For a change of pace I decided to give East Goleta Beach a shot this morning. Started around 6:30 am and didn't get touched for about an hour or so. The conditions were awesome which is somewhat rare for East Goleta. Small waves, almost no weeds, and clear water (actually from a fishing perspective it was too clear). Finally at around 8:00 or so I made a sideways cast and got nailed by a short halibut. The bite continued until about 9:30 or so when Bryan "Redrum" showed up. I landed my 7th flattie of the day just about when he arrived. Bryan threw a ripbait for a while and I continued with the swimbait. A little while later I get another halibut that I saw eat the bait right in front of me. At that point Bryan switched over the to a 3 inch "Clear Red" colored swimbait which was a good choice for clear water. I was using Silverside. I didn't have any clear red or anything that subtle, but because of the clear water I didn't want anything crazy so I stayed away from the yellow head and "gaudy" baits I typically throw. I stuck with Silverside just to see if Bryan's Clear Red would make a difference. Sure enough in the next hour or so Bryan landed five halibut to my one more and a perch (again I watched the halibut eat my bait). I had to leave the fish biting to take the family to the zoo. Bryan stayed and ended up with 5 more short halibut and dumped at least one legal. I am looking forward to the next clear water condition to play with the clear subtle colors once again.

The day was beautiful. The clear water allowed us to see some really cool stuff including a lobster crusing around! We also saw a whale just outside and Bryan saw a few more after I left.

hello

i am actually going to get my first chance to go out to goleta this year and will be going this afternoon . One question when you refer to east/west goleta does that mean .

a)when facing the pier west goleta beach is to the left ?
and when facing the pier east goleta beach is to the right towards ucsb?

I'll try to get in on the Hali bite you been raving about sounds like fun ...

thanks again for the info you have posted !!