All was perfect at the platform during Sunday morning's low tide. Barely a swell lapped up against the platform rock as I fan-cast my anchovy pattern five-inch Big Hammer jig out into an open sea. After half an hour and no hits I realized how frivolous it all seemed so I switched over to the enteromorpha opaleye bobber rig and had maybe one noticeable bite in the next hour-and-a-half I sacrificed while waiting for eight o'clock to come around. That's when private security forces open the gate at the Marineland parking lot, making access easy to Long Point.

From the pillar rock I spent about twenty minutes with the Big Hammer, an effort resulting in one measly eleven-inch calico rockfish. It was barely worth a taco so I let it go. I tried for opaleye in the whitewater to the right of the staging rock but didn't notice any bites after a while of watching. Before I wasted too much time on it, I hopped over to where Breakwall Darryl and I caught most of our haul last week, the shoreline thirty yards to the left of the point. That move paid off as three opaleye to a pound-and-a-half were landed in the first half-hour, a good sign that incoming tide was going to perk the fishes' interests. Actually, the only sign I saw was a stop sign. The rest of the day the bite was dead.

That evening I phoned Breakwall Dan, who wanted to go Monday morning. I warned him the action would be slow but still he wanted to partake in the pleasures of Long Point. He was happy to hear it was going to be a late bite after contemplating the one-hour commute it would take him to meet me at The Breakwall Angler main office at seven-thirty so we could get to the M. parking lot at opening time.

Unlike Sunday, Monday's air was blustery and its seas were rough. It was too Dangerous to fish the pillar rock. The first big wave we saw washed clean over the top of it. We started fishing the hot spot to the left without results for a half-hour when Dan the Man scored the day's first opaleye, a three taco fattie. Within ten minutes I had my first, a two-taco keeper.

Yes indeed, our first fish of the day, but would they be our last? We spent another hour at that one spot, chumming now and then to get some kind of bite going, fending off a persistent wind-driven wave-splash. Our efforts were of no account so we moved on. It didn't matter how many places we stopped to fish, the only action we had was a couple bites from presumed little guys.

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