One Angry Voice, A Hundred Happy Ones
A float tube is proof that Americans are an optimistic bunch. We willingly strap ourselves into what amounts to an inflatable recliner, kick a mile from shore with just enough fishing tackle to keep us afloat, and somehow convince ourselves this is a perfectly reasonable way to spend America’s birthday.
The funny part is…it is.
Out on that churning water, nobody cares what kind of luxury car you’re making payments on, what your worthless job title is, or if you’ve worn the same sweat-stained Simms shirt since Friday. It is just the raw, brutal indifference of the water, the weather, and the desperate hope of the next cast. This isn’t a hobby; it is the closest thing to absolute, primal independence I have ever found. So, happy 250th, America. Keep kicking that leaky donut.
The Plan
Every fishing trip starts with a game plan.
Mine was simple: launch before sunrise, kick out to the courtesy docks near Ballast Point, and work my way back toward the Second Street Bridge before the Fourth of July boat traffic turned the marina into organized chaos.
The Fourth of July had barely clawed its way over the horizon when I launched from Mother’s Beach, armed with entirely too much confidence and several hundred dollars worth of Japanese fishing tackle. America may have defeated the British in 1776, but Shimano defeated my checking account sometime around June.
The marina looked peaceful. Which should have been my first warning. Peace is never natural. It is merely the brief pause between idiots.
Like most of my trips, I also had a line I wasn’t willing to cross.
Literally.
When I fish Los Alamitos in a float tube, I have a “red line” where I won’t venture any farther into the main channel. It’s not because I can’t physically go farther—it’s because I’ve learned that good decisions are easier when you don’t negotiate with yourself. The line is the line.
The Pattern
The best fishing lesson of the day had nothing to do with lure selection. It had everything to do with current.
Most marinas have a subtle but consistent flow. Whether the tide is coming in or going out, water is constantly moving from the backs of the basins toward the main channel. Around 1:00 p.m., the outgoing tide amplified that movement, creating a very obvious pattern.
What surprised me wasn’t where I caught fish. It was where I didn’t.
Nearly every bite came from the left (up-current) side of the slips closest to the main channel. By casting to that side, the current carried my Jigpara Spin naturally beneath the dock fingers, exactly where an ambush predator wants to see an easy meal drift by. Casting to the opposite side looked good… but the current immediately swept my bait away from the dock and into what I call no man’s land—the middle of the slip where nothing seemed interested.
Even more interesting, the pattern completely died once I got deeper into the basins. I could duplicate the same cast, fish the same structure, and present the bait the same way. The only difference was distance from the main channel. Once I was more than three or four boats inside the basin, the bites simply disappeared.
The bass weren’t scattered. They were positioned with purpose.
By the end of the day, I wasn’t really fishing docks anymore. I was fishing current. The sea wall that protects Basins 2 and 3 seems like a communal spot, but you have to be blind to not realize the current breaks and feeding opportunities it creates for the harbor’s apex predators.
The Sea Hag
The courtesy docks produced exactly what I expected early that morning.
A few small bass.
A couple of missed bites.
Enough to convince me I was in the right neighborhood.
Then the morning took an unexpected detour.
A large scuba charter boat was tied to one of the courtesy docks. I carefully maneuvered around it, made a few casts, and was already kicking away when someone aboard yelled,
“CAN’T YOU FIND SOMEWHERE ELSE TO FISH?”
Interesting opening statement.
No “Good morning.”
No “Happy Fourth.”
Straight to DEFCON One.
What followed was a laundry list of every bad experience she’d apparently ever had with fishermen.
Apparently I had become the elected representative of every fisherman who had ever bounced a sinker off expensive fiberglass.
I was guilty of crimes I hadn’t yet imagined committing.
Then…
“You probably don’t even speak English.”
Now we’d arrived at the real conversation.
I briefly considered climbing aboard and conducting a constitutional law seminar.
Instead…
I called her a Sea Hag.
Quietly.
Mostly for myself.
And the thing is, I agreed with most of her complaints.
There are fishermen who leave bait containers, Monster cans, and tangled braid behind.
There are anglers who bounce sinkers off expensive fiberglass and snag dock lines because they think every piling deserves one more cast.
I’ve been fortunate enough to fish from friends’ boats, and I know how much work goes into keeping them spotless. I respect anyone’s hard-earned property.
But it also isn’t fair to assume every fisherman is guilty before he’s even made a cast.
Years ago I’d have launched a verbal cruise missile attack so devastating it would’ve required NATO assistance.
Instead…I kicked away. Because here’s the ugly truth. The battle wasn’t with her. It was with me.
Somewhere along the line I’d become the kind of man who carries loaded missiles in peacetime. Always waiting. Always expecting. Always rehearsing the next argument before the first word is spoken.
That realization was considerably more uncomfortable than anything she’d said.
Back to the Fishing
Bass didn’t care about her emotional inventory.
They care about current.
Fortunately…
The fish were still willing to cooperate.
Later that morning, I crawled beneath a low concrete overhang where the ceiling was barely above my head.
The GoPro was rolling as I said to myself.
“There’s gonna be fish in here….there’s GOTTA be fish in —-“
I hadn’t even finished the sentence before the Jigpara Spin got absolutely freight-trained by something monstrous and angry. The raw violence of the strike nearly pulled me right out of my rubber donut.
From there, the dock pattern west of the Second Street Bridge really started to reveal itself. Every fish reinforced the same lesson.
Current first. Structure second. Everything else was just details.
The only real casualty of the day happened when I made an overhead cast without noticing a large anchor hanging above me.
CRACK.
My still new-to-me Shimano Zodias B became a travel rod.
Oddly enough…I wasn’t angry. It was completely my fault. I laughed, reminded myself to pay attention to overhead clearance, and realized something else. The 7’2″ model had always felt just a little long while fishing from my float tube anyway. The handle constantly bumped my lap and tube. Shimano’s replacement program would soften the financial sting, and I’d probably replace it with the 6’10” version.
Sometimes expensive mistakes still teach you something useful.
By the time I kicked back toward Mother’s Beach, the fog had surrendered.
A gigantic American flag hanging from one of the harbor cranes finally caught the wind.
Kids were laughing from an inflatable Zodiac.
Families crowded every inch of sand.
Mexicans. Asians. Black families. White families. Veterans.
Tourists.
People who probably disagreed on absolutely everything…
…except that it was a beautiful day to be alive.
By the time I dragged my waterlogged rubber donut onto the sand, the unpleasant interaction from earlier had been reduced to exactly what it deserved to be: one small, brief moment of ugly madness in an otherwise beautiful day.
Fishing has a funny way of doing that. It restores perspective, if you are paying attention. Sometimes it teaches us about bass and currents. But if you listen closely, sometimes it teaches us about ourselves. This Fourth of July, I came home with a new, technical dock pattern, a broken, useless Zodias rod, and a profound reminder that one single difficult, entitled person does not get to define an entire, beautiful day on the water.
I would call that a pretty successful trip. Keep kicking, you bastards. The current will take us where we need to go.
