Great fun after a year of Covid

I’ve just come back from my 2020 holiday. I was lucky enough to spend the time with good friends at Cape Vidal from 28^th November to 12^th December. Over the years, we have seen that the fishing is fantastic over those 2 weeks and then tapers off into December. This is due to that first appearance of warm current from north, bringing with it all the summer gamefish. This year was no exception. In fact, it was one of the best dorado seasons I can remember.

If I had to write a story about every day’s fishing, I would be writing for a long time, so I’m just going to give you the brief summary and maybe highlight a few days that really stood out.

The boat we fished on was the very first 22ft forward console Yeld Cat named “Avanti”, owned by At van Tilburg. I was super excited to fish on her and man was I impressed. This early season fishing is normally in strong wind and heavy seas, but on this boat, it was a pleasure.

In total, I fished for 10 days and our stats, even if I do say so myself, were pretty impressive.

Dorado:               83

Sailfish:                2 from 4

Cuda:                    26

Snoek:                  1

Tuna species:    13

Kaakap:                1

Marlin:                 0 from 2 

Our best day gamefishing was on 2^nd December. At, Henry and I launched at 5am and battled for an hour to get a decent amount of bait. The SW wind was blowing 20 knots and the sea was pretty big. This was a dorado fisherman’s dream conditions … well mine in any case. The game plan in these conditions is simple, find the depth where the fish are (normally where the bait is), turn the stern into the wind, turn off the motors and let the flasher do the rest.

Our baits were live maasbanker rigged with a cable tie through the eyes on 5/0 single hooks with 60lbs nylon leader. Three of these were fished around the flasher and one rod was further out the back. All were fished with light drags set just enough to stop the bait from taking line off the reel. 3 rods were on standby with single hooks to pitch livies to the followers. When the dorries are thick, anything with a pulse is fair game, sand soldiers and lizard fish included. 

On this day, the action was non-stop. Most of the time, when one close rod went off, the other 2 did as well. On many occasions, I would be feeding and hooking 2 fish at a time while Henry had the third. Our team production line worked well with myself rigging bait and hooking fish, Henry fighting them and At gaffing. Every time I passed the rod to Henry, I would put another bait out… as long as the flasher was in the water, the fish were there. At one point we had 4 dorado and a sailfish hooked up and managed to get all of them. It sounds unbelievable, because it was. One of the most action-packed days I’ve ever had. By 9:30 we had 28 dorado and 1 from 2 on sailfish. The smaller fish were released so that we could stay within our limit… and freezer space. 

The very next day also stood out in my mind as one that I really enjoyed. The SW wind from the day before had died and a NE wind was predicted. With enough gamefish in the freezer, we decided to target marlin but on 30lbs line. With the same crew from the day before, who between us we have been with over 600 marlin captures, I felt pretty confident of our chances.

We had some bad luck with a few live baits being hooked in the gills and dying in the tuna tubes. Also, the dorado, which were great fun the day before, were now a plague and grabbed any surface lure we put out. We moved to an area further north and managed to get a 2kg kawa-kawa which I rigged up on the 30lbs outfit. The bait had a small profile in the water, so out came the flasher. Suddenly it looked like a shoal of bonnies instead of just 1.

We picked up a thermocline at 180m and in 185m, the rigger popped. I fed the fish but it suddenly started jumping towards us, trying to throw the bait. I tightened up on the fish and it went mental on the surface. Just seconds later the fish was off. On closer inspection, the 400Lbs leader had broken. Probably due to a tailwrap. Oh well, the fish looked a bit small for the record, only about 90kg. 

We headed back to the bait pinnacle and managed another small kawa-kawa. This time we only made it to 115m when the rigger popped without any warning. I was dropping back when the fish erupted next to us with the bait hanging along the side of its body and the leader through its mouth. As can be expected, this didn’t last long and soon the party was over. Again, the fish was a bit small so no harm no foul. 

In all it was a great fishing trip. I know its going to sound like marketing smack, but what was strikingly obvious was how effective the flashers were. Later in the holiday, when the dorado tapered off, the cuda were also coming up on the short lines. Report from some of the other boats are that the sails and little marlin have come in on them, as I told them they would. It was also nice to see that the charter boats off St Lucia have ordered a few sets from me, so that tells me everything! Henry was baffled by them to the point that I made him a mini version that he is going to try for tigerfish and bass. 

I’m looking forward to seeing the results from the boat Cyclone. George and Geraldine Breedt and fishing light line exclusively and use my flashers to tease up their fish. I know of two double headers of sailfish they released on 4kg line so far and there are a few SA record applications in the post.

Good luck to everyone for the December holidays and have a great and safe festive season.