A ordinary winter day

yup

I couldn't wait to get into the water. Let me back up and rephrase that, I couldn't STAND not being in the water. After a series of storms dumped record rainfall on us, followed by winds and massive tide fluxes, the local waters looked like....well... um shit. Brown water sat around san pedro for days on end, I'd walk down to the beach and take a look and it was the same every day. Brown. Even the harbors were littered with floating crap and I even hit a telephone pole last week running our work boat full throttle, KA THUNK! Holy shit what was that??? Thank god it didn't do any damage to the hull or prop!

I had been anxiously watching our chlorophyll charts for days on end. Every day it was almost the same, red around the islands and shore, followed by yellow and green in the middle. It was like someone was painting a desert sunset by throwing warm colors on the screen. It went that way day by day and then finally the weather relented and we had a few calm days with no rain. A week later the water was green but looked diveable. I begged for a day off and hit up my friends for a local trip.

I can't remember if we made it to the islands, down south, or up north. But we went somewhere. I turned the key in my whaler and instead of hearing sputtering the mighty honda leaped to life, thank god for fuel stabilizer for periods of long neglect! We threw our gear in and headed out, we dodged a few pieces of floating wood and when we made it past the harbor we were greeted with greasy flat seas and no wind. As we made our way to our destination I noticed the water was clearing, peering down into the kelp beds I guessed it was at least 10 feet and it turned out to be closer to 15! Not spectacular by any means but definitely diveable. We hurriedly scrambled to put our suits on and I fumbled with my new weight harness. I was doubtful that it would help my aching back, but heck anything was worth a try. I clipped it on, pulled on my fins and gloves and I quietly dropped over the side. The water didn't seem that cold in my 7mm suit and I took a breath of air, dipped my fins and instantly I was home.

I wish I could say that first spot was magical but I didn't even see hardly any fish. I made drops into sand patches looking for halibut but came up empty. Even opaleye were hiding out from us. But it was still nice to sneak our way thru the thick kelp and drop into the reefs. Eventually we worked our way to a spot I knew held some reef fish. There was hardly any bait around, but you could make out a few skittish smelt winding their way thru the kelp and here and there small calicos would peer at you and then quickly swim down to their holes. I saw the usual suspects, opaleye, some sargo, kelp bass, sheephead, blacksmith, black surfperch, halfmoons, rubber lip perch, I never got tired of counting the new arrivals. Most of the fish were more skittish than usual and would quickly take off after seeing me extend my gun. I made dive after dive, drop after drop and came up empty handed every time. Holy shit I was rusty, I missed a few shots but eventually I got the hang of it again. Once I lined up on a nice bass and then SQUEEEEEEEEEK my sinuses cleared suddenly and the fish took off like I had exploded some dynamite in the water. Dammit! Eventually I made my way to the other side of a big submerged reef. Here some orange lipped scallops quickly closed their shells as they sensed I was near. I saw some keyhole limpet snails holding onto that reef and some sea hares swayed in the surge. Some blacksmith schooled up and swam into the surging swell. I could make out the mottled shape of a kelp bass down deeper and when I got near enough to ID it, I slowly extended my rabitech 120 and squeezed the trigger. Thunk! The spear lept out and hit home, the bass took off and pulled line off the reel before crashing into the reef head first. It laid there twitching and I quickly swam down and grasped it by the gills and headed back up for a breath of air. Success at last! My buddy came over and yelled out kiddingly, "you shot a baby grouper" and laughed. I smiled and dispatched the kelp bass before holding it up and admiring the colors and then stringing it up against my belt. That's going to be a nice batch of fish tacos! That fish would weigh in at 6 lbs on the digital scale. By the end of the day I made the drop on a few other reef fish and got lucky and stoned a few as well. After a while the cold water was taking it's toll and I would feel the water chilling my skin. When that happened, I'd jump back onto the boat and fire up the shower. Man hot water is a luxury I don't know if I can live without again! When I checked the meter, the water temp was 56 degrees. It's definitely winter time spearing!

The day shot by like it was minutes. I made 152 drops that day and the weight harness worked like magic, under the water it felt like it wasn't even there and it was the first time I had bucked 26 lbs of lead without having a backache at the end of the day!! All in all, it wasn't what you'd call an exceptional trip. There were no beastly white seabass or gigantic lobsters seen. No yellowtail or other pelagics. Shit the water wasn't super clear, it was pretty damn cold, and we didn't even see that many fish. But you know what, it was one of the best days that I've had in months. Just some guys on a boat sharing some good laughs and some great times. After six or so hours in the water we called it quits, I had a couple of kelp bass and some reef fish so I fired up the engine and we pushed up against the leaning post and headed home.

Later, when my friends asked me how it was out there I couldn't stop smiling. It was just one of those days that makes you feel lucky to be alive and well. I thought about a lot of things. I thought about the sun setting as I sat in my warm truck and towed my boat back home. I thought about lining up the shot on that bass. I thought about skimming across a flat sea. Hell even as I type this I still have a smile on my face...