This week’s adventure was a good day out on the water.

Well, I was up at 4:15 this morning, ate breakfast, and headed off to John Wayne Marina to meet up with my friend for a ride onto the water in his boat to try to catch a halibut on the next to the last day for the season for the year.

It started out a bit gray as we left the marina a few minutes after 6 AM, then the sun came out as we got out to the bay just off of the Spit by the lighthouse. Anchor was dropped, the pole was rigged, and we were sitting there waiting for dinner to end up in the boat. We chatted and laughed and carried on like we usually do when we are together, telling stories and having a good time for a few hours. We got a few nibbles by some other fish that would take the bait so I watched as the hooks were baited several times with a herring and pieces of octopus and then covered with various scent attractants and anchovy extract. Quite a bit of work and not like just putting a worm on a hook.

We did not have much luck staying anchored so we set up to drift, going to another spot and dropping the bait on the bottom and then let the current take us away. We drifted for a while and had no luck still, then the weather started to come up a bit and the water started getting choppy so we got ready to head back to John Wayne Marina and get the boat out of the water. My friend asked if I wanted to drive the boat so I finally got my chance to run a boat on some big water. That was fun and something I had never done before.

We came away empty handed today, but we had a good time and are already planning on doing some crabbing when the season opens up July 1st. I am going to go get my catch card and my taste buds will be ready for that.

One thing odd I notice is that even tonight I am still feeling the waves… my balance is a bit off. Pretty strange, as I thought it might go away by now. I hope it does soon!