11/26 Hitting the Surf with the SWAT Commander. PB Halibut for me!

[Badbeat]

I get a text from Phuong aka Blackwater Saturday night asking me to give Arthur aka Wingnut a call and try to get him to go fishing. I asked why and Phuong says that USC lost to Notre Dame, they were at the game and the Commander wasn’t in a very good mood. He thought that Art would need some cheering up and the best way to do that was to get him in the surf. I called Arthur around 11pm Saturday night and he said he was already planning to hit the surf in the morning and was getting his gear ready. So the plan to invite him turned into me begging CAN I PLEASE tag along???
Arthur said sure, and to pick him up at 5am sharp. I asked what beach and he says don’t worry about it, and that I'm on a need to know basis only, hahaha

Sokha and I were about half an hour late to pick up Arthur at the SWAT Command Center. That’s a big no, no when you fish with the Commander, of course I blamed Sokha. Lol
Arthur just gave us that look, threw his gear in the truck and said “101 North, we’re going to miss the grey light.” and off we went.
A bit of advice, don’t ever talk to Arthur about the Trojans after a loss.

We got to the AO and sure enough we missed the grey light, sorry again Art.

Photos of the day. All photos were from Arthur's camera.
Sokha and me getting ready.




Conditions at the first beach we hit were not bad. 1-2 ft waves with occasional 3 ft. The water was clear and hardly any weeds. Wingnut says his goal was to catch a 16 inch Perch today.
Sokha and I just wanted to catch anything.


True story, before we started, Arthur handed me a LC and told me to tie it on. He said that it was his special holiday edition LC with Christmas colors. I said cool, a free LC customized by the Commander himself, how can I say no. This LC proved to hold some magic later on.
Red and green dots, like Christmas lights, haha


All morning, the Perch bite was pretty strong as we all caught Perch after Perch. We were all throwing the LC and they were super aggressive and attacking like crazy. The Perch range between 9-12 inches, no really big ones today, but Sokha and I caught at least a dozen each and Arthur caught even more. He was just killing them with the LC with a red tail hook. Sokha did snag a small Leopard Shark that he thought was a monster Perch. Lol
Arthur hooked up to a decent fish, putting a nice bend on his rod. Brought it up near the beach and we saw that it was a nice Halibut, a for sure legal and it came off right at the end.
The Commander just laughed it off and continued on. He was more pissed that SC lost than losing a nice fish.

Here’s one of the many, many Perch we caught yesterday morning. Arthur didn’t take many photos because all the Perch looked the same.


Red tail hook.


It was around 8 o’clock and we were making our way slowly down the beach. I was working the surf right behind the Commander and Sokha was lagging far back. All of the sudden, Arthur stops and motion for me to come over. He points to a spot in the surf in front of us and said, you see that big hole? I bet there’s something good hiding in it. Then he steps aside and told me to go first. Honestly, I don’t even see the hole he’s talking about, but I step ahead of him and started casting to where he pointed. I kid you not, three casts later I get a thump on the lure. Heavy weight and the thing took off with my drag running. I look over at Arthur and he said, “Looks like the right kind, let’s hope it’s not a Shovelnose or a Leopard.” After a 5 minute fight, I dragged the thing on the beach and the Commander gives me a high five. My second legal Halibut ever and my first legal this year. Arthur said, take it home, you earned it. I said yes sir, I will release my next PB.

I barely hooked this fish by one hook.








My day was made and I didn’t care if I caught anything else. Thanks Commander for everything. It was a pleasure watching you in action. You took me to the right beach, gave me a free LC, located and gave me first shot at the best hole. What more can anybody ask for?
We worked the area for another hour for more Perch but no more Halibut. Arthur says let’s go get some ice for my Halibut and hit another spot. We’re going to try to put Sokha on his first ever surf Halibut.

