Left Monterey harbor around 6 am with high hopes of catching a few tuna, but these turned into fears as soon as I got outside the bay and saw the whitecaps and felt the 10 knot wind. It was going to be a bumpy one.

My general plan was to head for 36.30/122.30 and tack SW because of the SST on tempbreak, but the break was a few miles past that. We dropped in around 9ish after the 3 hour pounding to get out there. We started working once the water was 59 degrees W/SW but were hearing radio fish at 34/57 so eventually fishless in 61 degree water I set a heading for those numbers.

Around 11 I switched the spread from purple and black feathers to zuchini clones. We were only running 4 rods due to the wind and difficulty keeping it all fishing properly.

Finally at about 12:00 we got a single, but turning back over that spot produced nothing. Around 12:30 I heard on the radio some big Farallon had just felt the weather had gotten bad enough to turn around and I was in Dad's little 21' Grady, and we were looking at a 3 hour run home at least.

At 12:45 I called it with one fish in the box and decided it was time to limp home with my tail between my legs. We pulled the rods and started heading east, and as I was trying to figure a comfortable speed and heading in the slop and chop I looked down at the sonar and the SST had shot up to 61.9 degrees. OK, put em back in! We didn't get all 4 rods back in when the short corner went off, my brother was in the process of dropping back and I think hooked a fish with the rod in his hands. We just kept turning back over that spot for 16 more tuna in singles, doubles a triple and a quad to finish in the next hour and a half. I was pulling my fish over the rail by the leader to gaff the others cause they weren't that big (12-15 lbs maybe). Too fun!

The numbers on that spot were 36.27 /122.44.
At 2:30 we decided we had enough fish for our needs so we left them biting. Tuna fishing. wow! back at the dock just after 6 pm. return the boat to my dad, eat a nice dinner my parents had prepared for us, back home in Sonoma County around midnight. longish day, brutally rough conditions, and I can't wait to do it all again when the calendar and the weather and the fish permit.



the catch minus 4 already packed in another cooler.



a visibly tired crew, but no longer sorry about the pounding I put them through!



me with the big fish of the day. boga on the water after we bled it said 27 lbs.