By Del Brunning, Charter Master and Phil Diment
The two-day trip on Pacific Voyager, out of San Diego, was definitely one for all of us to remember. We cannot say enough good things about the captain and crew. They turned some very tough fishing conditions into a fun and enjoyable trip; and the food was outstanding!
On Monday morning, we were out about 60 miles south of San Diego. Captain Mark Oronoz had us trolling for Bluefin Tuna. His sonar was metering a lot of tuna out there, lots of jumpers, and fish in the 40-70 lb range. But getting them to come to the boat was a major challenge. He would chase them down and would try to slide in on them quiet-like but the second we got within casting range they were gone. Seconds later we would see them pop up 1/4 mile away – they were that fast! We trolled and chased them all day, as far as 90 miles south, because there appeared to be a lot of Bluefin in the area. However, the Albacore were a no-show all day. Captain Mark thinks they are just down too deep and have not come up yet.
We were fortunate on two of our stops to get a few schools of 15-20 lb class Bluefin to stay with the boat. With some very hard, and frantic, fishing on these spots, we were able to land 15 Bluefin on the trip. This was not without help from the deckhands. In one experience, Phil Diment was reeling in his second Bluefin and the fish was pretty hot and taking line. When Phil got it to the surface, he noticed a stream of blood coming from under his pectoral fin. Immediately, he realized that the fish was not hooked in the jaw, but instead, somehow side- hooked. Only heaven knows how that happened. Captain Mark and deckhand Matt, Mark’s 16 year old son, coached Phil all the way to get the fish to the boat. They got a gaff in him and there was the hook just barely penetrating the bone near his pectoral fin. Phil could not give enough high fives to the crew. The crew was great in keeping our multiple hook-ups away from each other to enable us to land most of the fish. We did lose some fish due to break-offs – but that’s fishing. (1st day jackpot fish was a 14lb 7oz Bluefin caught by Ted Porter).
Because fishing was so tough the first day, and some on our charter had not caught any fish, we opted to go into the Coronado Islands for day two. It turned out to be a wonderful decision as the fishing kicked into high gear.
During the night, Captain Mark kept some of his crew up to make squid, and at 1am in the morning they kicked the flood lights on and they soon had a squid float so thick you could almost walk on it. Instead of waking more crew to get the squid on-board, Don White, Santa, acted as crew and helped them get it on. (Thanks, Don!) They filled all the tanks with squid, caught a few hours of sleep, and at 5:00 am the next morning we were just south of the TJ Bull Ring on a reef where we had a wide-open bite of Barracuda and big Sand Bass. (Ted Porter caught a 6lb 10oz Barracuda there).The captain and crew joined us on deck to fish and we had an absolute blast joking around and just really scoring big on the bass. The power of live squid!! Can you say, “candy!” Then the captain made the smartest decision of the day and made a 1 hour move south to the Rock pile area. Wow! There were birds working this high spot and we immediately saw boiling Yellowtail. Pretty soon we had screaming reels with 25 lb class tanker yellows pulling drag! We managed about 21 yellows for the day with the biggest one at 33 lbs 7oz caught by Mike Kaneen (2nd day jackpot fish). They were all caught on fly-lined squid. There was also plenty of Calico Bass to catch under the Yellowtail and we caught fish until we had to depart for home.
I think this was one of the best trips of the year. The Lord truly blessed us with a wonderful boat, captain, crew, fun, fellowship, and a great catch of fish. We thanked the Lord for His bountiful blessings as our trip ended.