My buddy caught a 38incher without me, I saw the pictures. I was jealous. Just a month earlier, I helped him land a forty incher, in a hole, close to shore. A woman screamed in terror as we brought the halibut onto the shore. My buddy strained to keep the head pressure on, but I lifted it up, then broke it's neck...blood poured over the sand.
I was distraught. Two days later, I made my way down to old Del Mar to surfboard fish, and hopefully, redeem myself.
It was an incredible day, not a cloud in the sky, no one near, I was the only one out, and I was scouring the rip tides near the beach break. I would paddle my surfboard to the inner break zone, cast, and drift to the the outer reef. I was in about 8 to 10 feet of water, kicking my feet to stay out of the middle of the rip, taking a few waves to my backside, but using that momentum to keep me close inside. It was a balance between getting sucked out to sea in the rip tide and getting slammed back to shore from the set waves.
I got a few small tugs, then I hooked into what fealt like a huge toad, and the fight was on.
When I hooked the halibut, my pole started to take jabbing dives into the water as line was stripped from the reel in frantic bursts. My drag washers started working overtime, and a few violent tugs more, I had to back way off. I couldn't see the fish but I worked the reel delicately while straining to stay on my board. That sucker would have pulled me into the water if I didn't loosen the drag. As I kicked my legs to keep myself perpendicular to the waves, a couple of set waves lined-up and took sraight aim at me and my big fish. Before I could finish a curse word, a barrel of whitewater came crashing down. Rats!
I was knocked off my board, swimming for dear life, sruggling to keep all my gear on, and not lose my fishing pole.
