Well boys it was a hell of trip myself and 3 buddies headed out to Port Eliza on Aug 16 made a stop in Campbell River for the night and then headed to Zeballos the next morning!
Aug 17 we got picked up by our guide Cole from Zeballos government dock, After dropping off our gear and coolers at the lodge we were off for our half day of fishing which was great ended up with a couple coho and a 12lb spring and lost a lot of others springs and coho along with a nice high teener spring about 50' from the boat on the surface. 3 of my buddies have never fished salt water so it was quite the learning experience for them on Sundays half fish lol.
Aug 18 our first full day of fishing was a wet one but was well worth it, ended up hitting up the doughnut which was just outside the inlet where there was a little wind and 1.5 meter swells. We limited out on coho within an hour and couldn't keep them off the lines it was craziness, double headers and foul hooked fish and waves, had a couple buddies go green so they had to sit out for a little bit and take some pills which slowly kicked in while myself and my other buddy cleaned up lol. Headed back inside to a nice female humpback and her calf playing on the inside, after watching that beautiful show headed over to rosa and ended up getting another 10lb spring and some more coho, trolled towards the garden and log dump only to catch some small jacks and couple cod but nothing special that's for sure.
Aug 19 our 2nd day full fishing, we noticed the night before that the winds and waves were dropping below 1 meter and Cole was ready to get us out to the highway (Salmon Highway) 14 miles off shore, we headed out at 7am took about 1 hr of boat time to get to the highway. Started fishing 6 and 7"(#605, #725 and a custom UVBII plug not sure of the number) tomic plugs naked at about 265 and 295ft down and not 5 mins in landed a 15 pound spring, over the next couple hrs we landed another 5 springs all the way from 15 - 19lbs and lost about 8 others. Weather cleaned up and was sunny and slow rollers making it a beautiful day so we decided to switch up and go for lings and hali and cod of any kind really. Got a couple lings then ended up catching ALOT of yellow eyes, which were sent back but also got some canaries and black cod. Coho were heavily abundant as well out on the highway they are just everywhere it seems lol
Aug 20 our 3rd full fishing day, the weather was beautiful and got to play on the outside again needing another couple springs and coho headed out to Sandstone, what a beautiful location along with about 7 other boats we hit our 2 springs within 20 mins and lost a bunch more, lots and lots of coho as always hitting our trailhead skinny G and the Meat Rig almost non stop, I lost a freight train of a fish mid to high 20's just rocketed from the boat at 105' and just pulled like hell with about 4 runs, ended up long line losing him when he turned towards the boat as I just couldn't keep up with him was reeling like hell. After a while of playing with the salmon we decided to head further off shore to some hali grounds, first stop not much going on then my good buddy Allan hooked into a nice fish, pulled like hell he was saying how much his lower back was feeling it bring it up from the depths lol a nice 80lb Halibut about 135cm well over what the keepable size is unfortunately had to let that beauty go back down. After a little while longer not really getting into anything of size, headed further out to the chicken ranch where we ended up getting some cookie cutter 15-20lb hali's we were shooting for 30-40lbers but they just didn't seem to be around. My good buddy Cory ended up reeling in about 7 hali's that day and for 51 that boy can reel lol
Aug 21 last day half fishing day, Sunny morning had a game plan with Cole to get our bottom fish cleaned up for the license ideally shooting for Lings and Cod so we shot off to Pin Rock for some jigging in and around that area, ended up getting another 4 lings, 5 cod and a coho and a spring on jigs which were by catch but fun still the same lol they hit some large led sled style jigs which was mind boggling to me as I've never jigged and caught salmon that way! Headed back around 10:30am to the lodge where we packed up and sorted our processed catches from the 4 days and loaded them into the coolers for transport. Jim and Sue and Cole our guide are amazing people and really care about the experience at Port Eliza, its a very beautiful location secluded away, food and accommodation was great, the atmosphere was awesome and close to the fishing grounds for amazing salmon fishing and bottom fishing! Needless to say this was a total win for myself and 3 buddies who want to do it again in a couple years hopefully
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