Beep. Beep. Beep. Beep. It’s 4:30 am in Lakewood, CA. I roll out of bed and fight through the mental haze as I stumble to my dresser, where I have laid out my clothes for the day. One look at my clothes and I remember – I’m going fishing today!
A smile creeps its way onto my face as I begin to think of what California fish would I like to catch today. I make my way to the bathroom to wash my face, brush my teeth, and slap the bare essentials of makeup on my face, I am almost ready to go.
Feed the dogs, check. Grab snacks out of fridge, check. Fill my Nalgene with water, check. My friend and I grab our gear and head to the car. It’s about 5:30 am – Oh NO! Boat leaves out of Pierpont Landing in 30 mins! We rush down the 91 freeway, hop onto the 710 freeway, and exit Aquarium Way. Uh oh…which street do we turn right on? Never fails, half asleep and so excited to go fishing we miss our turn. I am literally staring at the road we should be on, but find us flying towards the Queen Mary. If you are not familiar with the area, it is a one lane road with nowhere to turn around until you get down to the entrance of the Queen Mary. We hurry up and get our ticket to enter the Queen Mary parking lot and rush to the exit. Frantically retracing our path and end up back at the correct street to turn down. We hurry to park the car and rush to Pierpoint’s storefront.
“Three-quarter day boat girls?” says the girl behind the counter.
“Yes, please! We have a reservation.”
“Which spots would you like? We have back left corner spots available – 4 & 5?”
“Perfect!”
And just like that we were headed down the gangway and board the Victory. My friend and I begin to rig up and get situated for the day. While sifting through my assortment of weights I hear, “Hey Pinky, whatcha’ got there?” I look up and its Captain Mike. Awesome! He has always been a great resource to have on the boat. I feel I have a strong knowledge of lake fishing, but when it comes to ocean fishing I consider myself to be a novice on the verge of becoming intermediate.
“Hey Pinky, you know what you are doing over there?”
“I think so. You wanna check it?”
“Let me see here,” he says as I am tying up a rock fishing rig on my line. (Take 18-20 inches of line, cross ends over to make a circle, twist about 5-8 times, and pull the belly through.) “No bad kiddo, not bad. You keep doing that all day and you got yourself a job.” Although I would love to follow my cousins, great grandfather, and grandfather in the commercial fishing industry, I think I’ll leave it to them and stick to real estate.
The ride out to the first wreck site between San Pedro and Catalina Island was refreshing. Crispness in the air, cool breeze on my face, and a soft yellow sun rising in the distance. I love being on the water.
The loudspeaker blares, “Alright gang, we are going to drop anchor here in just a minute. Get ready to drop your lines.”
My friend puts her coffee down and I, my water. Alright let’s do this!
I walk over to the bait tank, place a glove on my right hand and hope that a wiggly slippery anchovy sticks to my glove long enough to get it hooked on my line.
The loudspeaker blares, “Pinky, what are you doing with a glove on?” Captain Mike comes out of the bridge and says, “You mind if I show you something? Take your left hand and place it in the bait tank. Start from the left side of the tank and make a sweeping motion to the right side of the tank. When you have a fish in your hand close your hand gently to capture it. Place the hook from the top of its head through the jaw. Got it?”
“Yep.” I reply. From then on I thought ok I can’t use my glove – put your big girl pants on. You can touch the slimy fish for 5 seconds, just long enough to get from bait tank to fishing pole. Success! I did it. A new found confidence came over me as I remembered the old fisherman saying — Good things come to those that bait.
A couple people reel in sand dabs. Then a couple more. Now it was my turn. I felt the bite and reel in. It was a 4 maybe 5 inch sand dab. I unhook the little guy and set him free. No more than 5 minutes go by and I hear Captain Mike say to my friend, “What do you feel like catching today?” She replies, “Something big!”
“Alright gang let’s switch it up. Pull up your lines we are going to check out another spot.”
A quick 15 minute ride lands us on another wreck site just south of Avalon Bay, that has a depth of about 120 feet. “Look over there,” says Deck Boss Carl. I turn my head and there in the flesh is one of the most amazing mammals – a grey whale. The closest I have ever been to a grey whale was at the Cabrillo Aquarium where what I am sure is a paper mache replica is suspended from the ceiling. The magnificent creature spouted from its blowhole and glided back into the water. I was so stunned that I just stood there in awe and totally forgot about grabbing my phone to take video or a picture. Off in the distance we could see a few more whales amongst the kelp beds throughout the day. “Alright, that will be $5 extra per person for the whale watching tour.” says Deck Boss Carl jokingly. We all giggle and tend to our lines as we await the ok to drop in the water.
“Drop ’em.”
As soon as I drop my line I pull up a nice little 4 pound rockfish. Chef Cliff strolls over and unhooks the fish from my line. “What number Jamie?”
“5, please. Thanks Cliff!” and just like that I bait up and throw my line. Boom. Another one. Boom. Another one. Life is good. Fishing in the Pacific Ocean and watching grey whales migrate from Baja Mexico to the Pacific Northwest.
“SHARK!!!” I hear someone scream from the top of their lungs across the boat. One of the anglers caught a shark. Not more than 7 minutes go by, an angler on my side of the boat yells, “SHARK!!” The man fishing next to me caught a shark too. When Captain Mike saw this he told us to pull up and we were heading out to a different spot. After all none of us were out there to catch shark. We wanted snapper, sheepshead, and rockfish.
The new location was even better. Grouper, rockfish, and lingcod were being caught left and right. Immediately to my right Captain Mike was fishing for squid. Boy do those suckers ink! I felt like it was raining salt water and ink. I couldn’t help but laugh every time he would pull squid up. I have never seen anyone catch squid like that. I am used to seeing a massive amount of squid being reeled in by nets. It was quite the sight to see.
As my stomach began to grumble, I left my pole and took a break for lunch. My friend and I packed a delicious lunch of homemade grilled chicken salads, cucumber salad, and sunflower seeds. All I could think about is the cheeseburger aroma drifting from the kitchen to my nose. Since I am eating autoimmune paleo, cheeseburgers are not allowed. c’est la vie!
The remainder of the afternoon was filled with sunshine, cool breezes, and more fish to be caught! I thought I had a big one on my line. As it got closer to the surface, I could see it was a lingcod. Score!! This sucker had to have been almost 10 pounds. I pull it over the rail and Deck Boss Carl takes it off my line. As he was measuring it to make sure the fish was legal, I closed my eyes. Please God make this fish be legal, please! It would be the largest fish I have caught to date.
“Oh man, that sucks! It’s just barely under.” says Carl.
I open my eyes, if the tattered tail of the fish was intact it would have been legal. Being the ethical fisherwoman I am, I look at the fish and said, “Today is your lucky day fish. Back into the ocean you go.” I was a little sad that the fish wasn’t to legal size, because for sure I would have won the jackpot of the day. From that moment on it was like I had fire in my eyes. I was on a mission to catch a big one!
It just wasn’t my turn to win. I didn’t catch the jackpot winner, however I had a wonderful day on the water. Even made friends with a sea lion while the boat stopped to refuel.
In my opinion the Victory boat, it’s crew and Pier point Landing is always a great time. The staff is amazing and helpful. Every trip I have taken with them has been filled with laughs, good fun, and distinctive catches. To Live Distinctively is a way of being that is recognizably different in nature from the status quo. I encourage you to get out there and do something you might not normally do.
Don’t forget to share it with me and the Live Distinctively Team!
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