"We'll be fishing 6 to 8 ounce weights on live bait rigs today," explained deckhand Shawn Taylor. "The bite started out a little slow yesterday, but things really picked up in the afternoon and we took over 40 halibut."

The run from Berkeley Marina to Seal Rocks was amazingly fast on the New Golden Eye, just a hair over 20 minutes. Once there, Captain Vo positioned the boat in about 40 feet of water and we began our drift. Things were a little quiet for the first 15 or 20 minutes, then Donn Manasterio from Vallejo hit the first fish of the day, s good keeper around 10 to 12 pounds. I hit the next fish about 10 minutes later; unfortunately mine was an inch shy of the 22 inch minimum.

Over the next few hours, we managed to scratch a fish every 20 to 30 minutes. Most of them were decent-sized keepers with the exception of a 35 pound monster landed by Manasterio, his second fish of the day. "This is about how it was yesterday, so we should see the bite pick up around 1:00," explained Taylor. "It turned into a fire drill for about an hour yesterday with three or four fish hooked up at the same time."

As Taylor predicted, it was around 1:30 when the bite came to life. On a 15 minute drift, we landed four quality halibut to 18 pounds. Jody Jordan of Vacaville landed a keeper as did Bob Yoshida of Sacramento. Paul Meadors of Concord landed his first fish of the day and so did Emile Foster of South San Francisco.

Vo instructed everyone to reel em' in and he repositioned the boat to hit the same drift again. This time it was Corky Hart's turn to score. Hart landed a beautiful 22 pounder that was in solid contention for the jackpot since Manasterio hadn't entered the pool. Otis McKnight landed a small keeper and Brandon Timberlake from Elk Grove hit a big fish close to 15 pounds. Durbin Downey of San Rafael finally hit pay dirt when a keeper halibut slammed his anchovy.

One more drift produced similar results, then it slowed down from that point. By 3:00, we had a total of 24 halibut. Most were in the 8 to 15 pound class with several closing in on the 20 pound mark and the 35 pounder taken by Manasterio. Corky Hart ended up with the jackpot fish at 22 pounds.

This was one of those days where the fishing was secondary to the trip itself. Temperatures were in the mid 70's and seas were flat calm. We couldn't have chosen a better day to enjoy the open water on one of the most impressive boats I have ever been on.

For more information, call Berkeley Marina Sportfishing Center at 510-849-2727 or visit them on the web at SFBayFishing.com.