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Offshore Kayaking: Saturday 24 April 2010

Terry H

By Terry H
in Saltwater

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Terry H Newbie

Terry H

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Just a quick report...

Lee and I planned to be at Kings Beach Boat ramp around 4:45am read for a nice and early launch time. Lee mentioned the night before that I'd be late, despite my reassurances that I would get everything packed and ready to go the night before.

Well, come Saturday morning when I woke up, I realised I didn't wake up to any alarm. Crap. I instantly thought "That's not a good sign".

I worringly looked down at my clock and noticed the time was 4:08am. Yep, not likely to make it there on time. Damnit!

Thankfully I had everything ready to go, so after a quick 2 minute shower I was out the door by 4:13 and on the road up to Caloundra.

Good thing I was late though, as it was pouring down at Caloundra. However I get there to see Lee's kayak rigged and ready for launch, but Lee sitting in the car. A quick inspection and Lee's kayak is F****ng drenched. Yay for being late. My seat is nice and dry at least :)

After an eventless launch, which saw me stay nice and dry, we were off on our way to the blinker for some snapper action.

Thanks Mal @ Sunstate Hobie for a couple new seat plugs. Now my backside stays dry when I'm out on the water!

We got a drift or four in and suddenly saw some birds diving. Yep! Lets head for them!

These birds were working in the deep water between the blinker and brays, with conveniently a nice big cargo ship bearing down on our position. Thankfully we crossed his path well enough in front of him so that we could see the guys waving at us, but safe n sound on our little plastic kayaks. But bugger the boats, theres more important things, like Tuna to chase!

Just as we started to near the Tuna the heavens opened up and started quickly quickly filling up my seat area. Guess my backside isn't staying dry anymore! Fark it poured. and poured. And that big container ship quickly went out of sight; but not its horn! which it let off every minute for about 20 minutes. Yep, they're loud!

Anyway The first school saw a nice little mac tuna which I landed with no issues.

Then we continued following the birds and the tuna,

And followed

and followed

And went from the blinker to well out off moffats

back to the blinker

back to the beach off moffats

and back to blinker

and in to brays

and back out to 4km off moffats

And for all our troubles we got towed around by long tails. At one stage we even had a double hook up on longies. Two anglers in Hobie Revolutions holding rods with screaming drags getting a free tow. THankfully they must have liked each other because they (sort of) went in the same direction.

Then all went dead for a little while, so we started heading back towards brays to go home.

By the time we got to Brays and was almost home, I saw some birds, and headed back out. And then that lead to being out off moffats again.

Thankfully Lee hooked up to a nice longy - the fight lasting well over 30 minutes. At one stage he even asked to tag me in. I declined, told him to have a cup of concrete and then left him again because I saw another school of busting tuna.

Well, I hooked one or two and pulled some hooks, but unfortuantely couldn't land any more:(

Lee finally managed to land his catch, a nice fat specimen at 105cm. Boys these boys had beefed up in the last 2 weeks!

We continued to follow more tuna, had a few more hook ups and a few pulled hooks but wasn't able to land any further fish.

All in all we limped back, tired and victorious against the Longtails. 3 Longies were caught and half a dozen good size mac tuna.

We hit the water at 5:30-5:45, and left at around 2pm. The distance traveled was over 25 kilometres.

I hit the water again on sunday, and despite travelling 20 kilometres myself in some 6 hours, I only managed one bust off on a longtail (leader gone), one pulled hook on a big mac tuna, and one bust off on a trolled viper (leader worn through). Bugger. The fish on the viper was big too. Got towed aroudn for 15 minutes, almost spooled twice before the leader wore through. Shot and devestated.

Unforunately no fish were caught. It was simply impossible to chase the tuna down in the kayaks without a sail. These tuna schools were moving over 10km/h

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