The Fib’ers last 2022 charter trip was a 1.5 Day trip aboard the Voyager out of Seaforth Sportfishing. We departed Seaforth Sportfishing around 7:00PM, on Sunday, October 23, 2022. There were 15 of us, plus crewmembers. The weather around the dock was pleasant, and not too windy. It was a clear-sky night.
As we departed the dock, Charter Master Bernie Clayton led the group in prayer, thanking the Lord for the opportunity to fish together and fellowship, also petitioning the Lord to guide us safely as we traveled, and that we would have an enjoyable trip, and catch fish!
Voyager Captain Chuck mentioned we would be heading about 100 miles west, to fish the area around the Cortez Bank. Our target fish would be yellowtail, blue fin tuna, and assorted rock fish. Captain Chuck mentioned if a school of blue fin tuna tuna were spotted on his sonar in the early morning hours, he would stop, and we would fish for deep water tuna using heavy rig set ups. The bait acquired was medium -sized sardines. Captain suggested setting up our fishing rigs with, 3/o, or even 4/o hooks, or large flat-falls jigs, for deep water tuna fishing. Once we get to the targeted fishing area, Captain suggested changing to a fly line setup, as we would be surface fishing. It was recommended we us size 1, 2, or 4 hooks.
It was a long-rough ride down to the targeted fishing. The Voyager was really rocking to and fro. It was quite windy, with 4-5 foot swells. We didn’t end up stopping in the early morning for deep-water blue fin fishing. We started surface fishing around 8:45AM. Within a few minutes Val Handzus hooked up a bonito, then Tom Handzus hooked up. Tom decked the first fish, a bonito weighing about 3 pounds. Val quickly followed, decking a similar-size bonito. Daryl Evans quickly followed with a slightly larger bonito, around 4 pounds. Almost immediately, it was wide open bonito fishing for about 20 minutes.
Captain Chuck moved the boat a short distance, and as soon as we stopped to fish, the bonito hit again. Shirley Bruhl quickly decked the first fish, a bonito about 3 pounds, and immediately, again everyone started catching bonito. Rob Whittaker landed a large bonito about 8 pounds, that ended up being the largest bonito caught on this trip. Daryl Evans decided to fish the ocean bottom, and decked the first rock fish, a nice-size sheephead. We fished for only about 15 minutes, then Captain Chuck wanted to move on, and look for yellow tail or tuna.
Although the sky was clear, there still was a good swell, and the Voyager was still rocking left and right. After about 30-45 minutes of not spotting yellow tail or tuna, the Captain stopped and anchored in an area for us to fish for rock fish. Jr. Banda quickly caught the first deep-water fish on this stop, a nice-size white fish, using cut squid for bait. Shortly thereafter, Sam Camarillo brought up the first double hookup, two red rockfish. People were catching a lot of rock fish. Shirley Bruhl caught a nice sheephead, Jr. Banda brought up a good-size salmon grouper, and Daryl Evans decked a big Chucklehead, which ended up weighing 5 lbs, 13 oz, and being the biggest rockfish caught.
With a lot of various rockfish caught, Captain decided to begin looking again for yellowtail and blue fin tuna. The Captain metered yellowtail so we stopped. Robert Gist hooked up, and decked the first yellowtail, about 18 pounds. Yellowtail were starting to bite! Everyone started to hook up. The yellowtail were nice quality, 15 to 21 pounds. Ed Waites and his daughter Nicole each brought up nice size yellowtail, as did Tom and Val Handzus, Frank Sawyer, Shirley Bruhl, Tom Hinmon, Sam Camarillo, Perry Fanuef, JR Banda, Rob Whittaker, and Bernie Clayton.
Shirley Bruhl hooked up, and decked of all things, a mako shark about 4 feet long! Shirley caught the mako on a sardine using 30lb test. Crewman Travis said it weighed about 35 pounds. Val Handzus also caught, and then released, a mako shark that was about 3 feet long.
Ed Waites, using a dropper loop set up, hooked something very large. Ed battled the fish for quite a while, then the fish finally snapped his line. Shortly thereafter, same thing with Val Handzus. She hooked something very large, even using the rail to support her rod, and get leverage on the fish, but after a long fight, the fish snapped Val’s line. We were talking, and we’ll never know what Ed and Val each hooked up, but maybe a large black seabass, large white seabass, big halibut, even bigger blue fin tuna, who knows? But whatever it was, it’s still out there to be caught!
In the early afternoon, Tom Handzus caught the first blue fin tuna, about 25-30 pounds. A little later Val Handzus brought in a similar-sized blue fin tuna, that a shark ate the tail and lower portion of the fish. At lease the prime filet section was left for Val to bring home for eating.
As the afternoon wore on, the Captain again metered blue fin tuna. This would be our last stop of the trip. It was about 5PM. This time more people hooked blue fin. We were fly-lining sardines, most using 40 lb test, or 40 lb fluorocarbon topshots. Perry Finauf, Robert Gist, Sam Camarillo, JR Banda, and Bernie Clayton all decked nice blue fin. The blue fin were all similar size 42 to 51 pounds. Bernie’s blue fin ended up being the jackpot fish, weighing 50 pounds, Sam Camarillo’s blue-fin was second largest at 47 pounds.
We finished fishing around 6:45PM. Captain Chuck started the long trip for home.
Our final trip fish count was 11 bluefin tuna, 34 yellowtail, 21 bonito (plus at least 20 more released), 21 white fish, 7 salmon grouper, 5 sheephead, 5 copper, 14 rockfish (including 1 large chucklehead), 1 mako shark (plus 1 mako released), and 1 bat ray released.
We arrived back at the dock at 5:30AM. Before departing the boat, Crewman Trevor took our group picture. Although we experienced adverse weather conditions, we caught a lot of nice fish, and had a great time doing it!
