Bonanza

On Good Friday 19^th, over the Easter weekend, Hansie, Ruben, Terry and I launched Mitsu-Fishi off Richards Bay. We were competing in the Richards Bay Ski-Boat Club Bonanza. The weather looked good for only one of the days so we needed to have a game plan. We opted to head north to look for some snoek as there had been a few nice ones the previous week.

On the bait marks, we managed to get about 10 redeyes and a bunch of maasbanker. With bait in the well, we headed north and put out a spread of snoek lures. Hansie trolled over all our favourite numbers without even a hint of a fish. By 9am, we made the call to switch over to bait so I put out fillets, redeyes and two cuda baits, just in case. While working the area, there were a few birds fluttering about. We slowly followed them around hoping they would lead us to some fish. Eventually one of the birds started working and as we came within range, Terry and Ruben fired out 2 spoons. Both were chased by snoek, but none hooked up. Shortly after, the surface redeye went away. Ruben fought the fish to the boat where we saw it to be a small cuda. Just as we were about to gaff it, the hooks pulled. No worries, we had snoek to chase.

We upped lines and closed the gap between us and the birds which were now all diving. There were fish on the surface and were feeding on small sprats. Both Terry and I cast into the shoal and both hooked up. Almost immediately, two big sharks chased after my fish and managed to eat it despite freespooling for a while. Terry managed his fish. The chase continued and luckily we were by ourselves so we could get a few fish before the rush. Eventually, we were spotted and about 10 boats surrounded us. The fish became very skittish and eventually sounded.

We headed home with 8 snoek and 2 kingfish for the scales. The rest of the comp was blown out and Ruben managed to end up with the 3^rd biggest snoek prize.