By: Valerie Handzus, CharterMaster.
I couldn’t have asked for a better day on the water than to be the CharterMaster for the FIB’ers Christianfishingclub first charter of the year with Fury Sportfishing out of Dana Point.
I gathered everyone in the galley before leaving the dock for an opening prayer, a few words and a small raffle of custom made FIB’ers fishing towels made by good friend Chris Wheaton. It was great to see members Floyd Spangler and Dave Shill who we haven’t seen in a while and it was also a pleasure to have Kenneth Kunkel and Paula Kunkel’s grandson Luke and their “adopted granddaughter” Coral on board with us.
When The Fury’s bait tanks were full with beautiful anchovies, sardines and squid, we left the harbor around 9:30 p.m. and everyone tried to get some shut-eye before we arrived at Catalina around 2-2:30 a.m. A few anxious anglers dropped a line in the water right away and others gradually joined them at the rail as they rolled out of their bunk below. Barracuda were the first to show and Ken Kunkel caught a nice one that weighed 4.65 lb. A few minutes later, Tom Hinmon caught a nice 6.75 lb halibut and Brian Chichi caught a beautiful 7 lb calico. The real show stopper was when Rob Whittaker connected with a beautiful 40 lb home-guard yellowtail. It was a little bit of a struggle as 5 other angler lines were on Rob’s line as he continued to fight his fish but with the help of crew member Eric, that monster yellowtail finally came over the rail. WTG Rob and congrats for winning the boat jackpot at the end of the day!!
The bite continued with smaller fish here and there and Coral not only caught her first yellowtail, but caught two! All of us were excited for her! The bite gradually slowed down around 8:00 am and at which time I had everyone vote whether or not we stay at Catalina or make a move to San Clemente Island (SCI). The majority vote was to make the approximate 1.5 hr move which allowed people to regroup, eat breakfast or take a quick nap.
We made the right decision to spend the rest of our day at SCI and moved about the island when we exhausted the calico/yellowtail bite in a spot and Capt. Marcus Bailey went on the hunt again. Our last stop before heading home produced our best fishing session of the day as it was a nonstop open bite on calicos and yellowtail (of a better grade) with multiple hookups all at once causing occasional pandemonium in the stern. Tom Handzus also landed a nice 24 lb yellowtail out the 3 that he caught. The yellowtail hot stick of the day was Robert Gist (Mark Gist’s brother) who ended up with 6 in his bag. At the end of day we had 66 calico bass, 28 yellowtail, 24 barracuda, 3 halibut, 2 whitefish, 1 sheepshead and 1 bonito.
We finally had to leave SCI around 2:00 p.m. to get back to the dock so Capt. Marcus and his crew could prepare for their next trip. All I can say is that the FIB’ers are truly blessed and the Lord answered our prayer for beautiful weather and abundant fishing.
Thank you Capt. Marcus for keeping us on the fish and for having such a fun crew AJ, Eric, Jayden and Garrett. These guys worked really hard all day long and made our first trip of the year a most enjoyable and memorable one. We pray that The Fury will have fantastic weather and fishing for the remainder of their season.
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