Traded the Old Town for an Ocean Kayak

It's finally time to retire my Old Town sit-inside kayak and get a proper sit-on-top. The Old Town has been a great platform for fishing the bays, but at this point I've caught nearly all the common species that wander around San Diego and Mission Bay. I decided to stay with the same parent company (Johnson Outdoors) and get an Ocean Kayak Trident 13. With safety in mind I chose their most visible color, giant yellow banana.

The new boat's maiden voyage was in San Diego Bay, launching from Coronado Tidelands Park. My friend Tim joined me for a short bass fishing session. This was also the first time I recorded a kayak session on my Garmin watch, and afterward I took a screenshot of the route on the app.

Miles: 3.78
Hours: 3:21

I'm going to add a few of my early kayak sessions to this post since they don't have as many fish photos as I'd like for a typical blog post. My second outing was in La Jolla, but that trip has enough fish content to do a standalone post. For my third outing I paddled out of Mission Bay to look for bonito with my friend Emerson. The fish finder from my old kayak was installed at this point.

Emerson and I paddled south past the Ocean Beach Pier, but we didn't see any fish activity. There were a lot of dolphins in the area though, so they kept us entertained. I think in this photo Emerson was turning to watch a few of them jump behind us.

As we headed back north past the pier I finally got a hit on an Xrap Magnum 15. It wasn't a big bass, but it was still a fish! Someday this lure is going to get hit by a big yellowtail or mako.

Kelp Bass (Paralabrax clathratus)

With it being such a slow day we didn't stay out for very long. We jigged around the end of the north jetty for a few minutes, but I didn't see anything on the fish finder so we called it and headed back to our landing spot.

Miles: 6.40
Hours: 3:38

The next time I went out I met up with Kam, another local guy with a kayak. He has an old Ocean Kayak Scupper Pro, which has dimensions similar to my Trident. We launched from inside San Diego Bay and paddled out past the end of Point Loma to fish the kelp beds.

You can't fully appreciate how long Point Loma is until you paddle the length of it. We trolled lures as we went, but we didn't have any hits. The weather was great for us, but the fish weren't feeding.

Once we reached the kelp, about 5 miles from the launch, we jigged irons for bass, rockfish, or whatever else might hang out around heavy structure. Mostly though we caught mackerel.

Pacific Chub Mackerel (Scomber japonicus)

Along with the mackerel there were swarms of smelt (jacksmelt or topsmelt) that would nip at the iron but avoid getting hooked. Judging by how brazen they were, there must not have been any bigger predators around.

Finally I managed one non-mackerel fish from the bottom, a kelp rockfish. They're one of the more common species in less than 100 feet of water around San Diego.

Kelp Rockfish (Sebastes atrovirens)

I also had a decent kelp bass on, but it pulled me into the kelp and ended up coming off. The wind was picking up, so it was time for us to start heading back. Kam managed to get one last fish, his first white seabass! It was too small to keep, but it was still a really cool catch from the kayak.

White Seabass (Atractoscion nobilis)

The wind really picked up as we paddled back towards the launch. Kam and I were both pretty exhausted by the time we made it back. It was a good reminder to keep an eye on the wind and start heading in at any sign that it's beginning to pick up.

Miles: 10.66
Hours: 5:53

Ten miles was my longest paddle to date, so even though we didn't catch many fish, I still felt like it was training for longer days on the water.