SportFishing and Charters Forum - The 2012 Fred Hall Show

The 2012 Fred Hall Show

7 am on wednesday. some of you might remember roger. he was my driver for our long range trip on the intrepid last year. well, our young fire figher just got married, and he bought his drop dead gorgeous wife a new car. yup, it's a prius. i swore i'd never get caught dead in one of those. hey, i know how dangerous they are to drive. i'm constantly having to pick them out of the grill of my ford excursion. anyway, roger provided the car and drove. i slept and paid for gas. what a deal!

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five and a half hours later, we're bombing through downtown los angeles. roger missed the 405 cutoff, so we get stuck in a little traffic. for those you that have never been to southern california, rush hour in los angeles is 8 hours long. it starts at 1pm and ends at 9pm!

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walking into the show, these were the first guys we saw. manzanar was one of the relocation camps that the japanese were sent to during world war II. my mother was among them, but she was only 5 years old at the time.

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i've been a subscriber to western outdoor news for a very long time.

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meet bill tanaka and tom schlauch of big 5. they have some great deals. a favorite reel of mine is the tyrnos 8 two speed. think of it as a makaira 8 that will deliver half the drag, figure 14 pounds of drag for the tyros instead of 27 pound in the makaira. they have the tyrnos on sale for $150.

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down the aisle from big 5 are all of the california fresh water resorts.

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mixed in are all of the other resorts from alaska to south of the border.

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i stayed at frontier charters in sitka, alaska, quite a few years ago. meet marc, michelle and justin. their lodge has 8 rooms, housing 16 guests and they run four boats that fish in sitka sound. very nice operation.

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this is something on my bucket list. it's peacock bass fishing on the amazon river.

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ah, turners. lots of stuff on sale.

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back to the destination resorts!

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took a quick look at the defiance because they had it set up with disco lights.

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meet jim sammons! he's a TV show host, he runs trips out of san diego year round and he has a trip out of rancho leonero on baja california every july. at the fred hall show, he's doing daily seminars on kayak fishing around the world. his most memorable trip was on the east coast of costa rica, catching 10 tarpon in one day. he was asking me what i thought about okuma because he just signed on with them.

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down the aisle from jim are jackie and richard yamada of alaska reel adventures. they're located juneau and they are the hawaii connection in alaska. they run 2 lodges with 16 guests per lodge. this is their 30th year in business. they do the usual salmon, halibut and rockfish, but they also fish for black cod (also known as sable or butterfish) in water down to 2000 feet. the black cod is a favorite for their hawiian and japanese customers. it's also the only resort that serves rice with every meal!

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they've got guns this year! i had fun here because i just build my first AR!

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for those of you that watch NCIS, you know that gibb's rule number nine is "never go anywhere without a knife." i've carried this little kershaw for the last 10 years and i never have been able to put a decent edge on it. well, 5 minutes in the hands of an expert, and it's so sharp it's spooky!

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the little firing range was a blast.

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a bunch of guys here in northern california will be fishing with baja pirates again this year.

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meet glen kaisaki. he does all the reel repair for alaska action anglers out of anchor point, so we had a great chat!

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another destination on my bucket list.

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here is steve's baja fish gear.

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caught roger and mark goofing off!

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check out basil pappas at eric's tackle. i missed him today so i'll have to catch him tomorrow.

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poor roger. he's just fallen in love with phenix rods.

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for my long range trip this year, i am back on the spirit of adventure with mike keating. the spirit is only an 88 foot boat, but the skipper and crew are great. if there are fish out there, mike will find them!

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so, a couple of years ago i had this brilliant idea! why not set up a rod but that will give you a constant read out of your drag pressure. that will take all the guess work out of it. well, aftco has one, $250 retail!

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another great publication.

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BLOODY DECKS !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

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if anyone were to ask me to recommend a shop for reel repair and rigging, these guys would be at the top of the list! this is ken's custom reel in oceanside, california.

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ken was showing me the new shifter button from cal sheets.

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i don't know who this guy is, but he does some really nice work!

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senor tuna - probably the "nicest" fishing website on the internet.

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the unibutter guys have some great products.

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frank murata of daiwa!

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michelle of blackwater international.

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i stopped off at the accurate booth. they have prototype of the bx2 dawg but asked that i not take a photo of the internals just yet. suffice it to say that it is a sequential TRIPLE dog system. each of the three dogs fall in sequence, not all at once, so that only one dog is holding while the other two are in reserve.

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lots of guys ask about the smart shift reels. mind you, i have never caught a wahoo, but for guys that are luckier than i am, it allows you go drop into low gear without having to stop to shift. lots of wahoo will spit out a hook at that critical moment. yup, nice reel!

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meet THE Dan Hernandez!

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angler's choice!

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finnor has some pretty good deals on their fishing reels.

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the ever elusive, mysterious, out of focus cal and eric sheets.

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my favorite fishing hottie, wendy! years ago i was joking around with her and said, "so you fish, you're gorgeous, and you're japanese! where were you when i was looking for a wife?" and she was gracious enough to not say "junior high school ....".

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intrepid!

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captain bruce smith!

