Today is departure day for the SDLongeRange.com adventure aboard the Royal Polaris. Anticipation is high as our passengers are loading their carts with gear and catching up with old friends from trips past. The word is that fishing is slow now but that is looked at as a good sign. You don’t want to get to the fishing grounds and hear “you should have been here yesterday”.
The loading of the gear goes smooth and we are underway for the bait receivers. After we take on a great load of bait we are steaming south towards Hurricane Bank.
Our crew for this trip is Roy Rose at the helm with Billy, Dharyl, Eddie, Arron and Cole with Anthony and James in the galley. There are many Chefs in the fleet that get tons of Internet notoriety but I would put Anthony up against any of them.
After out safety seminar Roy lets us know that we will make a brief stop at Alijos Rocks for some Yellowtail we have some time to burn so this will be a nice tune up and also break up the 3 and a half day travel to the bank. After a full day of travel we awake to some windy conditions but no real sea state we made a few yoyo drifts for yellows, which produced enough for a nice fresh yellowtail meal. We only fished iron to save our bait for the real target for the trip, Giant Yellowfin Tuna. The Yellowtail weighed from 15 to 18 pounds with 2 going over 20.
We are now underway again for the bank. Roy gave a seminar on what leaders we will need and some techniques for Wahoo fishing.
We had our giveaway after the seminar. Everyone got SDLongRange.com Tee Shirts, Salsa 6x Jrs, Pack of owner hooks, Blackwater x16 Braid Sample in 100# and 130# along with a $25.00 off certificate from Cals 2 Speed. The passengers also got to pick 2 items from the table, which included Blackwater Fluorocarbon coils and Hats, Owner Hats, Penn Visors, Berkley Tees and Basil Top shots. Jerry Brown also has provided $100.00 certificates for JB products and a free Jerry Brown tee shirt as a daily jackpot for the biggest fish over 100 pounds. Also courtesy of Accurate Fishing reels we have a Accurate 665 Boss reel to give away for the first 200 pounder caught on bait. We also have 2 Royal Polaris jackets that we will fish for during the trip.Everyone enjoyed the gifts and is excited to get to the fishing.
The rest of today and the next are spent rigging playing card and telling fish stories.
Game day, we arrive at the bank in the morning with windy conditions but fishable. We troll around for some Wahoo but only manage 9 small ones. We get the anchor down and the kites out and start our tuna fishing. The sharks get on us right away and it is tough to get a bite on the tuna. Jim Mitchell is hot today and gets 3 tuna on bait but they were all shark bit. We make a few moves trying to get away from the sharks but no luck they are on us heavy eating the kite baits and the sardines along with the few tuna we hooked. The word from Clarion is slow fishing on 60 to 80 pounders. The Qualifier 105 is on its way back from Clarion and should arrive around noon. The rest of the day was about the same. We should get some live flyers tonight and maybe that will make the difference. We had no fish over a 100 pounds today that wasn’t shark bit so I decided to give the Jerry Brown daily jackpot to Jim Mitchell for being the hot bait fisherman today and to get the trip started off on a positive note.
We had great flyer fishing last night and have lots of nice kite baits for today. We have much better sign of big tuna as they are blowing out all over the bank. We did get some nice tuna on the kites with Phil being the hot angler today getting a couple nice ones on the kite. The small Wahoo continue to show as long as our friends the sharks. We also had a Seiner show up today but he just milled around and never made a set. We did try to make some drifts on the breaking fish to try and stay away from their sharks.
This is were I had a fish that the story will log out live the result. We slide up on some nice fish, I hear Roy yell out the they are surfing on the surface up swell off the bow. I grab my rig and run to the bow, I am the only one up there, Roy is out on the portague and is all excited and says ”can you see um?” I look up and see about 100 bigguns just surfing down the swell, I fumble around in the bow bait tank to get a bait, Roy is scream in excitement the whole time, I finally get a bait and he yells “aim right off the bow” I look up and see a huge boil right in front of the boat, Roy is laughing an screaming with excitement. I make a perfect long cast and deliver my bait right on the spot, the bait takes off, I can see the whole thing, Roy screams “here he comes!” I see 2 sharks turn on my bait then out of nowhere, a giant charges out of the deep and takes the bait from the sharks in a nick of time and I am on! Roy is laughing so hard and so am I as it was the most bitchen thing I have ever seen. The fish makes a long run and takes me back the to stern. I start to get some cranks on him when something lit his fire, line was screaming of my reel like there is no tomorrow. It gets to the point that I have my 7465H with a full bend and it is not slowing down. I give the heads up that I might need the backup, I looks like he is not going to stop so we clip on the backup ball and get the rod ready. I give it one more full bend with all my might and finally get it to stop and start getting some cranks, looks like we have him stopped. He takes me back to the bow and we are making good progress on it. The entire time we are all still laughing at how cool the bite was. As I alluded to at the begging the story doesn’t have the desired outcome as the line parted and he was gone. The funny thing about this one that got away was after the line broke I looked up at Roy on the bridge and said, “That was so cool”. The story of the perfect cast and the big bite was the talk of the day and will live in my memory forever.
The Daily jackpot went to Phil Faubert with a nice kite fish that should go over 200.
