Captain Tommy, aka tjcarroll, organized a Westport trip aboard the Hula Girl for a halibut trip. Somehow, I managed to Ho my way on a spot on this trip. Also coming along on this trip would be Sky-Guy, seastrike, Irish Rogue, a lurker or two, and a bunch of Tommy's co-workers, friend, etc. I believe the boat total for this trip was 16...with one no show when the boat left the dock.

The predicted weather and swell for Thursday was crappy, followed periods of more crappy, with the seas at a calm 12' swells, 12 seconds apart. Sounded like a good day for a boat ride!

4:00ish rolled around and the Hula Girl out of Westport Charters , Captained by Steve Westrick with his deckhand and son Jason Westrick, took off across the bar. The bar was a little bumpy and we only bottomed out the boat once..OK, maybe twice. No pukers yet.

Parker and Sky-Guy hunkered down for the long 3 hour boat ride to the fishing grounds. Parker is even wearing his new lifejacket (I should get a gold star, or something..considering how much shiat I got for doing so.)



First to puke was an older gentlemen (sorry, I forgot his name). He'd never ever been seasick before and was quite stunned at having to puke in the cold, wind, rain, and big seas. Next up to the starboard puke rail was our very own seastrike! YARGGHHHH! There goes the morning cup of coffee.

Fortunately, the Hula Girl is one of the, if not the, fastest boats in the fleet and we got to the fishing grounds first. A quick "how this boat operates" talk by Captain Steve and we were gearing up for some BIG BUTTS!!!!

Sky-Guy gives his bait the "taste test". "Yup, this bait tastes JUST fine......", proclaimed Sky-Guy! You can tell by the smile on Jason's face that he liked us just fine.



Took all of about 1 minute until the first "FISH ON!" was heard up from the bow. Team Double 'But hooks up on double on their own! Wooo Whoo! Notice the nice hail pellets in the shot....



Another Parker Under The Rainbow shot. YEAHHHH!!!! This 'but thing is pretty cool!



Sky-Guy lost his 'but at this point and had to wait to fish again. Parker's 'but put up a pretty good fight. A *lot* harder than I had expected. Granted we were fishing down at 700', but still. Dang ol' 'buts put up a good fight. I won in the end, though. Classic Parker Grip-N-Grin with a 30'sish 'but.



Sometime during the confusion, seastrike hooks up on a what turned out to be the biggest 'but of them all!



Tom admires a nice 'but he just dragged up from the bottom. Phew.



Look at the determination on seastrike's face. A man on a mission. Not too sure who was winning the battle at this point.....



More on the next thread........