Miss the old days..
- Thread starter thinman
- Start date
ZZZZZ
I Post A Lot But I Can't Edit This
I forgot to include.
“Verbally spoke to the greenie. To keep swimming. Go go go keep going. You can make it. Almost there
don't turn back around. Bait positive encouragement“I talk to my bait (usually not out loud) to stay connected with the live bait. Keep my head in the game. Trying to know and imagine the baits moves. Helps to pay attention for when the bait gets nervous just before the bite. Set up on the fish because the bite wasn't a complete surprise
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I agree with everything you guys have said. I’ve been fishing six to eight day trips for some years now and always appreciate the trips. Recently in the last three years with the Guadalupe island closures I’ve been left to wonder if the days of the long range trips are just a memory of the past. It was the days of the skiff chasing down the big ones that got me really moving to the longer trips.
I’m very greatful for the fishery I live near yet concerned that all the legendary spots are closed or spotty at best for the long ranger.
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Going ashore at Clipperton. Can't do that anymore. Glad I had that opportunity when I could...
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I love islands. My dad started talking us on barrier island exploring and camping trips along the GOM as young kids.
I wish my long ranger carrier started a lot sooner so I could have done that but I have loved long range since 2019!
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I loved Clipperton. My 1st cow (246) was there. So interesting to explore the atoll. It wasn't to hard to get on the atoll but a little hard to get off! We swam out over the reef through the very small slot to get to the skiff. Great memories! Thanks for all the great pictures in this string! Scott
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Scott, I know what you are talking about. We got dropped off and had to swim the last couple of hundred feet shore. That was easy. On the way back to the boat though, with Tim Eckstrom driving the skiff, we tried to make it through a reef pass but got caught by a set of waves. Tim gunned it up and over causing the inflatable to go completely airborne with all 5 of us suspended in mid-air above the skiff. We all came crashing down on one another. Luckily no one got hurt or broke a leg. Kind of far from medical services while at Clipperton.
There was another situation that was not widely publicized. Another long range boat took a group of passengers ashore and while heading back to the boat the hard bottom skiff was rolled in the surf and sank, stranding all of the passengers on the atoll, and since the boat had only one skiff, no way to get off the atoll and back to the boat. Captain radioed a super seiner tuna boat in the area with a helicopter and that helicopter plucked those people from the atoll and returned them back to the boat.
Did not hear to much about that one and I think soon thereafter boats stopped taking people ashore due to the liability.
That helicopter ride would be an expensive line item on your galley tab...
There was another situation that was not widely publicized. Another long range boat took a group of passengers ashore and while heading back to the boat the hard bottom skiff was rolled in the surf and sank, stranding all of the passengers on the atoll, and since the boat had only one skiff, no way to get off the atoll and back to the boat. Captain radioed a super seiner tuna boat in the area with a helicopter and that helicopter plucked those people from the atoll and returned them back to the boat.
Did not hear to much about that one and I think soon thereafter boats stopped taking people ashore due to the liability.
That helicopter ride would be an expensive line item on your galley tab...
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Can’t remember all the details but heard a story about a boat “rescuing” a stranded person. Something like he was left there at his request, hiding out. What I do remember was the part of the story referring to the crabs that would eat just about anything. The guy had a pair of leather boots that got completely chomped.
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I’m no youngster, 74 in May. 3 day trips in ‘93 and ‘94 followed by my first 5 day in ‘99. It’s been pretty regular since then with more and longer trips. Numerous 14-16 day trips to fish the buffer zone at Clarion and/or the Hurricane Bank. But honestly, gotta tell you, seeing all the pics and reading the stories, I feel like a total rookie.
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Some of you may recall my post about one of the guys bringing a joint in ziplock ashore at Clipperton, smoking half of it, and leaving the other half pinned to a palm tree head high in the ziplock...with a book of matches.....maybe that stranded guy found it....
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This was a daily occurrence at Clipperton...over and over again...
Pictured are Chris Wong, Jim Peyton (RIP) from ProCircuit and Mike Tumberio (sp.?) who runs a boat down in Cabo now...
Pictured are Chris Wong, Jim Peyton (RIP) from ProCircuit and Mike Tumberio (sp.?) who runs a boat down in Cabo now...
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Not fishing related but have to acknowledge what a great friend Jim Peyton of ProCircuit became. We fished many trips together, including Clipperton, before he passed. He and his sons owned a motorcycle racing shop that had a Supercross race team (still do) and did dirt bike modifications. Huge company known worldwide.
