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Offshore Gold Coast 23/3 **video added

Andrew_P

By Andrew_P
in Saltwater

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Andrew_P

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The bloke I sit next to at work is a mad keen spearo from the Gold Coast and just bought an old Haines V16 4.8m a few months ago. He set himself the goal to catch a marlin out of it and had 3 successful trips before Xmas, even landing a nice black solo. So hearing the bait was still thick and reports of marlin being caught we decided to go see if we could get one. Conditions were a bit ordinary on the way out following the left overs of a storm cell, but we got out and it settled down nicely. 

We were soon joined by 20 or so other boats (some similar size to ours but no Timmy the Turtle skiffs today) with different ideas about etiquette and found the bait right on the spot. Top to bottom slimies in 80m. 

We jigged some baits and put them in our unplumbed live bait tanks (2 buckets and an old esky) and started our drifts on 8 and 10kg gear. The current was raging and even though the bait school was huge we drifted through it very quickly.  Putting back up to the spot we saw a fish going crazy in front of a 50 footer and wondered who had hooked it. No boat around the fish had the tell tale signs of panic involved with a hook up so it must have been a free jumper. Good signs!

After almost being swamped by a courteous neighbour (think he was still learning how to drive his 8m beast) we moved and set our drift. Shortly after my mate had a run, eased the drag up and set the hook on a fish before the line went slack. He must’ve had a nick in his mainline as he only got back about 10m of it. 1-1-0. Spewing!

Boats around us started hooking up and our hopes were high for another shot. To increase our chances we found a patch to our selves and dropped our livies down. The skipper had another run and eased the drag up slowly as a nice fish jumped towards the boat. I put my drag up to clear my line out of his way but there was more pressure than just the sinker. I hadn’t felt the bite (very out of touch!) but I also had a fish on and it started moving north steadily. A double hookup on nice blacks! 3-3-?  Chaos! 

His fish was heading to NZ and mine to PNG so he offered to break his off to give me the best chance of landing one of the two. By this time I had lost half a spool of 8kg and he had managed to get his moving towards the boat. Mine started jumping a good 500m from the boat in an awesome aerial display and spat the hook. 

Ok so now we could focus on landing his fish. I took the wheel and we went about getting some of his line back and had the fish on the surface within 10m of the boat after another 5mins. It was far bigger than we both thought (50kg?) I had only seen small blacks of about 20-25kg up close and this looked easily twice the size.

He tried to coax the fish towards the boat but it didn’t like it and jumped away before going deep in protest. This was how the battle went for the next hour or so with attempts to plane the fish up, change direction on him and annoying him with the sound of engine getting him near the boat but not allowing us to reach the leader. About an hour and a half in my mate felt the line was scuffed badly (he had removed about 50m after the first break). We worked out that the tip roller on his rod wasn’t spinning and the line was chafing on the sides of the roller. No good! 

After 2 hours and 5 or so sightings near the boat he handed the rod over to me. We couldn’t up the drag due to the chafed line so I tried to short stroke it back to the boat with my fresh arms.  Any line I gained he took back (stubborn fish!) before he turned as I pumped and the pressure on the line was too much. 3-3-0. Spewing!

I was pretty disappointed to lose his fish after so long but we had to try something to end the stalemate and the chafed line wasnt helping. The northerly had come up so it was time to head in. 

We were both pretty excited to have had our chances but hopefully next time we can land one. 

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kmcrosby78 Mentor

kmcrosby78

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43 minutes ago, Old Scaley said:

Best donut report I have read in ages.

Sorry Steve, I've been busy ...... might get out next weekend though ......... 🙂   Great report @Andrew_P. Unlucky not to leader him but a fight and experience you'll both remember for a long time nonetheless. Can you give us marlin/gamefish rookies a rough idea of how far out this was? Something I'd like to have a crack at with my boys in a few years time 🙂 

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tugger Enthusiast

tugger

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23 hours ago, kmcrosby78 said:

Sorry Steve, I've been busy ...... might get out next weekend though ......... 🙂   Great report @Andrew_P. Unlucky not to leader him but a fight and experience you'll both remember for a long time nonetheless. Can you give us marlin/gamefish rookies a rough idea of how far out this was? Something I'd like to have a crack at with my boys in a few years time 🙂 

Out on the gold coast 36s and at spot x which is around a 30km run from the seaway

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  • Andrew_P changed the title to Offshore Gold Coast 23/3
  • Andrew_P changed the title to Offshore Gold Coast 23/3 **video added

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