We arrived at the second AO about 30 minutes later and found awesome conditions. Really flat swells and super clear water. But it was so darn weedy and hard to fish. I’ll make it short. We only stayed for about an hour. I caught another Halibut about 18” and Arthur got a weird looking Kelp fish or something. We packed up and left around noon. We dropped off Arthur at his house and he said to bring the Halibut in and he will show me how to fillet it up. It was nice to see the Iron Chef and play with the Pugs too. You're a blessed man Commander.

Thanks again for a great day Art, that was a day to remember for me. Let’s do it again soon bro.

Some photos at the second AO.
Really nice conditions.






The weird fish that Art caught.


Sokha


Me


The Commander


We heard somebody yelling from behind us on the beach and it was Lieutenant Bones and Wingnut’s DFG officer buddy Cory. A very cool dude. Too funny, he says that he knew it was us when he saw all the orange rods, hahaha It was cool hearing him tell us a story of a recent Bear attack.


Group shot. Good times.

[gletemfeelsteelgary]

very nice catches indeed...


makes me yearn for some more salt : )


congrats U guys....

Gary

[SP Dan]

Hi ya Badbeat,

Congrat's on such a beautiful Halibut!
Arthur was absolutely correct......YOU deserved this one my friend.....enjoy!

Thank you for the fantastic read with pictures!

SP Dan <"))><

[PTN]

Congrats on the halibut! You guys had an awesome day. I'm very jealous I was waiting for a SWAT report since I knew Arthur was planning to attack the surf. That's a pretty cool kelpfish Arthur caught. I need to start customizing my LC with Christmas colors too

Happy Holidays to everyone and hope everyone had a fantastic Thanksgiving.

-Peter

[bloox8]

Congrats Binh! I hope that halibut tastes amazing
(mmmmm some chopped up chilli in some fish sauce with some rice sounds amazing!)

BTW, that Christmas pattern LC is pretty cool. I just read yesterday that fish like walleye, perch, and several others are mostly limited to the spectral range of red-orange and yellow-green with the best color vision in the range of red-orange. I also noticed that the best perch bait, Camos, happen to be red and green (mmm coincidence??). I don't know if that's what Arthur was going for but I have to give those color combination a try and maybe top it off with red hooks

Arthur, nice sized kelp fish you got there. Too bad you weren't able to land that 16" you were going for. I noticed that when Daniel and I landed our big ones, it was during rough conditions (2-4 ft waves). I guess the small ones come out to play when conditions calm down. Does this mean 4-6ft waves = +18"ers!?!?.. who knows

Thanks for the report!


Thien

[fishshep]

You asked him "What Beach" and he said, "DON,T WORRY ABOUT IT "

I ain, t messin with that guy !!!

Great Catch !!!! WHAT BEACH WAS THAT !!!!

[jinbow]

Congratulations Binh, that is a nice catch with some Christmas blessing. hahaha.
Dude, that is the biggest kelpfish I've ever seen, never knew they could get that big, amazed.
Thanks for the pictures and great report, hope Sokha lands the next one soon.
See you guys on the surf some time, tight lines.

[Which Way Out]

Nice to see quality fish are still around and I get to read some good reports.

Thanks for sharing.

WWO

[iLLest]

Binh,

Congrats bro, I remember when we first fished the surf together with Arturito you didnt know much about surf fishing.
Look at you now! hahaha. Hanging around with the commander has rubbed off on you huh!
Yeah, he has that sort of magic with his LC's. For some reason, whatever he touches becomes golden lol.
Very nice job out there man, way to stick that beauty hali man. Hope you enjoyed that sucker.

-Frank

[dlmoo312]

Dude that's a nice halibut! Seems appropriate that you caught it on that christmas themed lc lol Congrats!
Thien and I have been hitting that spot a few times this past month looking for butts.
I was starting to have doubts but I guess I wasn't looking hard enough! Thanks for confirming that for me.
Next time you guys hit that spot you should try to get there in time for the greylight bite!
Almost all of my biggest fish there were caught in the early morning.
That kelpfish Arthur caught is big The front half reminds me of a calico.
Anyways, thanks for the report!


-Daniel