#13 Unlucky

Saturday 5/23/26

We heard our Point Loma Marlin Club was having their annual Blackman Memorial Halibut Derby this weekend so we donated a few swag packs to the event and thought we would enter the tournament and give it a shot. We were really hoping for our hot streak on local yellowtail to continue so we played Yellowtail side pot. We launched the boat early and made it to La Jolla just in time to put our lines in the water at 5:00 am. Water temperature was between 68- 69 degrees all day. The morning was very slow. Not too many boats out there, which was surprising for Memorial Day Weekend. The birds in the area were flying high and it seemed like everyone was looking for signs of fish. We started our day by releasing a nice calico bass, then fishing was quiet for a while. A few spots of barracuda popped on the surface, so we threw some irons for a while and managed to catch and release a few more calico’s and a barracuda. We fished very hard throughout the day. With minimal signs of fish we decided to put out the trollers and after a while we caught a small Mako shark. We pushed the clock to the limit and left La Jolla at 4 pm to make the run back home around the point. It was a day of catch & release for us, and back at the dock it sounded like that was the case for a lot of the boats in the tournament. It was a tough day of fishing. A few halibut and one yellowtail were weighed in. It was nice to see some halibut caught for the tournament, and we all enjoyed a great meal at the club! Thank you to the anglers in the community and The Marlin Club for a great evening! Even though we couldn’t find our lucky yellowtail, we had a great day beside the point.