1/2 day Party boat, Long Beach area, PM

[Frankenfish]

Went on A 1/2 day to redeem a raincheck i got last year...about to expire. Got there kind of late...parking was backed up due to weekend parking and some kind of foodie event going on...so all spots were taken 90% all the way up to the bow except one on the side which i took. Id say 55-60 folks...normally i would have turned around and just fish the shore somewhere but didnt want to waste the raincheck. Even though I was nearly last in line there was still plenty of rod holders and even a prime tackle box spot..so im like wtf!? But the boat was a sea of orange rod tips that day which explains it. Hit a hard bottom spot around an hour away with decent fishing on sculpin w. Some sanddabs and a few reds mixed in. The sculpin were initially small...threw a lot back but as the tide started coming up they got bigger. Tangles werent that bad surprisingly, because if you could cast a little ways out, since 98% dropped straight down.

As I was dropping down you would periodically see clouds of chunks and particles drifting by. The guy next to me let out a couple of gurgles and belches...then he finally blew...my guess was gatorade and some chicken...then he was out,and i had even more rail space. So the rail space kept growing and the galley and all the benches were filled with people sick and sprawled out. So then a girl with a spinning rod fills an open spot and almost nails a guy with a 2 oz jig tied to the end. She opens the bail..drops it straight down...but then starts stripping all this line off her reel...then she sees someone sitting gets up and puts the rod down and goes and sits on the bench with her underweight jig drifting down toward the stern!

Anyways, i probably caught about 12-15 sculpin to get a limit...ended up w. 5 sculpin, 2 small reds, and 6 sand dabs. I threw a jig for a bit for nothing ..but the deckhands said they havent seen any yellows recently. All i can say is...usually sculpin fishing is pretty damn boring but the pukefest made it kind of interesting. If you see heavy loads on the boats with a mediocre fish count...it doesn't necessarily mean the fishing is bad...sometimes its just the load the boat gets. Ill be glad when i can go out during the week in the summer...id say by the end of the trip, 20 people were sick and the weather was no big deal...