Swell: E, 2m, long time between sets
Current: none
Launch point: Middle Groyne
Participants: richmond, pedro, sunshiner
Even with a recce the day before you can never be entirely sure what the Middle Groyne surf break will be like. But our prediction of yesterday that it would be OK proved correct, even if we had to take the usual care to avoid breaking waves and a wet bum.
I've fished offshore with pedro many times, but today was the first time that I'd launched with him. Maybe, as he said today, he’s becoming an old fart and adopting old farts’ habits of waiting until there’s at least a teeny bit of daylight before jumping aboard and confronting the oncoming waves. Whatever the reason, it was polite of him to wait for the older guys, richmond and me, and to tag along to look after us.
It was still too dark for photos at launch time, but not too dark to obscure the dark horizontal lines which mark the approach of waves. Fortunately we’ve all done this before and even more fortunately the channel along the western side of the wall is still doing its job. This allowed me, second to launch, to paddle out to within spitting distance of the break zone and wait, back paddling a little to avoid being dragged out, until the lull arrived. Today was one of the driest Stealth exits ever for me and I joined pedro out the back just before 5:00am, to be joined within a minute by richmond.
We expected smooth conditions and got them. The waxing moon had set by now but we could still notice that there were no baitfish dimpling the surface just off the groyne as there often are, prior to sunup.
There were some rumours around that there might be some spotty macs at Little Halls or Halls so we agreed that we should check those locations first. Soon we were paddling toward the NW, spread out enough so that we had eyes covering a front of about a kilometre and in contact by radio in case one of the sets of eyes spotted some surface action. We all trolled some offering or other, perhaps two, but I had only my battered old HLP lure out on my trolling outfit.
05:32. Sunrise as seen from the back of my boat, peeping past my trolling outfit.
Paddling (and presumably pedalling as the appropriately nicknamed pedro was) in such flat sea conditions was ridiculously easy but a quick check behind revealed that richmond was hove to, and stationary. It turned out that he was being plagued by the attention of a single persistent small shark.
LH reef came and went and still there was no sign of fishy predatory activity. But the terns were up and looking and a few rare patches of baitfish were spotted but bypassed as we pressed on toward Halls Reef, which is about 5km from the launch point, reaching its vicinity without further interruption by a little after 6:00am.
Here pedro opted to drift a pillie awhile and I kept trolling gently along going in a wide circle until I spotted about a dozen terns paying close attention to a patch of water about 500m inshore. Calling the attention of my companions to this activity I changed my course to head directly toward this action, still trolling, but with a casting outfit ready just in case.
Typically, this bird activity fizzled out somewhat, although the terns were still circling and occasionally dipping nearby, always a good sign that there may be fishy predators in action out of sight. But the best indicator of fishy predators is the scream of the reel, and this happened to my reel, right then, about 06:15.
The yak turned to point at the fish which was running strongly toward the NE and the towing started as I gently increased the drag to a more appropriate setting. The ratchet was still on and line still pouring off the spool of the overhead when I decided to let pedro and richmond in on the situation by holding the radio near the spinning spool and simultaneously pressing the transmit button. I think they got the message.
Fish on. Pic by richmond
At first I had hopes that this might be my first Spaniard of the season because the first run was long and powerful but gradually the down deep slugging tactics of a tuna took over and toward the end of the fight, before I had even seen the fish, I called it for a tuna, probably a longtail. A minute or so later, when the fish swept past showing its right side, under the boat, I could clearly identify it and confirm it as a longtail. The end came quickly as the fish, clearly exhausted, just gave up and, under pressure from the rod, its head popped free of the water right next to the yak, offering an easy target for the gaff which found a good hold in the tough skin at the top of its head.
The longtail offered no resistance as I dragged it over my lap using the embedded gaff. [Edited 08Feb] I got a little bit of video (27 secs total) which I've now cobbled together...
[End of edit]
Then once I was tidied up richmond kindly interrupted his fishing activity to take a few pics.
pics by richmond, thanks Jeff
As we were taking these pics some smaller tuna began feeding on the surface just nearby so richmond got going after them as I tidied up (removing lure, stowing fish, etc).
Shortly afterward richmond announced that he was hooked up nearby and so I paddled over to see how he’d gone.
As you can see, he’d nailed a yellowfin tuna. This was caught by casting a slug into a bustup. I understand that the fish took the slug as soon as it hit the water.
At this time of the year a clear sky and no breeze, which we had at 7:00 am today, can result in very uncomfortable kayaking conditions from about 08:30 onward as the heat becomes stifling, particularly if you have to travel any significant distance. There was still no cooling breeze by 07:20 and as I was now 5 km from Middle Groyne, about an hour’s paddle for me, I decided to head for the beach, particularly as surface activity seemed to have stopped. Pedro, meanwhile had been unsuccessfully chasing tuna bustups so at this time was, unusually for him, fishless. Richmond decided to follow me back to Middle Groyne.
Almost exactly an hour later we were off the beach and shortly afterward had safely run the surf zone which had the unusual situation of large sets of four to five waves coming through every 2-3 minutes while the rest of the time was almost swell free.
Some pics on the beach
Longtail and yft on the mat. The longtail went 105cm.
Yellowfin tuna, 70cm.
Lady from New Caledonia with the longtail.
By the time richmond and I left the beach, around 09:20, pedro was understood to be making his way back from LH reef. Accordingly we don’t know his final result.
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