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the world famous mr. dennis braid!

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qualia! i've had a couple of conversations with these guys. i screwed up this time. i came by to say hello and wanted to get back to talk more indepth about their reels, but got side tracked and never did. i'll have to talk to them sometime later in the year.

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these are my local electronics guys. they installed all of my electronics, including the flir camera.

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southern california guys know this place, as well!

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phenix!!!!! this is the black diamond hybrid 700 X4H. it's rated 80-200. yup, i'm thinking about a cow trip! it's supposed to be midway in lifting power between the seeker 2x4 and 3x5.

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calstar! i own 30-40 of their rods. i love the old school fiberglass rods.

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seeker! i've been looking at the 2x4's and 3x5's as well.

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ol' roger has a one track mind. back to kayaks. he has this same model with the foot pedals. the kayak you see here has an electric motor, that's more my speed.

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now for the best part of the evening. roger found us a sushi bar called the octopus. i had a beer, 3 sake's and we stuffed ourselves with sushi, and the bill with tip came out to only $65. killer deal.

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throw in a couple of scotches for a night cap and it all adds up to one hellava headache in the morning!

day two!

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into the belly of the beast! for all grousing i do about shimano reels, the fact remains that their line of reels is the most sophisticated. for better or worse, their reels have up to 50% more parts than their competitors. ALOT of time and ALOT of money goes into designing a shimano reel. it also means that it can be difficult to change. regardless, they, and daiwa, share the top spots in the industry. meet eval salvay and pat schlauch. yes, pat is tom's son.

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most of their smaller baitcasters have composite. the core is the first to feature greased carbon fiber. they call this drag material dartanium II. the sustains are also riggted with carbon fiber. it is nice to see!

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now, out of the frying pan and into the fire. avet continues to run dry drags. they are the only company. but they're the business to sell fishing reels, and their fishing reels are selling.

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new from avet is a three speed reel. it's the same size as the larger reel you see in blue. unfortunately, a prototype was not available for us to look at.
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meet rick ozaki. i'll be picking up one of his line winders pretty soon.

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meet bob hoose!
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and the unflappable steve carson.

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meet john bretza of okuma, with the new makaira SE. it's the only reel that i would fish, straight out of the box, with absolute confidence. an oversized offset handle grip, a clicking preset knob, a clicking lever, a coat of lube on all the non-exposed metal surfaces, greased carbon fiber drags washers, non-spool bearings packed with grease, and spool bearings lubed with TSI 301.

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was finally able to swing back around and see steve carson!

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and get a decent shot of cal.

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i do alot of rock cod fishing. i bought a couple of them to try out this season.

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and lastly, i got a chance to meet basil pappas. even bought one of the big wind on leader jigs.

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at the end of the evening, we had a quick dinner with john bretza and hit the road. it was quite a trip. what really made it fun was getting to meet basil pappas and dennis braid. gotta give a big thanks to roger for getting me there and back safely. it was ALOT of driving.

Alan,

Thanks for making the trip and posting this! The Fred Hall Show and a 5-7 day long range trip are on my bucket list.

PB

So we've got pictures of Roger, a Prius, and about 5000 of assorted
fishing equipment...but not 1 of the drop dead gorgeous new wife?????

I am very disappointed.

What is that reel in the picture with cal? And Avet didn't have their new reel there? On bd they said they were taking it to the show?

avet had their new three speed reel there on wendesday but not on thursday when i finally made it over. they said it would be back on friday, but we left thursday night. the three speed was the same size as the big blue sd in the first and second photos. the reel that cal had was a narrow 80 with a 1:1 low gear. he has been making low gears for many reels - accurate, avet, shimano and penn. they are very popular with the older guys. you know, the ones that have all the money!

What is that reel in the picture with cal?

Penn 130 narrow! Spool is 2" wide and holds 1000 yards 200lb hollow!

Thanks Alan, saves me the drive !! LOL LOL

Was it as busy as last year?

it wasn't that busy on wednesday and thursday. i'm certain saturday was hoppin'! for the reel, i think cal mentioned that the reel had a 1:1 low gear.

basil, funny thing. a bunch of guys out here have commented after seing your photo that they thought you were older. i'll bet this is the first time that anyone has seen your photo. all of my gray hair is concentrated along my temples. not you! i'll bet you were getting hit on a few times as well, huh!

I have a booth at the show, not sure how we missed each other??? I'm at Booth 554 if anyone's coming out today (last day).

Would have been nice to meet you Alan, ps I have some reels i need to send as well.

-Rob

crud! you know what happens is that i cruise by and sometimes you've got people in front of you and i don't want to horn in just for a photo. i mean, you are talking to potential customers, after all. sorry about missing you. i am definitely going to have to be more organized next year. alan

No worries. Always nice to put a face with a name. Next time!

-Rob

Heard it was good in LA this year; drive is too far for me, but I'll go when it comes to San Diego.

With all of those pictures, I feel like I went!

About the only thing I miss about not living in Los Angeles any longer is going to the Fred Hall Show.

Well maybe the food too.

great write up alan!!!! thanks again for all you do!!!