Oct. 1 2003
Good evening folks. Well, bad news. The rocks completely fell on its face. Between us and the Vagabond we had a pitiful score on fish. We left at 3:30 with 5 tuna and 6 wahoo for our efforts.

We have decided to check out the lower end of the ridge tomorrow starting on the 23 fathom spot and then working down if need be. We stopped on a couple kelps later this afternoon for not much, hooked a couple of wahoo on one and got one. We will be fishing first light. We will report again tomorrow. Andy Cates

Oct 2 2003.
Good evening folks. We spent the day fishing the Ridge. Hoping to get some action and let the Rocks turn around for the last part of the trip. There was a lack of school size tuna and yellowtail but a sample of those legendary Ridge size Wahoo. We scratched out 19 wahoo for our efforts on various jig strikes and drifts.
We pounded and pounded and were only able to come up with 19. Although they were definitely trophy wahoo. It looks at an estimate to be a couple of 70 pounders in the shuffle.

They are deceiving so we will find out at the dock. I posted some pictures of some of the nicer fish caught today and one group photo. Tomorrow we are going to fish outside of Mag Bay in hopes of some action on Dorado. We will report again then. Andy Cates

Oct3 2003
Good evening folks. The morning started off with a bang. A stop on a couple of birds produced 60 dorado and 5 wahoo. We were primed and ready to rock. We thought it was the beginning of a great day. We ended up driving around the rest of the day stopping only on another troll caught wahoo and a couple of dorado.  We saw one promising thing floating that did not produce. Moral went down after that, and right now we are on our way back up to the ridge and start were we left off on those big wahoo. We are going to spend the day on the ridge and then finish the trip off with yellowtail.

We have some nice quality fish aboard, now the guys are hungry for some red hot action. With the lack of quality grade school size yellowfin tuna it will be tough . Hopefully we can stay busy anyhow. We will report again tomorrow, Andy Cates

Oct 4 2003
Good evening folks. We spent the day on the ridge. Most of the day spent on the anchor scratching away on nice size yellowtail. Average yellow is 18 to 25 pounds. It was a lot of work, the yellows were on the bottom and a Yo- Yo jig was best throughout the day although we had a few on the dropper loop as well. We ended up with 18 wahoo for our efforts on various shallows. Our best stop was for seven fish. The others came one here two there.
We are going to stay on the ridge again and hope for some more wahoo tomorrow. A few more dorado were landed this  evening on the anchor. We will report again tomorrow, Andy Cates
 

Oct 5 2003
Good evening folks. Another day on the ridge brought us more action on yellowtail and wahoo. The yellows started to bite at 4:30 in the morning. Some smaller yellows mixed in but plenty of nice ones mixed in. We scratched until lunch and picked up the anchor after 160 yellows.

We spent the afternoon trolling for wahoo and left the upper end of the ridge at sundown. We are going to start at Isla Natividad in the morning. We will be there after breakfast and ready to go. Posted a couple of pictures of  Tony and Bob with a couple of nice wahoo. We will report again tomorrow, Andy Cates
 

Oct 6 2003

We went up the line last night and had a decent night. We arrived at the south end of Natividad at 8:30. We got on a spot of yellows and kicked over the anchor. The action was very good on 15 to 22 pound yellows. Fish biting the surface iron and the fly lined sardines or mackerel. After an hour and a half we had all we needed and decided to head over to Chester's Rock for some bigger grade yellow. Not much sign at first and then after a couple of anchor jobs we started to scratch nice yellows. Average was very nice 25 to 40 pound yellows on the surface iron and the green back mackerel, fly lined. I posted  some pictures of a some of the Chester's yellows. We had a pretty good hook land average and picked off 28 of the better yellows in the 2 hour window when they were biting
Tomorrow we will be at Guadalupe just for lack of anything else to do, and hopefully we get a morning shot on yellowfin and finish off with a bang. We will report again tomorrow, Andy Cates
 

