorgeous. Warning: currents can be hazardous in the Sound and the Islands. Sounds like a great time was had by all.

Fantastic report and pics, Lee!

Man that looks like great times.  I have to get out there sometime

I had a great time meeting up with everyone and enjoyed the adventures. One pic below of me on the crossing to Sucia. Was so impressed with dinner cooked on the camp fire, spot rocks. Having our tote and cooler brought over made for a comfortable weekend, thank you deepcolor. Thanks to Lee for helping me on my way to fisherwoman status. I have a lot to learn, but it's sure fun.

Marie

This picture

What can I say that hasn't been said. Good times with good homies! Thanks DC for the awesome digs and showing us such a beautiful island. Your hospitality can't be matched brother. Brother Spot, always good hanging and don't lip greenies.  Your camp cooking skills were a real treat. Can't wait to try (and most likely miserably fail) that out. You got some really lucky kids!!

When we showed on Thurs it was drizzling and fishing was spotty. I dropped a greenie that got hit but lost it. Day one for me nada. The next day was better and got my greenie but again couldn't put a keeper in the bag. Saturday things finally started to click and still had to work but got my first Sucia ling, just a hair under 30". The Sunday was even better and got bait and got my second keeper ling, just a hair under 34". Then fished a smaller bait and smacked around a grab bag of rockfish, lings, and cabbies.

BTW DC was showing his local skills and hooked mass fish. Brother jigged up a storm!!

BBTW I blame the early bad fishing on Darth and the Empire. I knew that cloud looked weird!