19.56S 179.37W 1st October 2011
Mojo 2
Andrew Partington
Sat 1 Oct 2011 01:30
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Hit the jackpot with our fishing [as there's not
much else to do] yesterday....Wahoo. It was around 6.30pm and the sun was about
half an hour from setting when we had another big strike. The reel was screaming
and we gave up heaps of line before we applied the drag to slow the fish down.
Rob grapped the rod while I tried to slow the boat down by turning to windward
and dropping the genoa. Applying the drag just made the fish angry as it went on
a series of strong runs. Rob just held on through these and I held on to him.
Eventually he was able to get some line back but just when we thought it was
over the fish went on another powerful run. All up it would have been around 15
minutes before we had the fish at the back of the boat and even then it still
kept taking line in short sharp bursts. Eventually we were able to land it on
the port stern but had to haul it into the cockpit area because it would not fit
on the steps. Not sure what this incredible fish weighed [Rob was grunting
trying to lift it!!] but it was 1.4 metres from nose to tail and after
cleaning [finished in the dark] it filled a 10 litre bucket with fillets. I
had to lean on the freezer to get the door shut. Any concerns I had with whether
we had enough food aboard were wiped out with one fish. Fresh fillets
tonight.
Dean's purple halco lure had come through for
us again. Since Panama this same lure has caught sailfish, yellowfin tuna,
mahi-mahi, mackeral and now a huge wahoo. The hooks have been changed because
they had been bent and broken by all these incredible fish and the lure itself
really does look as though it has been a dog's chew toy. When Dean was on the
boat we were discussing how expensive lures were. He made the comment that lures
are well known to catch more people than fish. This may well be true but
this particular lure has been a ripper and I am considering offering it a
retirement package and a well earned rest.
That was the good news.
The bad news is that we are in a flat calm so are
still motoring. If we did not have a destination and a timeline this would be
the perfect day. At 10.15am the ocean is like a mirror and there is not a single
cloud in the sky.
We motor-sailed late yesterday into a weak
south-westerly breeze. It had just enough angle to fill the sails and give our
motors a bit of a boost. The skies had cleared fully towards dark, after another
overcast and gloomy day. We were able to keep motor-sailing into the night
but eventually we hit calm at around 4am and it is with us still.
It is 10.30am now and I will take a break and come
back this afternoon with, hopefully, news that the wind is blowing
south-east at 15 knots!!
...Back now and it is 2pm. We have some wind but it
is a south-westerly at 7 knots and is right on our nose...Aarrgh!! It
looks as though it is trying to swing further south but it hasn't been all that
convincing in its efforts.
We mainly motored yesterday for 80NM. We are still
averaging 100NM but we really need to be doing better than this. Fingers crossed
for a change to the south-east tonight. Brisbane is a very distant 1567NM
away.
Andrew.
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