Hooked on tubing

BOBBING lazily in the Los Angeles Harbor, Leo Campbell is doing what he does best. In one smooth flick of the wrist, he snaps his fishing pole and drops his lure about 10 yards away into a sweet spot just beyond a kelp bed. He then begins to kick hard, scooting over the slimy kelp with the agility of a determined water bug, and just as quickly, halts his craft and spins it around as if in a teacup ride.

In the distance, his pal Alan Marino is kicking steadily, fighting an easterly current, and casting as he bobs up and over waves churned out by nearby excursion boats. Wearing a well-worn wetsuit and a frayed baseball cap that says, “Cheap as Dirt,” Alan squints up at the cloudless sky, drops his line and lights a cigar. He sits back in his float tube, an amped-up inner tube with multiple air chambers, the aquatic cousin to the La-Z-Boy. From a distance, he looks as if he’s slouched in a bathtub, taking a soak.

Their friend Angel was supposed to be with them today, but Angel’s wife had other plans for him. “Angel’s in lockdown,” Leo says. Leo, 27, wears a black knit cap, wraparound sunglasses and a weathered black wetsuit.

He’s an excitable guy who exudes the healthy enthusiasm of a fine Labrador puppy. He’s frustrated by Alan, who’s raised a few questions about how clean the water is. “Dude,” Leo says. “What’s the worst thing that can happen? Your fingernails fall off?”

Suddenly Leo feels a hard tug. His tube moves in the direction of the line. Then, for an agonizing minute, his tube is pulled in circles. He kicks furiously with his fins, regaining control. The creature heads for the open sea. Leo’s heart begins to race.

*

Up close and personal

NO one knows for sure when someone first decided to pitch an inner tube into the water and try to figure out how to sit in it. But commercially produced float tubes have been used in freshwater lakes since the 1940s, when Tucker Duck & Tube Co. in Fort Smith, Ark., began manufacturing them.

The early tubes, which sported diaper-like seats, were made with heavy rubber covered with thick canvas. Today they have a feather-weight nylon exterior with durable urethane bladders and are capable of supporting a 350-pound angler.

Some float tubers switch over time to kayaks or kickboats, which are faster and safer in open water, but die-hard ocean tubers are willing to sacrifice speed for the tube’s portability, stealth capacity and the pure womblike experience of bobbing in coastal waters.

To fish from a float tube is to drift Buddha-like, bobbing in the swells like a baby in a bouncer, alternately watching for a bite, inspecting one’s navel and gazing at the widest-screen TV in nature.

But float tubers are mostly interested in catching fish, and it’s the exhilaration of the unexpected that they like to talk about: the pod of pilot whales passing within petting distance, the lone gray whale that surfaces right next to the tube. One tuber fell asleep in his tube and woke up nose to nose with a seal that had plopped one large wet flipper on the tube’s armrest as it tried to hoist itself aboard, smelly breath and all.

Once, late at night, Leo, defenseless in murky water, was fishing off Long Beach. Moonlight carved luminous crescents into the waves, and he felt something brush by his leg. Then something slapped the surface. Whap. A little too close.

He shrugged it off and cast out his line. Then he began to hear heavy breathing. Labored breathing. A sound you’d hear in a hospital. It grew louder and louder. He tried to kick away from it, and suddenly dozens of black dorsal fins rose out of the water, in unison. He watched them rise and fall, first one group, then another, until they were all around him, for as far as he could see. Dolphins.

“Floating in the ocean in a tube, you can catch anything, and I mean anything,” he says.

*

Hitting halibut

TO get to their top secret fishing spot, Leo and Alan have driven Alan’s van through a maze of industrial side streets in San Pedro to a small inner harbor. Dotted with creaky old fishing boats pulling at their moorings, the harbor has all the curb appeal of a Balkan canning factory, but Leo and Alan don’t care.

