On Friday 6th April 2012, Michael Duvenage, Wessel and Marinda Visagie and I launched the boat “LIHANN” out of Richards Bay. We had entered into the Richards Bay Bonanza held over the Easter weekend.
Our first stop was at the pipeline to look for live bait. Unfortunately there were none to be found so we headed further north and deeper. We came upon a large shoal of maasbanker and redeyes which went into the live well before we headed south to highpoint. Enroot we passed small highpoint and I suggested we quickly make a turn over the pinnacle, just to see what was happening. Michael altered course while I set 5 bait lures. As we crossed the pinnacle, 4 rods went away! Amidst the chaos, one fish burnt off but we managed to get a yellowfin and 2 big kawakawa. The lines went out again and before we could cross the reef, 2 rods went off. This time with 2 small jube jubes. Again lines went in and as we passed over the pinnacle, 4 rods went away with yellowfins. This time the fish on the rod we left in the holder pulled hook, but the rest we landed and released. We had to drag ourselves away from the tuna and continued to highpoint.
As we arrived, I put out 5 baits, including the jube jubes we caught. On the first turn, the one was eaten and the reel smoked off. Wessel tussled a 16kg cuda to the boat where I gaffed it. What a way to start the day. I reset the lines and the livebait on surface went away. This time it was a big kawakawa which was foul hooked. As Wessel brought it to the surface, a blackfin shark followed it to the surface. Luckily we were fast enough to pull it away before it was taxed. A short while later, the wala wala on the surface was taken and Michael brought in a smallish cuda. Things went quiet so we moved a bit south. After about an hour, the rod with the live bait on the surface slowly bent.I picked it up and tightened up. The reel absolutely smoked off. As the other lines were cleared, the fish bit through the #7 wire! Unlucky...
The wind had picked up and most of the boats left. I returned to the main pinnacle and was rewarded with a smoking reel on the downrigged livie. While Wessel was fighting another nice cuda, Michael went on with another kawakawa. Just after I gaffed the 15kg cuda, Michael’s fish was eaten by the sharks. We were running out of time and made 1 last turn with only 1 rod. Again, the reel screamed off and Wessel caught another cuda around 10kg.
We packed up and made the 40km run against a 20knot NE. Needless to say we were a few inches shorter when we arrived in the harbour.
The next day was a blowout but day 3 was fishable. We were allowed to launch after 8am when the weather settled. Again we stopped on the pipe and managed to fill the livewell in a short period. We headed for small highpoint and put out 5 bait rods. Our first pass resulted in a full house strike of 4kg yellowfins. We kept 2 and released the rest. The next turn again resulted in a full house strike resulting in 3 skipjack and 2 yellowfins. We kept the 2 small skippies for bait and released the rest. We knew that if we stayed there, we would catch tuna all day so we headed to petingo to fish for cuda. We had beautiful baits swimming the whole day, but the 19 degree water and reverse current switched the fish off and not one fish came out for the day.
All in all, it was a great comp with great friends.