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The flyer fishing continues to be good and we have a 100 pieces, which comes in handy with the shark problem, which appears to be with us for a while. The kite is still the producer and accounted for 3 bigger ones today 2 of which should go over 200,
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We still have windy conditions and plenty of sharks, The sharks are now eating what few fish we mange on bait. Roger Hawtree continues to have that good kite luck., though with Roger I not sure it is just kite karma. Roger still has a fish in the top 10 tuna of all time with a 364 caught on 80 pound. Roger always seem to manage a few over 200 on every trip. I asked Roger how many over 200 he thinks he has and Roger replied “I don’t know” and my reply was “I’m sure it is a lot” Roger just smiled.
Some bigger Wahoo showed on the bank today, which was a welcome surprise. As you can gather from above Roger Hawtree took the daily jackpot today and the Qualifier 105 headed for home.
The wind is coming down now and we are the only boat here today. We still have lots of sharks but it seems a little more fishable today and the sign of fish is still improving. It might just be our optimism but we are seeing fish all day. Today the kite is hot with 4 over 200 and fewer sharks, I’m not saying they are not biting the kite baits but we are getting 1 tuna for every 3 sharks which is a welcomed change over the last few days. We started catching some fish on bait today as well and the sharks seemed to leave them alone.
Keith Peterson grabs the big fish jackpot today with a 267. Keith’s fish when it came through the gate reminded us all on why we are here. With the bigger fish showing and the wind coming down we will stay another day, we are in no hurry to go fish the Clarion buffer zone as the reports from there are still slow.
The wind is coming down and we have clear skies. The weather today is just beautiful, however the flyers are on the spawn and they were tough to come by. The stayed up all night to make sure we have enough to fish with today. The sharks are still here and have just become part of the fishing, you need to just keep fishing and hopefully you get a tunas to steal a bait away from the sharks. This type of fishing condition will really test what you are made. If you stick with it you will be rewarded. As a example today I went through 6 top shots and two packs of hooks. We are going through the kite rotation 3 times a day but when you get one it is a good one, we also are seeing better Wahoo fishing every day. Thom Bhlom managed a 185 today on the kite to win the daily jackpot. The Accurate 665 is still available but with the sign of fish we have it wont last long.
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Today is our 6th day of fishing and we have great weather again today, we had a few good tuna this morning but the good signal we have had is gone, we spent most of the late morning fishing Wahoo and we managed 20 or so of the nicer grade fish. At noon Roy decided to head to the Clarion buffer zone. The fresh well is coming down in temperature so it will be nice to get some tuna in the fresh. Kathy Rounds today caught the daily jackpot for big fish.
The weather is nice for travel and we spent the rest of the day putting our tackle back in order as the sharks have taken a heavy toll on the gear. We arrived at clarion around 8:30 and did find some biters in the 40 to 60 pound class. The wind is coming up and it makes looking very difficult. And that is how we spent the rest of the day, looking. We spent a nice night in the anchorage. We awoke to calm seas and the wind coming down, the problem is not only is the wind down so are the fish. We spent the entire morning looking for the right school but it would not work out for us. Just before Lunch Roy makes the tough decision the head back to the bank. The Sharks will be a pest but at least we can catch some nice tuna. We are in the bottom of the 9th and will fish it hard tomorrow. We will have one full day to fish then we will need to head for home.
We arrive back at the bank in the early hours, we decide to take a troll around and to our surprise a new batch of Wahoo have moved in and these are big ones, we have wide open limit style fishing on the better grade Wahoo for most of the morning. With everyone fixed up on the fresh Wahoo we get the anchor back down and the kites out looking to finish the trip with some giant Yellow fin tuna. We do have some successes on the kite and few bait fish our biggest fish today is a 195 caught by Rocky on the kite. We lose a few bait fish to the sharks. As the sun starts to set it is time to call it a trip and head for home. The reports are that we will have some weather for the ride so people are starting to tear down their gear. Others are just enjoy a cold one and talking about the prize catch or the ones that got away. Tonight is Kathy Rounds Birthday and we have Steak and Lobster on the menu courtesy of the Rounds family. After dinner I decided to raffle off 2 Royal Polaris Jackets and the Accurate Boss 665 reel since there were no baitfish over 200. The ticket for the reel was drawn first to allow everyone a chance, Jim Mitchell won the first Jacket and Rocky won the second. Then wouldn’t you know it; the birthday girl won the reel! Congratulations Kathy. Before you start yelling it was fixed, Roy Rose drew the ticket in the galley during dessert.
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The bad weather for the ride home hasn’t shown it self yet and we are have nice seas and little wind the partly cloudy skies. If we,ade numerous stops along the way for some nice reds to finish off our trip.
The unloading went smooth as usual, we ended up with 7 over 200 with the biggest going 277 and a real nice catch of wahoo.
I would like to thank again for the great giveaways:
Blackwater International
Accurate Reels
Salas Jigs
Owner Hooks
BHP Tackle
Jerry Brown - Line One
In summary I still mark this trip up as a great adventure, we had many personal bests and new experiences for some. I had a great time and look forward to next year.
Go get some!
Brandon
