My first exposure to surf fishing was of this nature. Right after I joined this board last month, I decided to start learning the sport by going to observe people with experience, and at the same time maybe scout a few spo... uhhhh.. places. I owned exactly zero surf gear. Drove down to the East end of the ditch in the middle of the 9 day rain storm. When I got there, parking lot was jammed packed, and it was shoulder-to-shoulder. A few googans like myself, but largely experienced surfcasters managing to stay out of each other's way despite the crowded conditions. The water was high; all the way up to the rocks. The wind was howling and there were giant rollers roaring in from the bay. The rocks and bikepath were littered with fish ranging from just legal size to over 30lbs. There was a huge ball of herring being chased back and forth from the middle of the ditch to the rocks and back again. When they got to the rocks, they were being slaughtered by predators of all sizes, as well as being dashed up against the rocks in explosions of silver by the huge surf. At this point, much of the bait was actually
behind the surfcasters. Guys were dipping thier plugs at thier feet, snagging a herring, and letting it fly, resulting in a fish on with almost every cast. Many of them weren't bothering with the herring, just casting thier plugs, working them deftly, and hooking up.
I worked my way down the rocks towards the water for a closer look. It was an insane scene. Controled chaos. This one guy who already had a 30 pounder up on the path, hooked a small keeper. His wife was there watching. Curiosly enough, despite the wind, rain and cold, she was dressed in shorts and was all smiles. While trying to unhook the small keeper, a hooked became lodged fairly deeply in his hand. Luckily for him, the fish didn't thrash around while he was unhooking it. His wife climbed down the rocks and retrieved the fish, while he took his pliers and dehooked himself as if her were taking a prized plug out of a bluefish. He then turned around, and bleeding like a stuck hog, went back to casting. a few minutes later, waist deep in water, with huge rollers crashing in, a big one made him loose his balance. This was followed by an even bigger one that took him out and down. He popped back up, reached into the water for his now soaking wet knit hat that was knocked off his head, placed it back on his head without even wringing it out, and went back to casting.
As I'm watching all this, all I can think is, "... and here I am without even a camera, let alone any fishing gear. I must have said something outloud to myself, because this really big guy who had one nice fish and one HUGE fish, and who had been saying that we exhausted and had had enough, offered to let me use one of
his rods. He had a couple of 10' custom-type rods with expensive looking reels. I thanked him for his offer but respectfully declined. I had never so much as
thought about throwing a plug into the ditch and was not about to start in such conditions with someone elses expensive gear.
I watched the whole scene for almost another hour. I studied who was doing what, who seemed to know what they were doing, and saw some of what
not to do.
When I left there, I went and got some gear; rod, reel, plugs, waders, etc. I came on here and some other websites to try to get some basics of technique and etiquette down. The next day, I went back to the same place at the same time, all geared up and ready to go.
No wind. No waves. No people. No bait. No fish.