Oct. 7 2003

Good afternoon folks. We just left Guadalupe and are getting ready for lunch. We had a nice morning with good action on yellowfin from 25 to 100 pounds For the morning we ended up with 74 tuna , 8 of  which were 70 to 100 lb trophy size and the others 25 to 40 pounds. For just a couple of hours we had steady action and was a real nice way to end the trip. The weather is flat calm and reports from up above sound good as well. We will be in tomorrow at 8:00 AM and leave again on another 10 day trip. We will report again tomorrow. Andy Cates

Oct. 9, 2003
Good morning. We departed yesterday on the annual Bluefin Jim 10 day charter at 13:00.After taking on what appears to be a very nice load of 5 to 8 inch sardines, we cleared Point Loma at 15;00 hrs. After putting the Red Rooster III on course for Alijos Rocks we spent an hour getting everyone familiar with the safety equipment on board the vessel and bringing everyone up to speed on the working aspects of the boat. After my speech Bluefin Jim did a raffle where all 25 people received some very nice tackle giveaways, we would like to thank all our sponsors who participated, Catchy Tackle, The

 tackle store, M.C. Swimbaits, Owner Hooks, Izorline and Calstar Rods.

Needless to say we have 25 anglers on board with high hopes and visions of grandeur. This morning we will be conducting our on board tackle seminar and spending the rest of the day getting our gear ready for the fishing adventure ahead, we are now looking at an E.T.A. to Alijos Rocks of 05:00 Friday morning, wish us luck.... John and crew

Oct. 9, 2003
Good evening folks, today was a travel day heading towards Alijos Rocks in absolutely perfect weather. The seminar went very well and the rest of the day was dedicated to helping everyone on board getting prepared for the fishing days ahead. Our intentions are to stop at 4:30 AM, and put some fresh squid aboard, then get setup around day light at the rocks for tuna. The reports from down this way are fair to good on excellent quality tuna, so we are hoping to get our trip off  to a good start tomorrow. Wish us luck and we will report back tomorrow. John and crew

Oct. 11
Good morning from Alijos Rocks. Yesterday was exactly what we were hoping for to start our trip. The quality of the tuna is just excellent with a pretty good percentage of fish at or over the century mark. We started our day by trolling around and scratching up 14 Wahoo then around 10:00 am we got the anchor down and started fishing tuna. The tuna fishing was by no means wide open but we stayed busy right till dark catching fish both on flyline sardines and the kite. There were at least 6 people on board who caught their largest tuna ever, all of which I believe will break the 100 pound mark. We have no intentions of leaving for at least two more days unless something changes drastically for the worst tomorrow, this was a very nice day of fishing. We are sending three
pictures of Glenn Kerr, Butch, and Thor Van Horn with tuna that are personal best for them all, congratulations. These fish pictured are a perfect example of  the quality we are getting at Alijos. John and crew
 

Oct. 12
Good afternoon folks, we had some problems with our satellite phone that is why our report was late but we are on line now. Yesterday started out slow in the morning hours, but the afternoon made up for it we had pretty good fishing from lunch until dark on 70-120 pound tuna with 10 wahoo mixed in. Far and away our top producing method the past two days has been the kite, we have gone thru 40 kite turns in basically 1-1/2 days of fishing. The weather has been just perfect for both sitting on the anchor and flying the kite, very good fishing conditions. We are still at Alijos Rocks and plan on giving this at least today and possibly tomorrow before moving to new areas and hunt for new species. We are sending a picture of our evening bite before we put them down to give you an idea of just how good the quality of this fish really is also pictured is myself and charter master Bluefin Jim. We will report back tomorrow with hopefully an equally as good report. John and crew

Oct. 13
Good morning from Alijos Rocks, yesterday proved to be a true battle between trophy Yellowfin tuna and our anglers aboard the Red Rooster III. The hooked to land ratio on this quality fish on our 60 pound gear is the challenge we face on each and every fish. We have been very fortunate to have had very good kite fishing on BIG gear to improve our catch percentage. This has been a true quality experience here at Alijos between the fishing and the weather, things are good. We are spending one more day to try and take advantage of our very good fortune of being at the right place at the right time. The pictures we are sending here today once again display the quality of these fish. First picture is of Tony Garza with his first fish of the morning, next picture is of myself and my good friend Troy Parrot with Troy's very nice balloon fish. The last picture is of long time Red Rooster III passenger Ed Scheenstra with his tuna he caught on 60 pound test line.

