We went on another yellowtail and tuna prospecting run with Captain Scott. We covered about 140 miles, with only some fun run-and-gun bonito fishing to show for it. TB2 ran well, but was a little hard cranking when cold. Hope this is not a sign of things to come!

Other than that, the engine ran fine. This trip was rougher than earlier trips, and there were no false low oil alarms.

The Goodyear Marathhons ran fine, hadn't noticed this, but they balanced the tires on the trailer.

We wound up replacing the old Carlisle tires on our trailer with Goodyear Marathon radial tires. We took the remaining good Carlisle tire and are using it as a spare.

We made another trip with Capt. Scott as a passenger (busman's holiday). TB2 worked well. Just had to crank a bit when cold and starting for the first time, but this could be due to the engine not having fuel in the system. The engine ran flawlessly after it started once, averaged 4 MPG.

Fishing was slow for yellowtail. We covered the Coronados and offshore to the 425 bank, and encountered large schools of small bonito (2lbs or so) offshore. A lot of fun on light tackle!

Our drive home turned into a bit of a grind - we were caught in rush hour traffic, when a good samaritan pulled up next to us and informed us that our right trailer tire had a huge bulge in it. We managed to pull off and got the tire changed without any excitement. Time for a trip to the tire store!

After some work with the multi-meter and jumper cables, we appear to have pinned down the hard starting problem. It wasn't the engine at all - it was, believe it or not, the battery switches. If we bypassed the switches entirely, the engine would start without a hitch.

We were supposed to go out fishing today in TB2, buddy boating with Capt. Scott Leon who was hosting Ray Hutchinson and Keith Nelson from Sea Level Fly Fishing. But no dice - the boat refused to start! The motor was very slow cranking, and refused to start, even with both batteries hooked up via the battery switches. We wound up spending the day on Capt. Scott's boat, a 26' Jones Brothers center console, with twin 150s. A nice ride, and will be featured in our profile on Jones Brothers Marine.

Fishing was slow, with only a few small kelp and spotted bay bass. But the company was great. Now we just need to figure out what's wrong with the motor...

After last month's success, we decided to try rock codding again, same gear. This time, however, the tides were not as good, and there was little current flow. We started at the South 9 Mile Bank, in the same spots as before, but activity on the meter was much less. Instead of the large clouds of fish, we saw just small groups hunkered closer to the bottom. We still managed to catch a few, but they were all smaller, in the 2-3 lb range.

We worked our way towards the Coronados, and stopped on a couple of rockpiles with fish on them about a mile north of Pukey point. Imagine our surprize when this 17lb yellowtail nailed the 200 gram mackerel finish long Butterfly jig about 100 feet off the bottom. The fish put up a good tussle on the Shimano Butterfly jigging gear, although we had some trouble with the drag on the Torium 20 backing itself off during the fight. We had the drag set for around 12lbs, and it was frustrating to have the drag lighten up during the fight.

We switched to our deep-jigging spinning rod, and worked our way to another rockpile in about 180 feet of water, and was startled to pick up another yellowtail, this one weighing around 22 lbs. Both fish were caught on the long Butterfly jigs, the first fish hitting a 200 gram long Butterfly jig in a mackerel color, the second fish hitting a 120 gram gold/chrome green.

The boat started a little easier this time, but it did take a bit of cranking. Once again, it ran fine the rest of the day. We should take some time to troubleshoot the problem, but after we get the motor started once, it runs fine for the rest of the day, and we can't reproduce the problem.

Another day of no false oil alarms, but it was, of course ANOTHER day of flat water. Didn't think I'd ever complain about flat water!