1998 Season
 
   Not only is January not one of your typical Marlin months, but Albacore is not the run-of-the-mill quarry for the average fisherman. But January is one of those fishing withrawal months that gets the restless moving. And so, in mid January, the 15th, Harry Okuda, Kenneth and I decided to try our luck at - ugh! - rock fishing.   

 

 

 

 
  The "43" and the 60 mile bank have been some of the better spots. And so it was we headed out in a westerly direction. The weather wasn't that great and so we put out a couple of small jigs and a cedar plug. For reasons I can't remember I was checking the bilge and found that the forward bilge bump was not working and we had built up quite a load. So there I was in the forward stateroom with the hatch up and working on pumping the water out. We pumped into pails and then dumped them overboard. While sitting there I heard a familiar sound - that of a reel clicker zipping off line. I went up to the cockpit and there was Kenneth cranking away on a bent rod. No, it wasn't kelp but turned out to be a tuna-looking kind of fish with rather long pectoral fins. Nah, it couldn't be an al - - - - - - -! This was mid January, but there it was - a nice 12 pound Albacore. Mid January! We caught the first fish the year before and here we did it again.

   
Sorry that was it until the regular season got under way. And July brought a new "pro" from Lake of the Ozarks - my brother Alan, from St. Louis. It was time to introduce him to the joys of Albacoring and this we did - with a bonus.


   Heading out into the grounds we caught some Albacore and then got into some hefty Bluefin. Kenneth brought in a nice fish and Alan was heard uttering those immortal words: "I'm getting spooled." With some encouragement from the rest of us he kept up with it until, not having experienced the joys of deep-sea fishing, required a little help getting the fish on board. Nice Bluefin and nice day of Albacoring.
   
September 25 - Not too much to report for the year. But Kenneth supplied a nice day's report. He had entered the private boater's realm with a 20' Grady White, DEEP COLOR, which he had rigged for fishing. Every so often he would solo out to the "9" (i.e. 9 mile bank) or in and around the Coronado Islands.  On September. 25th while trolling "out there" he hung a Bigeye double and managed to bring in both fish by himself. He can tell the tale since he was the only there so maybe we can get him to contribute.

   

On October 1, Kenneth went out again on his 20' Grady, DEEP COLOR - this time with friends. They had a triple - one on a Rapala fell off and a second on a Marlin jig came off early in the struggle. The third one was a classic Bigeye "gorilla" on 30# line and spent 3 hours and 55 minutes bringing in a 142-1/2 pounder. Both Ken and Steve Dern fought the fish.