The day stated off with Mike (FA) meeting me at the boat at about 5:30 yesterday morning to see me off on my first Charter... Clients arrived promptly at 6:00am and by 6:15am we were on our way to the Blue Yonder...Now 3 of the guys aboard have been out before, 1 however had not...but we will get to that later. Anyway, we headed out of the harbour and set the spread. The NE was blowing at about 7-10 knots with a 2-3 meter swell...it was about 8:15am when the sound of a screaming reel caught my attention. I looked back only to see the line peeling off the reel at a rate of knots - just one look at the reel I could see that this fish had stripped about 200m of line in about 15 to 20 seconds... Yes!!! this had to be the monster I have been looking for...after setting the hook, the rod was handed to one of my clients...after a long 20 min battle there she was about 10 meters down on the port side, and yes, it was the monster YFT we had been looking for.. at first glance she was an easy 20kg + YFT. After another 5 mins she started to come to the boat and with a quick dash she shot under the boat hit the keel strips and was gone...talk about an anti-climax! What got me was that not only did she get away, but she got away with my brand new lure...Grrrr... but that's fishing...some times you win and some times....you lose a lure...Grrr again! After a quick tackle change we were off again looking for my new lure... but sadly could not find it. With the NE blowing, biggish swells and one of my clients lying flat on the deck, it was time to switch tactics and head for calmer waters - he had been chumming for most of the morning (those tablets he was taking may as well have been candy). So we headed into the backline and started looking for some smaller fish...Ended up with a 2kg Rock Cod and a 1kg Soldier before we headed back to port to put the guys back on dry land! Mike met me back at the dock after his anguished await - to make sure all went well - which ended up with me all wet and Mike smiling (check out FA's post)...
