CHAPTER XIV 



YELLOW TAIL FISHING OFF CATALINA ISLAND 



For those who enjoy a strenuous kind of fishing 

 there is probably no place of easy access that will 

 afford better opportunities than the vicinity of 

 Catahna Island off the coast of California. There 

 it is that the yellow tail stays during the greater 

 part of the year and offers sport as abundant and as 

 exciting as any man could wish. It is a sport that 

 must appeal most strongly to those who, while 

 enjoying the vigorous fight with the fish, do not 

 appreciate bodily hardships and the consequent 

 fatigue. Most of the fishing is done from an open 

 boat or motor launch, for the day's use of which you 

 pay about ten dollars with complete outfit. It is a 

 dreamy, lazy form of enjoyment while waiting for 

 the fish, followed by the keenest of excitement after 

 the strike. Seated in a comfortable armchair facing 

 the stern of the boat, with a rod on either side 

 trailing some fifty yards or more of line, you travel 

 slowly along, past rocky shores and islands of floating 

 kelp, gently rolling over the long, undulating swell 

 of the great Pacific. The soft air, the occasional 

 low mist through which the powerful sun shines in 

 iridescent splendour, the bright blue sky above and 

 the exquisite ever-changing colour of the water, all 

 combine to make this form of fishing a delight to 

 the senses, and one is almost tempted to be satisfied 



