It was time to head North to Bishop/Mammoth area for Fishmas, the season opener.Made a bunch of Breakfast Burritos, packed up Bad Pig and made my way on Wednesday morning



Had to make a Pit Stop and stretch the knee


This is always a welcomed sight


Arrived at a pre-fishing spot to get a feel for things, caught a mini version of the big one I lost


Made my way into Bishop, hit Vons to grab a few things and then fished the canal behind Vons Check out them Bananas
 




Went to another part of The Owens River just out of town, no players


On my way to Pleasant Valley Reservoir I stopped to grab some Elk and Buffalo Jerky, $3.31 an oz.



Before heading towards the house, I got fuel to top off my tank   


They were letting water thru the Power Plant so I didn't fish this spot today but it's usually good for a few nice Rainbows



Got to the house, still snow on the deck from the last storm, hoping the stairs weren't still frozen, ate sh*t last time





Thursday and Friday we fished Lower Owens and did some sight seeing and BBQ'ing too








Not a lot of fish this trip, seems like they weren't stocking the river as usual but we kept plugging along. Saturday was the Opener so we hit The Upper Owens this time and we got skunked   Still fun just being out there







We hit Convict Lake on the way back home and fished the creek, I got another small one. The storm was coming


Headed home Sunday Morning, had to navigate the ice again on the damn deck and found myself at this place for Lunch !



Great time with my buddies, I will be going back in June for my Birthday, I was given the house to Janie and myself for a week by ourselves so hopefully we find more fish and do more exploring, might even head back up to Bridgeport and fish The Walker river

My sister is coming down this weekend and wants to try a local fish 'n chips joint while she's here. I thought for a good long while about where to take her, and realized the best beer battered fish I've had was my own. Which meant I needed to catch something worth beer battering. Really only the best for my sister...so I had to catch some paisans.

I knew I had a hookup somewhere somehow through work to catch some rockfish. I ended up getting hooked up with a trip on the Freelance out of Davey's Locker.

The counts were kind of mediocre but I know where they fish so I figured with the conditions, I could fight for a limit even if the rental rods struggle.

So I hopped aboard and ingratiated myself with the captain whom I've fished with before on another work trip. I told him my mission and he says I'm on the right boat. Simple plan, but other boats already started heading to Catalina to struggle and scout, which I wanted nothing to do with. The Freelance has had 50+ people on board for weekday trips recently so I was fearing the worst, but it ended up being a very reasonable load of about 30, which honestly looked to me like 20. 80' boat helps I suppose.

Weather was great. High tide at 0900 and low at 1500. Warm, no wind til noon.



First stop was tough. Managed a honeycomb rockfish that I threw back. There was comb jelly in the water, aggregating on the line. I thought it was just another gelatinous bullsh!t until I tried taking it off and it stung me, irritation like fiberglass or nettle. Went away after 20 minutes but sometimes the line would just randomly fling it onto my arms in droplets and it would irritate my skin for the next while. Not great!

Second stop next to an oil rig, got my first paisan of the day. Looked up at the pilot house and I saw this seagull aura farming.



Next few stops I started putting together my bag of strictly bocaccio. They do love the fluke more than any other rockfish, though I'm a bit surprised I didn't get any reds or sculpin. The boat started really loading up on barely legal sculpin, and I completely f@cking ignored that bite and stuck to my task.

The bite petered out and I had somewhere around 8-10 paisans in the bag. Then we started shallower for whitefish. The whitefish didn't really wanna play. I got 3, only 1 being barely worth keeping.

I ended with an overall count like 10 bocaccio, 3 whitefish, 1 sculpin, 1 honeycomb. The last 2 hours were pretty much dead.

I was mentally prepared to catch 300 bocaccio for the boat, so I neglected the in-hand pics. Here's what little proof I had that I caught fish:



I had an excellent time. Being solo, I ended up befriending a family of dad + 2 early 20s boys that were total newbs, but very friendly and open minded. I nicknamed them the Bandaid Brigade. First the youngest gets stung by a sculpin, not terribly but needed treatment and continued fishing. Then the dad hooked himself past the barb. Then the oldest gets stung by a sculpin near the fish bags, only lightly. Completely ridiculous. But they held tough!


