Brother,
Fishing continues to be exceptional and four days ago finished a 7 day charter with father & Son, Dave and Duncan Royston.
It was going to be hard to beat their trip last year when they caught 5 Marlin in 7 days including two over 850 lbs.
Anyway to cut a long story short it was EPIC to say the least
….besides all the wahoo, dorado countless yellowfin etc etc in these last 7 days we raised 20 Marlin which materialized in 15 strikes, 10 hookup’s and 7 Black Marlin releases.
On the 10th and 11th of October we did two half days with Andrew Dickens and his Dad
We light tackle game fished the first morning and did well with 21 yellow fin and wahoo. We had an amazing 5 wahoo at the same time….INSANE!!! We also pulled on a couple of Marlin in the afternoon, so the next morning the guys said theyb wanted to target Marlin exclusively…ALLELUIA it was the first day I started targeting Marlin exclusively…this is what I come here for and with a huge grin I set a beautiful spread of five Marlin lures at 6am.
We caught a couple wahoo and at 7am sharp BANG, there goes the short rigger lure and all hell breaks loose as a big Black jumps.
We hook up and Andrew takes the #50 stand up rod and begins a fight with his first ever Marlin and a good one at that.
An hour into it we get the leader and take a good look at this big chubby fish. It,s another 45 minutes until we get the leader again, place a tag and let her go!!!
She had a lot of girth on her and was easily pushing 700 pounds…the first big girl of the season….
The next day again out for a half day, this time with a couple from the UK who had never fished before. We got some nice wahoo and yellowfin early morning and at 9 I decided to swim a live bait that immediately got taxed.
I decided to put some Marlin lures out and gave the guys a whole briefing and half an hour later there goes the short corner lure and our lady angler jumps in the chair to fight her first ever fish….a Black estimated at 600 pounds!!!!
This fish gave us a show jumping all over and staying on the surface. Meanwhile our ladu angler had an adrenaline breakdown and forget all I had said which meant I could not get on top of the fish right away while it was up. The fish then sounded and our angler come to terms and did a great job putting some pressure on that fish.
Unlucky very close to the boat the hooks come off….awesome experience anyway.
We had to cut the day short when we found a local boat 11 miles out at sea who had lost their propeller….obviously we had to tow them back!!!
Sean,
Brother the fishing as been absolutely insane…here´s a few reports and pics for the sardine….just been to busy to send anything fishing everyday….blownout today big SA, but out there tomorrow again!!!
After having some insane light tackle fishing over the last two weeks of September when we caught ridiculous amounts of sailfish, yellowfin, wahoo, dorado and others we finally started fishing heavy tackle for Marlin in early October and with perfect conditions the fishing as been insane!!!
First group was Craig Edwards with a few mates and they choose to also fish mostly for game fish and we caught no less than 30 game fish every day including some pretty beefy wahoo and yellowfin in the 20 to 25 kilo range.
We also caught a good number of sailfish including three in a day and to top it off a small 200 pound Black Marlin…
Duarte Rato at Bazaruto sent in this awesome photo of a yellowfin tuna…taken a few days ago…
These are what the big momma’s are here for!
It has been a little quiet, in town and at sea, for us in Tofo. But we have had the following launches:
Damian, Shane and Erlana
Shane was super stoked with his yellowfin on light tackle, seared and eaten still raw in the middle, with lemon juice and garlic butter. Wow!
But then Damiao got his first fish ever! A smallish sea pike – that he relished at Tofo Tofo Restaurant, where they prepared it beautifully.
Although the fishing was a bit slow, whale sharks, dolphins and whales made up for some action.
The Poker Club
Paul and I were sitting on the verandah at Bar Babalaza, wondering where our next customers were going to come from, when 8 Big Ous from Joey’s rocked up and turned our lives upside down. From partying at Fatima’s, to huge feeds at Barra Lodge and then a final assault on Freddie’s Bush Bar at Whitesands…
Lionel led the fishing charge but either he chose the wrong crew or bait – but it was not to be. We never saw a bird, and not one local rowboat fishing crew were out either. It’s about 1 in 6 trips that we score a duck like this – and no, they never let us live it down!
Double or quits next time pals!
Hey senor Sean,
After the crazy SE that blew over last weekend we have had picture perfect weather, deep blue water an ocean full of life…and some pretty EPIC fishing.
Unfortunately despite such perfect conditions we have not been targeting Marlin on heavy tackle as with such a ridiculous amount of gamefish such as wahoo, dorado and yellowfin tuna as well as sailfish around, guests have preferred to tackle these on light tackle.
Tuesday and Wednesday we only went out for a couple hours and some pretty good fish and lost a bus yellowfin and a big GT we fought for 35 minutes. But yeah, there is so much Yellowfin it´s stupid!!!
Yesterday we fished in the morning and released a sailfish out of a double strike, missed two black Marlin and again got a whole bunch of yellowfin tuna.
Today was epic…we started with a sailfish pack attack and managed to hook 3 of the five bites and released two fish. We then got into a massive school of yellowfin and got 14 as well as two good wahoo. We had to be back at 1pm but still pulled lures for a while and finished the morning with a small Black Marlin around 100 pounds for Craig Edwards…it was everyone’s first billfish!!!
Looking good bru…can’t wait to start chasing the big ladies !!!
Cheers
Duarte