I would buy a stock bike for my son and drop it off at Procircuit and it would come back looking like the bottom picture. No labor charges and all parts at his cost. He was always hooking my son and I up. Got the best seats at local supercross events and got to sit with the ProCircuit race team in the team trailers, basically going where most people were not allowed, all because of Jim.
I could never thank him enough for all he did for us....and I met him fishing long range...
RIP Big Jim...
I would buy a stock bike for my son and drop it off at Procircuit and it would come back looking like the bottom picture. No labor charges and all parts at his cost. He was always hooking my son and I up. Got the best seats at local supercross events and got to sit with the ProCircuit race team in the team trailers, basically going where most people were not allowed, all because of Jim.
I could never thank him enough for all he did for us....and I met him fishing long range...
RIP Big Jim...
I used to race District 37 with his son Mitch until he got paralyzed at a race. I got #4 the year Mitch got # 8 . Mitch still owns and runs Pro circuit.
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Yes, Mitch owns it now and his brother, Jim Jr., is the GM but boy did their dad love to fish...
One of the most generous people I have ever met...
One of the most generous people I have ever met...
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Went to clipperton in 2003 on the rooster. took over 6 days to get there. Yes quite the boat ride. adventure of a lifetime.
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Holi-e-Mackeral
Holi-e-Mackeral
- Jul 10, 2003
- 2,473
- 1,882
- 60
- Name
- Jeff
- Boat Name
- Royal Polaris - sold the boat
Now, when leaving the Atoll, you also think about all of the sharks you have been catching every day.. I just hoped the skipp would not be overturned going through the reef.
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The rides to Clipperton... Doing my own reminiscing. In 1997, the Mexicans invoked the 6 mile limit on the islands. The boats that had been fishing there before the closure were granted a reprieve and allowed to continue fishing there until 2002. The end. There were no legal island trips in 2003. It was Clipperton or nothing.
Bill Poole had gone hunting. He bought a square mile of ranch near Yellowstone and hunted it for a while. Then he got fixated on hunting big sheep, here in the US and in Asia. I figured it must be a good idea so I gave up on long range and went hunting too, Canada, Alaska, Africa, and killed all kinds of stuff. We have a couple of 30' walls in the rod and gun room here on the plantation covered in horns and heads to prove it. At the SCI conventions in Reno and Vegas back then, on the big dinner and auction nights, Bill sat at a front table with Ingrid. I sat three or four rows back. He never knew one of his old deck hands was sitting behind him.
Bill eventually sold the big property near Yellowstone to Steven Seagal, but he kept the original 65 acre homestead that got him started in Wyoming. Loomis hunted there many times, insisting on taking a big elk with a muzzleloader. He stalked and stalked three years in a row and every year he got close to a 6x6. He heard the bullet hit every time, but three years in a row, the elk ran off and he never recovered one. Three years was enough for Steve and he quit elk hunting.
In 2004, Loomis ran the RP and with the islands closed and few other choices, headed south and went to Puerto Vallarta. We fished in the yellow sodium vapor glow of PV for caballitos at night and in between the Mexican seiners north of Tres Marias for YFT during the day. Steve was friends with one of helicopter pilots who was flying off of a 190' super seiner, scouting the schools of fish, and pointing both the seiner fleet and the RP toward the fish. It was a good trip. No giants, but the tuna were like bookends, everything between 190# and 220#. I had promised my catch to the OC chapter of SCI so I tagged all the big ones for donation to Sportsmen Against Hunger, the SCI charity, and Saint Vincent DePaul. One of the other hunt club members showed up at the dock and hauled that pile of tuna to another member's seafood cutting business in OC. Twelve fish weighed in at 2640 pounds. I had one under 200 and the rest were over. Scotty told me I was her only passenger who turned down the 100# club patches. I had a lot of them by then.
The fishing hasn't been the same since then. I'm glad I went hunting. In 2019-2020, I took six trips from 3-18 days on a trio of boats. The "Sugarcane Bank," was all sharks. We flirted with Clarion a few days and took a few big ones. Then Jeff took a big chance and tested the Roca de Caca and found the dive boats were gone. He trolled it for a a straight 48 and pulled out 200 wahoo while he was staring at the radar, keeping his fingers crossed that no one else would see him. And then in a gutsy move he ran for San Benidicto. Arriving in the dark, about 10 miles out, he could see the bright lights off the dive boats and reversed course. We finished out the 18 at the Rock before the ride home. That trip was as close as it could get to old school fishing.