Solid crew, relaxed day, no thorns in my side (I only ended up in 1 tangle!), sister will be fed fish n' chips this weekend. Nice Wednesday f@cking off from work.

Bullseye!

That thing will be awesome up in The Sierras, I just got home from there and the lakes are full !

Had better luck Saturday, 4/25. Got there at gray light and finished about 8:30. Nice day out and water was up a little more. As the sun came up the minnow started showing up and so was the carp.

 Got 5 and was hitting about 1 out of 3 shots.


This unfortunate guy was the first. He was right at the shoreline and close so I went for the headshot.



My aim is definitely getting better.

-Keith

Forgot to add, there was a juvenile grebe swimming around me at one point, then it chased a tiny smelt along the surface right at me, between the pontoons, between my legs and under my seat. It was a hell of a squeeze for it to go through my legs but it somehow did it without touching me and slipped right through to the other side.

I had a paranoia for the longest time about sea lions and float tubes, never would I have dreamt that my crotch would become an ambush point for the diving birds.

At least did you catch the biggest? Damn, last place.... Lol

Super cool stuff Jeremy. I would think your rig was at least 2x as fast as a regular tube.

Thanks for posting Jeremy. I wonder if that AZ old coot still lurks on the forum anymore...

Launched 0630. Misting on me when I got out of the car. Not 10 minutes to set up this first time, nice change from the kaboat. Also brought a new (refurbished) combo, Calcutta 100b and a GCX inshore (absolute noodle).



Walked the boat about 100 yards to the beach, put on my neoprene socks and fins, shoved off. Easy!

10 minutes in and I get my first bite, missed. 0fer1. I see Jake and Omar+brother launching.

Jake gets first skunk off. I split to the opposite side of the channel of them. Went 0/4 on bites pretty quick with a 5" fluke before shifting way down in size to a 2" fluke/minnow dropshot. A couple more missed bites and I was properly aggravated as everyone but me had broken the skunk.

Finally I popped a dink spotty, lifted it out of the water next to me and it shook off. I count it! One cast later and all three of the other guys are hooked up and asking why I'm not hooked up. I love fishing with friends! I got one to the boat a couple minutes later, similar dink size.



Everyone starts piling and I fall behind on the numbers quick. Then a pancake decides to entertain me.



At this point it's something like my 3 to Jake's 8 to Omar's 6, then the bite dies down. I decide to wander off a different direction than them, either find my own fish or at least separate myself from the competitive voice in my head for a bit.

Popped one on my own, then decided I had hit the apex of the route and I needed to fight the wind back. Made my way over to docks out of the wind and started getting short bites.

Took a while, but once I started getting close to my landing spot, I got slammed while reeling up my fluke to cast again and it took me for some drag pulls and good dogging. Turned out to be a 16" turd roller. Not a bad sandie and certainly an excellent harbor fish.



Only a few docks from my landing spot and I get slammed again, calling it a last cast fish. I was totally dry all day until this cranky spotty pushed a ton of water with its tail into my crotch.



Landed around 1130.

Jake ended up with 18, Omar with 12, Omar's brother with 10, me with 6. I would have called 6 a successful day on my own but their numbers have me quite salty. But, I'll bring some 3" and 4" flukes next time, finally get my side compartments in the mail for the tube, dial in my tackle trays, and I'll be primed to make someone else salty next time.

The tube was dry, turned well (made a good choice on my fins), didn't get blown around (although the wind wasn't as bad as expected), slow but probably a hair faster than conventional tubes. I realize the main action of my leg muscles is basically a forward kick, so when I go to the gym I should do slow, high intensity bike exercises with my feet strapped in, and pull up on the pedals more than push down to increase endurance. 1.5 miles today has me sore.

The bench is like an inflatable SUP, 7 PSI. Very solid, barely bends with me on it.

No name yet other than Cool New Slash due to Mr. Scadden's insistence, but that will fade. I suppose something feline-like since it's my first of many cats to come.

You love your inflatables! 

Firstly, I think your buddy was trying to take you out by putting a pin hole in his tube he lent for you.  LOL

So, that's an interesting floatation type tube.  Is that seat a solid seat going across, or is it also inflatable?

As always, I'm looking forward to seeing what you catch in your new throne.  Does it have a name yet?