Before wading out into the water with their tubes, they stand on a low seawall, scoping out the tide. A gentle swell surges against the seawall. They haul their tubes out of the van, a 1973 Volkswagen micro-bus. Once a proud shiny orange, the vehicle has aged to the color of a melting Dreamsicle.

Leo and Alan pull on fins, hoist up their tubes and walk backward into the water. Once they’re thigh high, they drop down into their seats and begin scissoring their way into the main channel; cool water seeps into their wet suits.

Casting as they kick, they drift under a pier and maneuver around pilings as thick as redwoods. Below the surface, red starfish, bright and thorny in the refractive water, fight for space on the barnacle-crusted pier. Barnacles can pop a float tube, so Leo and Alan keep a close eye on them.

Alan, who works for a fishing hardware store, would one day like to work for the California Department of Fish and Game. As he says this, he feels a tug and begins reeling. In moments, a 15-inch barred sand bass, with tiger stripes and sharp fins, is on the surface, gasping for breath.

He measures it and lets it go. Alan, 42 and unmarried, took up float tubing a few years ago after breaking his leg. He found that the flippers helped build his strength.

Leo settles back and rolls a cigarette. As the two drift along, they start to hit halibut, releasing as they go. There are no seals around. Last week, seals had plagued them. “They’re not your friend,” says Leo, flicking his line out again.

Suddenly, his line is singing. He’s yanked hard to the right, and then even harder to the left. He sits up straight, as the fish pulls him in circles. Leo once landed an enormous bat ray, but he doesn’t feel this is a ray. He doesn’t have the advantage of being able to plant his feet, so he kicks hard to compensate. He takes up the slack, then gives a little back.

In a flash, the huge fish surfaces, fighting and splashing. Leo reels it in and reaches for it, but it slips out of his hands -- a 3-foot-long halibut. Watching from across the kelp bed, Alan now frantically kicks his way over and hands Leo pliers to grip the fish. Leo finally hauls the halibut onto his lap.

It’s green, slippery and flexing furiously. Leo feeds a cord through the fish’s mouth and gills, eases it back into the water and ties it to his tube. He prepares to cast again when suddenly the water in front of him begins churning like a blender. The halibut thrashes hard -- one last dash for freedom. In a minute, the big fish settles down. Both men heave a sigh, lean back in their tubes and begin kicking, side-by-side.

Leo tosses his line out again as a flustered sea gull lands squawking on a nearby buoy. A tern folds its wings and dives into the ocean. A boat goes by, and Leo and Alan bob up and down, like in a kids’ ride at an amusement park. Out here, where dinner scoots along the bottom and seals nip at your flippers, life is good.

*

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)Putting yourself out to sea

QUICK STUDY

Beyond a float tube, wet suit or waders, and a fishing pole, just what else is needed to go into the waters?

The tube

Float tubes come in a number of styles -- U- or V-shaped, pontoon or classic “doughnut” -- at prices ranging from $60 for a basic model to $400 for top-of-the-line. Most models have a nylon exterior and inflatable urethane tubes. A nylon zipper is a must for saltwater tubing. Popular brands -- Caddis, Trout Unlimited, Kennebec, Buck Bags, Wood River, Hobie, Water Skeeter, Creek Company, Out Cast and Hodgman -- can be purchased online and at outdoor stores.

The essentials

A small compressor or double-action bicycle pump, life vest, wet suit or waders, swim fins, net, gaff and, of course, a fishing pole (freshwater baitcast or spinning reel) and tackle. You might want a fishing pole holder and bait tank -- and don’t forget the required California fishing license.

The scene

Look for calm bays and coves, docks and harbors. Some good places to start include Long Beach (Cherry Beach, Grissom Island, the 72nd Street jetty, Mother’s Beach, Alamitos Bay, Belmont Shore), Cabrillo Beach, Newport Bay, Mission Bay, Huntington Harbor, San Diego Bay and Dana Point.

-- Janet Cromley

*

Janet Cromley can be reached at janet.cromley@latimes.com.