That was the strangest trip ever in history. The day after we left, they closed the entire world for Covid. Weird as fuck I tell you. I caught the news on CNN after lunch every day and did some fast calculations that 2 million would be sick by Christmas. When we returned, it was totally strange. The docks were empty with none of the hundred or so people who usually meet the return of an 18-day trip. The red shirts all wore N-95 masks. The few family who were there to greet returning fishermen brought masks. Rosecrans was empty. A young woman in mask was bleaching the pumps when I got gas for the ride home. The 15 freeway was empty except for a few cars driving 100 mph like they could avoid a virus. It was surreal. That's the strangest long range memory I'll ever have after 50 years of it.
Thinking back on then and now makes me sad. Sorry guys. We left the world in a much worse place since the 1970s and 1980s. Apologies to today's youth.
Bill Poole had gone hunting. He bought a square mile of ranch near Yellowstone and hunted it for a while. Then he got fixated on hunting big sheep, here in the US and in Asia. I figured it must be a good idea so I gave up on long range and went hunting too, Canada, Alaska, Africa, and killed all kinds of stuff. We have a couple of 30' walls in the rod and gun room here on the plantation covered in horns and heads to prove it. At the SCI conventions in Reno and Vegas back then, on the big dinner and auction nights, Bill sat at a front table with Ingrid. I sat three or four rows back. He never knew one of his old deck hands was sitting behind him.
Bill eventually sold the big property near Yellowstone to Steven Seagal, but he kept the original 65 acre homestead that got him started in Wyoming. Loomis hunted there many times, insisting on taking a big elk with a muzzleloader. He stalked and stalked three years in a row and every year he got close to a 6x6. He heard the bullet hit every time, but three years in a row, the elk ran off and he never recovered one. Three years was enough for Steve and he quit elk hunting.
In 2004, Loomis ran the RP and with the islands closed and few other choices, headed south and went to Puerto Vallarta. We fished in the yellow sodium vapor glow of PV for caballitos at night and in between the Mexican seiners north of Tres Marias for YFT during the day. Steve was friends with one of helicopter pilots who was flying off of a 190' super seiner, scouting the schools of fish, and pointing both the seiner fleet and the RP toward the fish. It was a good trip. No giants, but the tuna were like bookends, everything between 190# and 220#. I had promised my catch to the OC chapter of SCI so I tagged all the big ones for donation to Sportsmen Against Hunger, the SCI charity, and Saint Vincent DePaul. One of the other hunt club members showed up at the dock and hauled that pile of tuna to another member's seafood cutting business in OC. Twelve fish weighed in at 2640 pounds. I had one under 200 and the rest were over. Scotty told me I was her only passenger who turned down the 100# club patches. I had a lot of them by then.
The fishing hasn't been the same since then. I'm glad I went hunting. In 2019-2020, I took six trips from 3-18 days on a trio of boats. The "Sugarcane Bank," was all sharks. We flirted with Clarion a few days and took a few big ones. Then Jeff took a big chance and tested the Roca de Caca and found the dive boats were gone. He trolled it for a a straight 48 and pulled out 200 wahoo while he was staring at the radar, keeping his fingers crossed that no one else would see him. And then in a gutsy move he ran for San Benidicto. Arriving in the dark, about 10 miles out, he could see the bright lights off the dive boats and reversed course. We finished out the 18 at the Rock before the ride home. That trip was as close as it could get to old school fishing.
That was the strangest trip ever in history. The day after we left, they closed the entire world for Covid. Weird as fuck I tell you. I caught the news on CNN after lunch every day and did some fast calculations that 2 million would be sick by Christmas. When we returned, it was totally strange. The docks were empty with none of the hundred or so people who usually meet the return of an 18-day trip. The red shirts all wore N-95 masks. The few family who were there to greet returning fishermen brought masks. Rosecrans was empty. A young woman in mask was bleaching the pumps when I got gas for the ride home. The 15 freeway was empty except for a few cars driving 100 mph like they could avoid a virus. It was surreal. That's the strangest long range memory I'll ever have after 50 years of it.
Thinking back on then and now makes me sad. Sorry guys. We left the world in a much worse place since the 1970s and 1980s. Apologies to today's youth.
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Ah yes those pilots that flew for the seiners...
Remember one day on the Star with Randy he had one of his pilot friends dope him up. Was not a helicopter, but a plane that came in low and slow and once directly above dropped a plastic bag out the window which we retrieved. Inside was the hot tuna dope that was to valuable to put out on the radio.
We put it to good use....
Remember one day on the Star with Randy he had one of his pilot friends dope him up. Was not a helicopter, but a plane that came in low and slow and once directly above dropped a plastic bag out the window which we retrieved. Inside was the hot tuna dope that was to valuable to put out on the radio.
We put it to good use....
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