San Diego Fishing Adventures

San Diego Open Bay Bass Tournament

Saturday, January 24, 2009

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It was another great event put on by the San Diego Anglers Club. Once again the operation ran smooth as ever from 3am until dark when the event ended. I am always impressed by how well everything moves along during this event. There are 150 teams (300 anglers) that show up prior to 4:30am when they start the process of checking everybody in, checking the boats and getting all of us in the water within an hour and a half. It’s quite the show to see and be a part of. And the fact that they cook lunch for everybody and offer free beer is amazing! the public and the fishermen get to partake in all of this which is free for everyone. I first started by not entering this event, but enjoying the free food, beer and fish weigh in. Since then I have entered it for the last 3 years.

Terry and I met at my house at 3:30am and arrived at the check in “line” a little after 4am. We chatted a bit with friends and had a breakfast burrito before starting the process of getting the boat into the water. Once in the water we got to get our gear ready while waiting until all the boats are in the water and ready for the shotgun start. At about 6:30am they blasted the horns and off went 150 boats in San Diego bay. It is always fun to be a part of this excitement as 150 boats blast off at full speed.

We arrived at our first spot and in short order began getting doubles on the Sand Bass. Unfortunately there wasn’t much size to them, but they still got our 5 fish bag filled quickly. We continued on around the same general area until the bite really shut down around 11am or so. From there we ran towards the mouth of the bay and worked some of the channel ridges and down the center. Each drift produced one better sized Sand Bass but still not one nice kicker fish. We wanted bigger fish, but knew from talking to others already that some were not getting even 5 fish to put in their bag. So we felt like we weren’t doing horribly, but knew we needed to swap out at least two fish to climb higher on the tournament board.

By 1:30 we called it quits and headed back to the ramp to have Terry weigh in our 5 fish. Overall it was a slow day of fishing once the bite slowed way down around 8:30 am or so. We probably managed 20 bass between Terry and I with a few of them being Spotted Bay Bass. We placed 45th out of 150 teams which isn’t horrible but not where we wanted to be. We spoke to some people who didn’t catch any fish all day and others who didn’t even get 5 fish for the day. There is not doubt we know how to find the fish, but it’s time to focus on finding the big ones.

Either way it’s always a great time both on the water and off the water! I highly recommend this even for both fisherman and non fisherman! You get great food and drinks for free while being outdoors and enjoying the booths and fish being brought in.

Hopefully there will be some more tournaments starting up in March to entertain us!

Until then, tight lines.
El Capitan

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