Monday 11^th May - As of midnight day-18 we were at position 8:8.33S 125:16.28W

I guess never being satisfied once again as I went through my morning routine I dropped the line back into the water at around first light. As I lowered the squid like rubbery fishing lure into the amazing bright blue water, I let the line out on free with the ratchet gear engaged to prevent it from tangling on the spool of the reel. I usually let it out about between 50 to 75 meters depending on the time of day. Today was a little different because I had just let the line in the water and it seemed to run out a lot faster than normal, I checked the boat speed and we were doing the usual 5 Knots which is a decent speed. It was not until I slid the drag lever over that I realized by some chance hooked up another fish. It must of been storeking me after taking its friend from the sea the afternoon before. The line was wasting no time at all running off the spool so fast that I kid you not the thing started to smoke, I burnt my fingers trying to slow it down. I could tell it was another tuna however this thing was bigger yet again. Wow I thought it had only been 15 hours since I landed my prize fish and now I have another one on the line. Well when it rains it pores the saying goes and now was no different.

I yanked in the tow generator which is no easy feat but with the amount of adrenalin that just hit me I think I could off jumped in the water and swam faster than this beast of a fish. I slowly took up the drag onto the full setting ‘Strike’ and waited once again for the fish to slow down. This time it did not and I began to get a little faint with thoughts of loosing my line and new favorite lure to the depths so I started to fight. This is a risk because not only do I have a big momma of a fish going one way at a huge rate I also am onboard a sailing boat which does not have the luxury of breaks and steaming along at 5 knots in the opposite direction. Well it paid off as I fought he slowed and I managed to gain a few hundred feet of line back on the spool knowing that he would want to take another dive shortly. As he dove for the second time I waited for him to stop and then once again bought him back to the surface. The pore fish was exhausted, the solid bullet of mussel that has more power than you could possibly imagine had given up and lay in the surface behind the boat patiently again for me to spear the gaff through its gut and bring him up on deck.

This beast must have been 40 Pounds, I mean I could hardly lift the thing. The size of it is so deceiving, how can such a fish be so heavy I though well considering that the chest cavity is so small and it is nothing else but mussel it is like a rock.

I spent the rest of the morning cutting the fish up like an artist, with every stroke of the sharp blade my rusty knife lopped another prime fillet of tuna meat. I filled a container then another, then another, and then a freezer bag, and another and then the bucket and then I was running out of space. I guess the good thing is so much meat gives a man options. I carefully packed away the choicest cuts in to the fridge as I turned the fresh fillet sizzling in the large skillet on top of the stove. I cubed up the rest ready to be canned. By 6 PM I had a very full tummy and 7 large jars of Tuna canned for the keeping. I got so carried away that I made canned tuna curie, jalapeño and pepper corn tuna, lemon pepper tuna with a whole garlic that went into the jar with and of course it was all topped up with fine Spanish virgin olive oil bough in Spain for just such an occasion.    

Day 291

Destination – Marquesas Passage Day 18

Traveling Direction – West

Average Speed – 5.4

Total distance – 122 Nautical Miles

Travel Time – 24h