Bligh Reef Lagoon Explorer 19 Sept 2011:
Glanville:- Yet another amazing day....i'm in love with this place!!!! We set off this morning with big plans of catching a Doggie over 80kg, we fished hard and after 2 hours of trolling were rewarded with a cracker of a fish that would have been 45-50kg, in between the boys tussled another 2 Dogtooth to the boat that were both decent fish around the 20-25kg mark, a 20kg Spanish mackerel and a beast of a jobfish around 10kg trolled from 40m!!! The weather was dying off by the minute and we decided to take a run further south to drift the flats in hope for a few trout for dinner, we did exactly that and not long before we had our first trout in the esky, minutes later we hooked another great fish and a short battle later and incredibly we managed to extract a 15kg Maori wrasse and a cod on the same lure, the wrasse came in and tried to eat the cod right near the boat. The flats fishing turned into a lunch session followed by an awesome little softplastic session which started off with a triple hook up 25kg Maori wrasse, 15kg cod and an 8kg Chinaman, what a spread, after catching a few more awesome fish I turned around to the guys and laid down the options, "we can go do some more dogtooth fishing, try troll for a yellowfin, try for a marlin, do some popping for Gts, some more insane light tackle on the flats, or continue with the jigging!!!!" where in the world as a fishing guide are you able to offer your guests the choice of that type of fishing?
If anyone knows please tell me cause I want to go there ASAP....
The answer I got from the guys was quite entertaining and we set out for yellowfin tuna and a possible marlin in the deep cause the guys were too scared to lose anymore tackle to unstoppable fish in the reef, hahaha you gotta love it...we finished up the day with a dolphin fish which is going to be on the plates for dinner, what a day, can't wait to see what tomorrow brings!!!! Did I mention that I love this place.
Peter: Wow!!!!! What an pearler of a day the wind was blowing but the fishing was amazing and comfortable at the same time. We set out this morning on the search for a big Doggie. The conditions were good and the anticipation was high with good soundings and birds everywhere. We had an explosion on the skipping sharkey mackerel and lost 2 more on the troll one of which hit a stickbait on the surface that would have been around 70kg plus. We ended up getting a clunker longtail tuna and job fish on the troll. With things starting to slow down on the troll we went into the shallows for some light tackle action and caught some really nice size trout, red bass, cod and 2 GTs over 20kgs. After catching a couple of GTs on the light gear the boys were keen to go for some GTs on the heavy gear we pulled up on a likely looking edge and it was game time managing to catch
5 more good size GTs in half an hour. We would of kept fishing for them but we got interrupted by Clint in the other boat calling us up saying that they hooked a Marlin. We took off in a heartbeat to go and see this amazing fish.
What a surreal sight, seeing such a large creature up close in a small boat.
I can tell you the morale was incredibly high from everyone today with high fives flying around everywhere after having such an incredible day all round. I'm so stoked and pumped up for tomorrow that its not funny. I cant wait for the sun to rise tomorrow yeeeeooooww!!!!!
Clint: Man there are memorable days on the water that stick in our minds forever and today without a doubt was one of those. In the morning we headed out to gem alley where we got the big doggies yesterday and again it produced. The first pass the port side reel started to screamed off and Jamie was into a doggie which we boated that went 60 pound a great fish. We kept doing passes turning the reels several more times coming back with busted wires and lost lures there were some big fish down there brutalising our tackle.The jigs went down for one pass and Jamie was into his second doggie he was pumped. Between all this jigging and trolling we also hooked Spanish and sharkies. To mix it up it was time to pop this sexy ledge I had my eye on that went from 50 meters to 5 meters. With huge waves breaking and pefect current hitting this place went off. We got five Gts in a short time, one going 38kg which was Tom's biggest Gt. To watch these fish hit the back of waves in crystal clear water smashing lures is a sight to remember. The same ledge also produced some nice trout, bluefin trevally and red bass. By now the boys were over the moon with the fishing they had just had, we thought how could it get better? Well it did!! After lunch the wind had died down and we thought we would go out the front to try for Marlin. We buzzed around with skirts out the back and with mac tuna boiling there was a feeling in the air that there could be a chance to raise a fish. After two passes it happened the reel screamed off at a ridiculous pace. It for sure was a marlin then all of a sudden we had slack line, we missed the fish. Bummer!! It was good to know they were in the area though and the lines straight back out there we were buzzing. I watched the skirts intently and with the sun bright on the water it happened a marlin was behind one of the skirts all lit up we had our a second shot in just 5min. I picked up speed to get the fish fired up and the Marlin was all over the skirt. It happened we were away Holy crap! Tailing walking and long runs it was a textbook marlin fight. Jamie and Tom shared the fight as they were both broken from the earlier day's fishing. After 45min we got the beautiful beast a black marlin to the side of the boat. It was a special moment and to have the Nomad boys right there watching from the other boats was insane. All I can say is what a incredibly special day!
