Lobster opener, Saturday night

Went out with a buddy I've been lobster diving with for thirty years. We haven't been in the last five. It was like old times. Limits for both of us in about half an hour. Fun times and good eats.

Nice catch!!! Not looking for GPS coordinates, but where were you?

Looks like Mud Bugs to me!

I was out on the ocean in southern California.

I'll give you two hints. We were not at Catalina, and we were not in the LB/LA harbor. Those places were most likely a serious shit shows on opening night. My buddy and I have a blood oath not to tell people about our secret spot.

Use to dive often in laguna had success often easy access but thanks to the state and their mlpa that got shut down. Not alot if great dive access spots close when I lived in ca.

Bails said:

I was out on the ocean in southern California.

I'll give you two hints. We were not at Catalina, and we were not in the LB/LA harbor. Those places were most likely a serious shit shows on opening night. My buddy and I have a blood oath not to tell people about our secret spot.

Click to expand...

Hidden gems are hard to come by and I applaud you for upholding your oath.

The opener was good. I hooped for a couple hours with a buddy and got 10.
They cooked up nice. Goes great with smoked ribs and some Lobster mac and cheese.

Looks awesome, i heard from a few people that the did well. i do miss the shit show when the season opened at 1201am. some of the fights at the ramps and the chatter over the radios was epic.

The mouth of Huntington Harbour was lined with lobster can markers this weekend. I wonder how many survived the heavy traffic in and out going south to the air show?

Frozen tails but cooked these last night.

I split the tails with shears, peal the meat loose from the shell, cover it all in melted butter mix, then put it back into the shells and cook over medium coal heat around 325 indirect, about 3 ish minutes shell side down, then 1 minute flipped over directly over the coals. Definitely keep it to the rare side, they keep cooking after you pull them.

Butter mix is just melted butter, garlic, and a good pepper based hot sauce, not vinegar based.

Bails said:

I was out on the ocean in southern California.

I'll give you two hints. We were not at Catalina, and we were not in the LB/LA harbor. Those places were most likely a serious shit shows on opening night. My buddy and I have a blood oath not to tell people about our secret spot.

Click to expand...

Missing diver off Catalina from dive boat, guessing they were going for lobster.

I’ve wanted to go for over 15 years. None of my dive buddies would ever go. Damn.

—Sherpa

Open starts at 6am now. Huh. Shows how long it’s been for me.

Anyone got any not secret spots out of Oceanside?

coolchange said:

Open starts at 6am now. Huh. Shows how long it’s been for me.

Click to expand...

Yup they changed it. It's always been the Saturday before the first Wednesday in Oct. So we always got under water at 11:30 pm on Friday night. We would surface with our limits around 12:15am on Saturday, and be all good. Now things have changed and it opens at 6am on the Saturday.

Awesome, thanks for sharing.

No pincher/claws?

TomD said:

No pincher/claws?

Click to expand...

Spiney lobster. No claw

Awesome! I haven’t been in about five years either. I need to break out my gear and start going again.

They found the diver, RIP