Bay of Islands - New Zealand

[Cowfish13]

Hey guys, we went away with our uncle and grandfather, to the Bay of Islands on New Zealand for a week of fishing with Mum’s work friend Colwyn from Pukematu Lodge, based in Russel (look below for information on how to book). We had an amazing time and caught some awesome fish, so here’s a day by day account of the trip

Day 1

We arrived at Pukematu Lodge and what an amazing place. Here’s some photo’s of the view.

And the Lodge

After settling in, we set out for our “practice dayâ€. Here’s a picture of Colwyn’s boat and what we’d be fishing from for the next few days.

Jigged up some live Yakka’s (called Jack Mackerel over there) and set out for a rocky ledge next to ‘The Hole in the Rock’. Here are some photos of the ‘Hole’

Around the rocks, huge schools of Mow Mow (dunno about spelling, but it’s a type of Fusilier) and Kawhai (Australian Salmon) were all around. Here’s what it looks like, but these photos don’t do the amount of fish justice.

On Jack’s third drop, he hooked a nice sized Kingie, but unfortunately, the Kevlar cord on the jig broke Then, he hooked another, and this time landed

I got in on the action next drop and I managed to land this approx. 12kg fish. Measured in at 105cm

Then Jack hooked a much larger one at about 15kg. 113cm

Terry (our uncle from Cairns) got busted off on the Livie because he didn’t jam his thumbs on the spool While jigging, we were using T-curve 400 size Jig stick’s with Trinidad’s with maxed out drag with 80lb braid, but the Kingies were still pulling it off...

Jacked landed this little guy on a plastic as well

As we had a couple of fish on board, we left for the Lodge.

On the way home, we came across a pod of Dolphins and I managed the photo of the trip I reckon :cheer:

One thing that really messed with our heads though was the sun. Here’s a photo at about 9:30pm

Day 2

Today was Marlin Day. We did alright too.

Set-up

When Pop had the harness on (we shared it around at regular intervals), we saw a Billfish hook a Bee-line directly for the lures. Hit on, the hooked up on another. A while later and we landed our first Billie. It was a Spearfish Pretty rare in NZ waters, and the first on Colwyn’s boat, but pretty cool to look at. About 20kg est.

When I had the harness on, one of the rods screamed off and it was game-on :woohoo:

About 1.5hrs, and many blisters later, we got it to the boat and it was a 110kg+ Striped Marlin. Sadly, while holding onto the leader, it snapped the 400lb wind on and we couldn’t get a good photo of it But here’s some hook-up shots

Day 3

This was to be Kingfish day :woohoo: We ended up with 33 Kingies to about 1m. Most landed on Jigs from 50m of water, so it was pretty hard work. A few photos

Many doubles, even pentuple hook-ups while we drifted past a guy in his tinny who couldn’t get any

Above is Dad with his first Kingie of the trip

Our 80 yo grandfather, Pop, managed 8 Kingies before the livies ran out He’s pretty tough!

One of Jack’s fish got sharked on the way up by a 7-8’ Bronzie but he managed to get most of it back

You can see the other guy’s boat in the background

Day 4

Today the weather got a bit rougher with about 3m swells and 50m visibility. Here’s what the Hole looked like

We trolled around another rock and picked up some Kawhai on surface plugs which didn’t really do anything, but the Salmon loved them

We tried for Kingies for a bit, but only a few hook-ups. Later we went for a few Snapper, but as it was out of season, we only landed one, about 46cm

Day 5

Sadly, on our last day, the weather really roughed up with 30kt winds so we couldn’t go out in the boat, but had fun fishing off the beaches. I got a few small Snapper and Jack got this weird kinda fish. They called it a Rock Cod, but it’s nothing like our Cod up here

The wind was so strong, it pushed this yacht off its moorings onto the rocks ><

And that was really it for our trip. A huge thanks must go to Colwyn for having us over. He really did well to put us onto fish every day. Here’s some contact information if you’re keen to organise a trip with him. He also organises Rugby Tours as he has some contact with people who work with the All Blacks

http://web.me.com/pukematu/Site/Welcome.html

Thanks for reading. Hope you enjoyed it. If you have any questions about the area, gear, techniques, don't hesitate to ask

Will

[Angus]

Woo hoo!

Awesome work guys!!

Did you take your own gear?

Will def keep that in mind for my NZ trip (predicted for 2011).

Cheers.

Angus

[Cowfish13]

Angus: Nah, we just chose to use his because he's got Trinidad's, Tiagra's, TLD's and T-curves for his heavier gear. However, as light tackle isn't really used over there, we sort of wished we'd brought some 10-15lb to throw some lures at the schools of Mow Mow and Kawhai and maybe some plastics from the rocks. But Colwyn's gear is all in great condition, he supplies all the jigs, lures, hooks etc. So you don't have to bring any of yours if you just want to catch what we did. Maybe if you go over around October-November (Snapper season), some plastic throwing gear around 10-15lb would go well

[mick fillet]

Ripper of a week you fellas had. good to see the weather held off and was good for you for most of the week. what a wierd lookin cod.nice boat to be fishing from too.

[Rocket75]

you fellas certainly do get around! lucky buggers

great stuff on the kingies, must have been a thrill to get the big billfish too.

"When I had the hardness on, one of the rods screamed off and it was game-on"

Like I say...thrilling indeed!

thanks for sharing, love the mid-air dolphin shot !

rocket

[Cowfish13]

Trust you to pick up on that typo Rocket We're lucky that Mum knew Colwyn through work and we'd met at some Bledisloe Cup games as well, so we had been planning this trip for a while.

[ellicat]

With reports like this on AFO it's so much better than a magazine full of "look at me's" :laugh: You blokes are charmed!

[Malcolm]

Awsome photo's and report

[yoyo]

sensational stuff and great effort on the report.

[Old Scaley]

Question for any transplanted kiwis out there now fishing the Brisbane River - WHAT THE HELL ARE YOU THINKING???? Great photos and nice fish!

[Do$tylz]

oh man... definitely jealous of that trip. Absolutely awesome report.

[wesfish]

what a magic trip mate!!! great report with awesome pics of awesome fish and land marks!!!

[Scope]

Awesome report mate. Lovely part of the world there. And don't they just love their kingies!!! haha

p.s i believe its spelt mau mau

[Cowfish13]

Cheers Scope! Should've figured it would be something like that. There was an amazing amount of fish there, and they'd often turn a bright blue colour for no apparent reason. They seemed to be feeding on schools of plankton, but I'm not 100% sure on that.

And thanks guys. We tried hard to take quality photos, but often, photos would be rushed cause half of us were hooked up and we didn't want to miss out

[free2rome2]

Hi Will,

As always, you give one of the best reports, and the places that you've been to, like the Kimberly... man, you're lucky!

Wish I had half as much fun...

Love the shot of the dolphin, like I said, you're lucky, damn lucky...

Cheers! Jonathan