P.S. Topo wishes you and your short top shots were here, the guys.
 

Oct. 14
Good morning, our stay at Alijos is finally over and we could not be any happier with the out come.  There were so many highlights to the days we spent at the rocks its hard to pinpoint any one thing that stood out.  I guess for me it was the steady kite fishing we had for all four days at Alijos.  We went through seventy six kite turns and to watch those big fish go off on the kite bait was incredible, what a show.  We have left Alijos leaving ourselves plenty of time to top off the catch with hopefully some nice quality yellowtail, dorado and possibly a few more wahoo.  Currently we are traveling towards the coast headed for an area that to our knowledge none of our fleet has looked in this year, needless to say we are excited with the possibilities.  The pictures we are sending today are the last look at the amazing size of the tuna we have been catching.  There is a group shot of a wahoo stop we had yesterday and a picture of Joe Ornelas with an afternoon kite fish.  The last picture of Glen, George and John is of their three kite fish which came within minutes of each other yesterday morning. John and crew
 

Oct. 15
Good morning folks, yesterday did not work out as anticipated, very poor conditions and lack of fish made for a tough day of scratch fishing. We did manage to catch 49 Yellowtail and release a Black sea bass and a Marlin. Today we are around Natividad Island trying for Yellowtail and hoping for some fast and furious action. The weather continues to be picture perfect as it has been ever since we left the dock. We will report back tomorrow morning with the up date on today's fishing activities. John and crew

Oct. 16
Good morning, yesterday turned out to be a very good day of yellowtail fishing. We caught limits of fifteen to twenty two pound yellowtail with one token fifty pounder thrown in the mix.  We caught fish on all types of set ups but probably the preferred methods today were flyline sardine and the yo-yo jigs.  The yo-yo fishing was close to spectacular and the few guys who tried the surface lures were bit nearly every cast.  This was just a perfect day of  fishing in absolutely flat, glassy calm weather as you can see in our group photo.  At sundown we fished for mackerel near the south end of Cedros island.  We are currently traveling out to Guadalupe island to try and finish the trip with a few more yellowfin tuna and some home guard Guadalupe yellowtail.

 I am really looking forward to fishing Guadalupe the next day and a half and trying some of our old spots for the big yellows.   We are on the hunt for a few trophies.  This trip in my opinion has been just spectacular and we have been very fortunate to have seen the type of fishing that we've experienced so far.  We will report back tomorrow with the latest on our quest for a few yellowfin tuna and trophy size yellowtail.
 

Oct. 17th
Good morning,  yesterday worked out just great with the exception of big Yellowtail, we got none. We did however get sixty of the school size Yellowfin tuna that are here in the eighteen to thirty-five pound range and released another ten to fifteen fish. We spent the afternoon fishing for Calico bass around the weather side of the island. We will be leaving some time mid morning today and expect to be at the dock at 0900 Saturday morning. The passengers are extremely happy with the outcome of our adventure and are now anxious to get home to see their families, as we all are. The boat will be departing on Sunday October 19 for 14 days so look for Andy's reports starting Monday October 20, 2003. This is the first long trip of the season.  John and crew

Oct. 18th
 

Oct 20 2003
Good afternoon folks. Yesterday we left on our annual 14 day trip to the Hurricane Bank. So far things are fine. The sardines we got are very nice and looks like they will live good in the warm water. The weather today was very nice. We spent some time in a seminar going over the Jack Pot and the options for your catch at the dock.
We are going to provide a fresh catch option for the last three days of the trip.
So far the weather down below sound good . There is one storm developing and we will keep a very close eye on what it does. Tomorrow we will go over a few things abort wahoo fishing and spend the rest of the day looking for kelp paddies in hopes of some wahoo. we will report again tomorrow. Andy Cates

Oct 21 2003
Good evening folks. Not much to report today. Nice weather and smooth seas made for a very relaxing day. We are keeping a close eye on tropical storm Patricia and are hoping it goes up the beach.

