I had been throwing my line for sometime on the rising tide at a favorite zone when a guy trudged down the beach and set up just down from me. The interloper effectively reduced my fishing grounds by half, as I typically start where I was standing when he showed up and work my way down the beach beyond where he was. I shouldn’t whine, it was nothing like the near shoulder to shoulder line-up of guys I’ve seen on the Sacramento River when salmon are running the gauntlet. Nonetheless, I didn’t care for it.
With the set up I had tied on, light line and heavy tackle, I was able to launch my line way down the beach and promptly did so as he walked up. A kind of, ‘Hey man, you got a whole damn coastline to fish, so don’t start edging in on me.’ He was about to post up within casting range. I could tolerate his presence, irritably, but not a sidler hornin’ in. As it turned out, it was unnecessary jockeying.
I hooked into the fish right in front of me in several feet of water and provided the guy a show I’m sure he didn’t much care to see. The fish ran once when I brought it into the shallows after a decent fight and saw that it was a legal-sized halibut. It took a bit of line off my reel and disappeared over the seaweed covered boulders and into the murky surfline, but I kept my rod tip up and let it go. I coaxed it back to shore and onto the wet sand with the wash of an incoming wave, tossed my pole into the cobblestones without thinking and pounced on it.
A 27 inch, 7 pound flatty pulled from the beach on light/medium tackle.
Jack Elliott's Santa Barbara Adventure 
Whoa!! friggin awesome–how you gonna cook it up?? Hey Jack, Post a recipe or a favorite way to prepare fresh fish.
I’d say grilled over oak and done up in tacos is about my favorite way. Lather it up in melted butter with a squirt of lime juice and through it on the grill over oak coals. Toast up some corn tortillas so that they are slightly crispy and browned, but still bendable. Lay some slices of cooked fish in the bottom of a tortilla, top with fresh finely sliced green cabbage, add a few thin slices of raw red bell pepper, and top with a white sauce made from part plain non-fat yogurt and part mayonnaise whipped together with a squirt of lime juice, a couple of pinches of fresh chopped cilantro and a pinch of garlic powder. I include fresh sliced avocado and fresh made pico de gallo salsa sometimes, but with fresh fish I tend to like to keep it simple and not add too much that over powers the fish.
Great pics and read, Jack. Awesome. Lot’s of memories from Dick Smith era.
—
What did you use to catch the hali? Scampy-type lure?
I was fishing a Krocodile that day.