Virgin post

Listening to the news today you hear the same old stories.  Hamas is sending rockets into Israel. Israel is killing Palestinians.  There is chaos at the border as thousands of minor illegal aliens pour across.  The Pacific coast is on fire and the I.R.S. is a pack of disk drive crashing liars.  A depressing state for the generation who still respected their elders and felt pride when saying the Pledge and singing the National Anthem.

I say it's time for a change.  Not the systematic change promised in 2008 but real change like a trip to Baja California.  A fishing, diving, beer drinking trip that makes me forget the news.  Not like I can do a damn thing about it.  At my age I'll be dead before the true impact of liberal spending becomes reality anyway.

My first visit to The Isle of San Luis was 44 years ago.  The memory of flat seas, blue water and bright sunshine are as clear today as the day we made the Trip.  The 75 mile run in a 17 foot Boston Whaler on calm seas was a joy.  The whaler gunnels were about 4 inches above the water line.  The boat, packed with diving, fishing and camping gear was humming along and the skipper and mate were toasting the weather with a canteen full of Harvey Wallbangers when a school of about a hundred dolphins joined the party.  We put away the canteen, got out the super 8 camera and shot a roll of film as the dolphins rolled, jumped and surfed the bow.  The 3 minute roll of film lasted about as long as the dolphins could keep up and we stowed the camera and broke out the canteen.

About half way to our destination we ran out of Wallbangers and good sense.  The skipper noticed a large bird pile up and we decided to fish it in case there was a school of fish under it.  Turns out there was a sand bar under them and we ran aground.  By the time we got the boat back to deep water we had sobered enough to finish the run.

                               A natural breakwater on San Luis Isle

This is a picture of the bay where we camped.  Access to the isle is no longer legal and we plan to stay in a local motel at San Luis Gonzaga this upcoming trip.  On our first trip we speared grouper, halibut, trigger fish and veija which is a rass but very tasty.  We fed ourselves the ten days we were camped there and also fed the no see 'ums as well.   Pound for pound the no see 'um is the most vicious critter alive.  Of course it would take several billion to make a pound probably.  Their bite is similar to a mosquito but picture a swarm of mosquitoes that block out the sun and are small enough to fly up your nose.  The bite lasts about ten days and will swell a little more every day for the whole time.

I didn't get a picture of the no see 'ums as they are unseen but I did get a few pictures of the fish.

                       

 Most fish were speared at Pomo Island east of the backside of San Luis. Pictured above.

I'll keep you posted of the planned trip in November and in the mean time I will post pictures of the past trips to keep myself pumped up.  Gotta keep my mind off the state of the union and this is helpful.