Great day Friday 8/22 on the water
Started at the 302, but not much was happening. A lot of boats moving around. Got on 72 and asked for any report from the butterfly. No response. So we figured that they must be doing well out there. We picked up and ran to the SS knoll and halfway to the butterfly. We got out there and there were alot of sportfishing boats around and a few private boaters. We got a jig strike and stayed in that spot for about an hour. Pulled in albacore on sardines and anchovies. Then we found a paddy and spent the rest of the day. We got 9 albies, 2 yft, 2 bft and 4 nice yellowtail. We let a lot of small albies and yellowtail go. Lost a bunch of fish on light line. We were all hooked up on several occasions. There was a center console that pulled up to the paddy. They hooked a few but mostly watched us bring in fish. We called it the AARP paddy. We had to set up the filet board and filet fish to have enough room. We had one large cooler which filled up fast. It was chaos with the board set up and we were still hooking fish. Finally had to pull away with fish still biting. We left about 1PM and got to the dock at 3:30. Water was really smooth with some swell. But very easy going.
We saw a huge pod of "beaked" whales. They were jumping out of the water and there were probably at least 50. According to John, who is a commercial fisherman out with us, he has never seen a large pod of these whales and rarely jumping out of the water. It was a rare treat. Incidentally John caught his first tuna on a rod and reel. This is a real milestone for him considering that he has caught thousands of tons of tuna on a long line and continues to do so with his boat in Hawaii. We had a great time. We had sashimi with the bluefin tonight and I have some yellowtail and albacore in brine for smoking. bill