Another day of travel tomorrow and then the bank late that night. Everything is running well and the people are getting geared up for the next week of fishing We will report again tomorrow. Andy Cates

Oct 23 2003
Good evening folks. We arrived at the Bank this morning. We had decent bait fishing with nice flat calm weather for drifting. First thing this morning we noticed is no heavy presence of sharks. We are glad to see that. We had very few even while chunking.
Rob Tapert started us off with this nice fish in the high hundreds. We picked at the wahoo on the anchor most of the morning and had a few other nice fish and some smaller 70 to 90 pounders mixed in.
The afternoon was the most promising picking up a couple of fish over 200 pounds. Roger Nichols and Bob Tyler shown with Rogers fish 210 pounds and Bobs about 190. Also Bob Michner shown with crewman Spike
that was caught on the kite on his new accurate this fish taped out 220 pounds.
Dennis Bidigare and Wayne Honda also with a couple of very nice fish. We ended up with 75 tuna and 40 wahoo for the day.
Most of the bigger fish on the kite and the rest on the sardine. Out of the 75 tuna, half are the 70 to 90 pound fish and the other half are fish 100 pounds and up including the 2 fish over 200 pounds. We will report again tomorrow. Andy Cates

Oct24 2003
Good evening folks. We had a nice pick on beautiful grade fish throughout the day. We started the morning with a 175 ponder on the Tady 15  and from there things just got better. Most of the kite fish throughout the day were all good ones. Fish at least 100 pounds and 4 fish caught today that were over 200 pounds. The squid on the kite seemed to be the ticket. The live flyers were successful but the cows wanted those big squid. We had no shark problem all day and very little sign even in the dark. Ending the day with 50 tuna and only 9 wahoo. There is sign of wahoo but we are going to work on the tuna first. I posted some pictures of various guys .
A highlight is Roger Nichols with his third fish over 200 caught today and also a great group shot after a great bite on quality fish into the dark up to 200 pounds. We will report again tomorrow. Andy Cates

Oct 25 2003
Good evening folks. Today we saw the effects of Patricia and it made for a wet uncomfortable day. The fishing was also effected and we had a much slower day. We trolled around and picked up 15 wahoo saw sign of the 70 to 90 pound fish and got the anchor down for the afternoon. We released a dozen fish under 100 pounds throughout the day and threw down a dozen fish 100 pounds or better. Only a handful of fish 120 pounds and one about 190 and that fish showed for just a little bit in the evening.
Tomorrow we are hoping to have better weather and maybe a few more shots at some of the better grade fish. We will report again then. Andy Cates

Oct 26 2003
Good evening folks
We had a very slow day up until the late afternoon. There was very little sign of the better grade fish until about 4:00 in the afternoon. We released about a dozen fish throughout the day and kept 15 fish all over 100 pounds. One fish caught by Dennis Bidigare taped out over 200 pounds and several fish up in the high hundreds for the day. Not much wahoo here today, only a 8 for our efforts. It looks like we are just about full, but left a little room for some wahoo.
We are going to stay the night and hope that some wahoo move in for tomorrow. We will report again tomorrow, Andy Cates

Oct 27 2003
Good evening folks. We spent the morning trolling for wahoo. There was a little more sign but only 15 wahoo for our efforts. We still saw decent sign of tuna on our way out of there but it did not look like the wahoo thing was going to happen. With just enough room in the fish holds for wahoo, we decided to run up and look for kelps in hopes of finishing off on some of the nice big ones in that area.
We will be traveling tomorrow and rigging up for the bigger size wahoo and break down most of the tuna gear. The weather is now very nice and we are enjoying a nice ride up. We will report again tomorrow. Andy Cates