I had a last minute decision to take a vacation day and do a little Bluefin Hunting. I really needed to test the new trailer, but also was in need of getting in on all of the local action. As I got to the ramp, I was talking to an old fellow who said he spotted Bluefin 3 miles from the beach. As I said "did you get any?" He replied, I was in my plane flying over the area to check where I should go today. Wow! I would love to have my own plane to scout out my fishing areas for the next day! lol
The boat launched great even though it is much higher than my last trailer. It was a bit lumpy and windy this morning, but I wasn't going to waste a vacation day just to test the trailer. I headed out to make bait and as usual... bait was hard to come by, but I managed 7 nice pacific mackerel and a blacksmith. Hey, I kept the blacksmith because I was short on bait and he would do in a pinch!
I headed out and was damn close off the coast when I spotted a pod of dolphin. I ran ahead of them and on the first cast... BAM! I was on! About 10 minutes into the fight and he saws me off. It was a big fish and I was assuming a BFT, but never caught sight of it. Of course, after 10 minutes, the dolphin were nowhere to be found. That could have been my one and only shot.
I preceded on and went looking for paddies. I found a dozen of them, but they were all empty except for one. I got bit on the first cast and I let it run for a bit since it had to swallow the big mack and didn't actually slam it. Well, it plucked my mack and now I was down to only a few left.
As the morning rolled on, It got quite a bit nicer out there as the wind died down.
On my trolling rotation, I saw a dozen HUGE fin whales including one that breached out of the water! It looked like a submarine jumping! Unfortunately, I didn't get a pick of the jumper, but I had a few huge one rolling next to the boat. It was actually a little unnerving at times.
I was running low on fuel after a long morning and decided to start trolling to the barn. I was 0-2 today and not happy, but at least the trailer worked out well. I raised a cup to King Neptune and Poseidon and gave them shot of my beverage in hopes to change my fortune... The gods were listening!
I heard my one troller with the cedar plug go off and it took me a few seconds to grab the rod as I was in absolute shock! Everything was against me as he wrapped in my other troller and the loose line dropped into my prop. Thankfully I didn't panic and just worried about the task at hand. I have 500 yards of braid on my reel and he dumped 400 yards of them, but I finally turned her! This thing was a bulldog!
15 minutes later and I get the glory shot!
The Money Shot(s)
The Damage...
Got back in to hear from some friends that it was feast or famine out there. I was on the fortunate end this time and happy that I paid homage to the fish gods and they listened!
Good luck if you get out this weekend. It was a zoo today, so I could only imagine it will be a REAL zoo tomorrow.
The Boma's first Bluefin Tuna!
