On Tuesday 25th January
at 4:45am, Greg Edwards (aka Muddy) and I launched “ABF” off of the Gold Coast.
This was the first time I had launched out of the Seaway so I was glad to have the
guidance of someone who knew the area.
The goal for the day was to target black
marlin that were currently congregating on the bait shoals offshore. After leaving
through the seaway, we headed due East towards Spot X. It would be a 30km run,
but after 15km, the water looked really good, so we put out a spread of small
billfish lures and continued on our intended course. Unfortunately, there was
no action on the lures but when we arrived at Spot X, there were a lot of boats
with several of them hooked up to marlin. This was great news!
There was a N – S current so I
headed North through the boats, looking for bait showings. What I saw on the
sounder was pretty spectacular. There were mackerel from the surface all the
way to the bottom, 80m down. This huge shoal continued for quite a distance and
when we arrived at the northern part of it, we stopped and very quickly caught
a few mackerel. 2 of them were rigged up and we drifted over the shoal. It was
a pretty quiet drift but finally, just as we were going to up lines, Greg had a
pull on his livie. After a short feed, he hooked up. There was only a short run
then it came in easily. Definitely not a marlin, but a skipjack. It soon become
apparent that there were not only marlin on the bait shoals, but a lot of skipjack
too. By the end of the second drift, we had caught 4 of them. To try and avoid
them, I headed further north to a different patch of bait, hoping that we would
have better luck.
A boat next to us went on with 2
dorado, so I put out a surface bait to see if there was another one for us to
catch. The line was scarcely out when the line got heavy and the reel started
running. I freespooled a bit but nothing happened. Just then, Greg’s reel went away.
He hooked up and the line angled to the surface. I put up the drag and wound
like hell to clear the line, but the line cut through the water towards where
Greg’s fish was. It had eaten both baits. Luckily, mine pulled free and we
could continue with just one rod. I had just cleared the last line when the
fish stuck its head out the water. It was a nice size marlin of about 65 or
70kg. I chased after the fish, but it sounded and remained deep for most of the
fight. After putting some big pressure on the fish, it surfaced and jumped a
few times, in the process getting tail wrapped. The fish was close enough to
the boat that we could get the wind-on leader onto the rod for a tip, but just
then, a big shark appeared from the depths. The marlin must have seen it and
took fright, going down deep. The shark faded off and eventually, a long 45 minutes
after hooking up, it surfaced again for a few jumps where it luckily unwrapped.
It still took another 15 minutes before I could grab the bill and remove the
hook. It was a difficult fish, but it was still the first one on “ABF” in
Australia.
On the next drift, the lines were
just set when Greg and I both went on with skippies. They were both
unceremoniously released and the drift continued. Just as we were coming off
the end of the bait, we went on with a fish that took a lot of line in a hurry.
We gave chase but soon realised that we were hooked up to an undesirable… Greg
was on sunset drag with his fingers on the spool applying maximum drag, but the
shark would not budge. After 35 minutes, I put gloves on and grabbed the line
to try and pop it. Only after getting most of the line back, did the big swell
and a surge of the fish meet, luckily resulting in a breakoff.
We regrouped, had a cooldrink and
headed back up to the top of the drift. Out bait stocks were low, so we decided
to catch a few more for. As luck would have it, the bait shoals had moved during
the long fight and it took us a while to find them again. When we did, we
caught about 15 mackerel and one big maasbanker (yakka). With the pressure of getting
a fish off our shoulders, we could relax on the next drift. Now that we had
enough bait, we could put out a third rod, so I took a blind scoop out of the
live well and caught the only yakka we had. I saw it as a sign to use it so I
rigged it and put it out. The rod was hardly in the holder when it bent a bit
and the reel slowly ran. With the rod still in the holder, I fed the fish a bit
and then put the drag to strike position and wound into the fish. The rod bent
over as the fish started moving away. Line was steadily leaving the reel and
the line angled to the surface where another marlin jumped halfway out the
water. I passed the rod to Greg and cleared the other line before starting up the
motors and giving chase. This fish was also a difficult one, fighting deep for
most of the fight. It only jumped a few times, enough for us to get a good look
at it. After a 45min fight, I had the leader on another 70kg black. I wrapped it
and held on while the marlin swam next to the boat with all its lights on. I
leant back on the leader and the added pressure sparked a sudden surge from the
fish. I wasn’t about to let go, fearing another extended fight, so the light leader
popped without too much hassle. 2 for 2, not too shabby.
While I was chasing after the last
marlin, I marked a few fish on the shallow side of the bait shoal so I stopped
the boat up current of it to intercept. Just as the bait started marking, the
deep bait went away. We were convinced that it was a marlin just by the speed of
its first run and big head nods after hooking up. Unfortunately, it was like
deja vu ending with another forced breakoff.
By now it was 13:45 and we were
approaching the turn of the tide so we were hoping it would switch on. It
seemed like the bait balls were a bit more condensed, and just as we were on top
of the highest point, we had another slow but steady pull. I tightened up and
the rod bent over. The fish stayed on the surface and headed into the current.
When it finally did start taking line, there was a splash on the surface and a
better size marlin stuck its head out. We were hoping for a quick shot at the
leader, but again, the fish was stubborn and stayed down deep. Grep put big
pressure on and after 20 minutes, before it came up. When it did, I had the
boat right on top of it. It cleared the water like a Polaris missile. Moments
later the leader came up and Greg wound it onto the reel, but as quickly as it
came on, it flew off. The fish swam around the boat making spectacular jumps as
it went. We chased it down and eventually managed to get hold of the leader. I
wrapped it and held on until something broke. On closer inspection, the circle
hook had straightened and then snapped. With that it was 3 for 3 on an 80ish
kilo black.
We were on a bit of a roll, so it
was back up to the top of the drift and sure enough, 10 minutes in, 2 rods went
off. One was a skippie that was very quickly released. The second fish was
definitely not a skippie and took a lot of line. We followed it for some time
and when we got directly above it, it sounded and after half an hour still had not
moved it so, not wanting to waste more time on another shark, we parted off and
headed back to the seaway.
It was a great day off the Gold
Coast and one that I’ll remember for a long time.
