Palos Verdes 12/10
This opaleye season we fished high tide and outgoing tide from points, big rocks, and the backs of coves along the coast of Palos Verdes from Christmas Tree Cove south toward Golden Cove with perfect bait and water conditions each trip but did not catch any of the blue-eyed babes. Today we attempted something a little different, an incoming tide to six feet by nine thirty.
The bait at the usual slime pit was of even better quality than last week. I raked in a full scoop of the dark green gooey long strands that covered all exposed mud banks.
I arrived at Christmas Tree early and was making my first casts with the WildEye Sardine for bass by five thirty. Instead of walking 20 or 30 minutes south, I ventured to the point only ten minutes north, where last week I observed less kelp in this zone. That trick didn’t work. I cast all over the place for a half hour but only snagged weeds multiple times every cast within about a 75-yard stretch of rocks making lure tossing impossible.
To the ol’ opaleye hole at the back of the cove I trudged, where I chummed handfuls of algae then waited about ten minutes for enough light to see my bobber. The swell was perfect with only a few larger sets of barely two feet rolling in. I didn’t have the first bite until an hour-and-a-half later at eight o’clock, when I hooked up to a fish that felt pretty big as it battled to the left and to the right. A dip of the net lifted out a solid three-taco opaleye that felt more like a 4-taco but I ain’t complainin’! Into the gunnysack it went.
More chum was tossed out in an attempt to get a school going but unfortunately two more hours of sitting on a rock looking stupid produced only three more bobber wiggles by little guys. It was the $40 opaleye I caught today because that’s how much round-trip gas cost to get here. Since opaleye is a bust this year, I will catch up on household projects these upcoming Saturdays before hike training begins in March.