Days 36 & 37, June 25 & 26, San Diego, CA

You never know what's going to come down the chum line.  But there's a good chance it will be something mean and nasty, and you can be assured it's going to be hunting you.  Could be a mako shark, could be a blue shark, or it could be something even meaner and nastier.  When a big shark rolls by your boat and turns a dark eye on you, it feels like pure evil, man.  Cold.  If you study the bottom half of this picture carefully you may see what I'm talking about.

I'm not going to write a whole lot about my experience fly fishing for sharks off the coast of San Diego.  It was definitely an experience that is best expressed in pictures, and I strongly encourage you to check out this 3-minute video:  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Em72KKHua08n.  I want to thank my good friend Mysterious L.A. Sharker for inviting me to go with him on this adventure, and also Conway Bowman who arranged for our guides, Captain Dave Trimble and Captain Lou Fodor.  Both of our guides are really dialed into the shark scene in Southern California, and did a fantastic job of laying down a chum line.  The sharks came and Mysterious and I both caught them.  It was amazing!  I've never before had 200 pounds of pure evil on the end of my fly line.  What a thrill!

So rather than give you the full narrative about the shark trip, I'm going to cover the social element of our San Diego stay instead.  I am fortunate to have some friends who live there - specifically Therese and Joe Fleming - whom I've known for almost 30 years.  I used to torture Therese in her first professional job after college when she had the misfortune of working under my "supervision."  She must have liked it, though, because we're still friends after all these years.  Therese and Joe were kind enough to put Mysterious and I up at their place when we arrived in town and found out that every hotel and motel south of Riverside, CA was booked for the weekend.  I know that sounds impossible and I thought it was impossible, but it's true.  The Flemings saved the day, and not only did we have a comfortable place to stay, but we had a fabulous time chatting with them and their friend Pamela into the wee hours.  Therese really surprised me - she's turned into a great cook!  And besides that, she's hot!  (Aren't you? Therese.)  Anyway, thanks to T & J - the company and food at their house were almost better than the shark fishing, which was spectacular.

If you're paying careful attention, you may have noticed that I've left a couple of trip days out of my blog.  As I mentioned in my last post, I've got too much material and I haven't had enough time to write it all down yet.  But I will try to revisit the lost days, eventually.  I promised to touch on the topic of religion and I will also get to that eventually.  Right now I'm visiting with another set of friends in L.A. and I'll write about that next time, and more fishing adventures, of course.  Tomorrow evening I'll reunite with my wife Trish.  I can't wait!