@Tallguy, @SilverFly, @jonTheFisherman and I went out for tuna with @Nick Clayton yesterday on the boat he’s running this year. The Reel Electric with Mutineer Charters.
It started early with @jonTheFisherman banging around stoves and pans at 3:30 am in the campsite to make coffee. Followed by a 4:15 AM check in and 4:30 am departure from the dock. They start early on this charter, so a good chunk of the run out was in the dark but also got us to the grounds nice and early.
It was a hectic day so I’ll talk in generalities. This might not be exactly how the day unfolded but close enough. The day started with a troll hookup and nothing else. Followed by two troll hookups and a slide fish. Then a troll hookup and some cast and strip fish. Then a troll hookup or two and a bunch of cast and strip fish. Another similar troll hookup and a bunch of cast and strip hookups. Then we were done. By around 11 am with ~750 lbs of tuna on deck. At some point @Tallguy decided he wanted to play deckhand and did not fish for about 45 minutes during our last stop…and we still finished well before noon. On a few of the stops, jig rods were deployed and we landed a few. Not because they were needed but because they were brought and we had an interest in mixing things up a bit. Everyone caught a lot of fish. Everyone left sore and on a high. I’ve done 10-12 of these trips now and this was by far my favorite with most of the fish (all of mine personally) coming on the slide or cast and strip.
Plus, outside of a single outlier, they were large! ~750 pounds of tuna from 29 fish. You do the math. 21 on fly rods. 8 on jigs. Multiple lost fish on the fly rod. The action was so hot on the last stop, that I hooked 5 casting and stripping and lost three of them but was actually happy about it. We had so much tuna onboard, getting the initial take and run was all the fun I needed from fish that size by then. With as hot and consistent as the bite was all morning, I have little doubt we could have filled the boat plenty early with just the fly rods as well.
An amazing day. Great captain of course, and an excellent boat to fish from. Multiple fish brought us completely around the boat due to their size this trip, and the full walk around deck was great for that. We even fished two fly guys off the front simultaneously a couple of times which required a bit of casting choreography and trust, but was doable.
Last trip of the year for me and most others on this trip. If I had more friends or a bigger family I’d be trying to haggle my way into one more with fishing like that. Alas, the 12 weights are now put up for another year. For those of you with trips left this year, I hope the bigguns are still around when you head out.
Some pics.
Take home for 3 fisherman. Tallguy had already taken his share…
It started early with @jonTheFisherman banging around stoves and pans at 3:30 am in the campsite to make coffee. Followed by a 4:15 AM check in and 4:30 am departure from the dock. They start early on this charter, so a good chunk of the run out was in the dark but also got us to the grounds nice and early.
It was a hectic day so I’ll talk in generalities. This might not be exactly how the day unfolded but close enough. The day started with a troll hookup and nothing else. Followed by two troll hookups and a slide fish. Then a troll hookup and some cast and strip fish. Then a troll hookup or two and a bunch of cast and strip fish. Another similar troll hookup and a bunch of cast and strip hookups. Then we were done. By around 11 am with ~750 lbs of tuna on deck. At some point @Tallguy decided he wanted to play deckhand and did not fish for about 45 minutes during our last stop…and we still finished well before noon. On a few of the stops, jig rods were deployed and we landed a few. Not because they were needed but because they were brought and we had an interest in mixing things up a bit. Everyone caught a lot of fish. Everyone left sore and on a high. I’ve done 10-12 of these trips now and this was by far my favorite with most of the fish (all of mine personally) coming on the slide or cast and strip.
Plus, outside of a single outlier, they were large! ~750 pounds of tuna from 29 fish. You do the math. 21 on fly rods. 8 on jigs. Multiple lost fish on the fly rod. The action was so hot on the last stop, that I hooked 5 casting and stripping and lost three of them but was actually happy about it. We had so much tuna onboard, getting the initial take and run was all the fun I needed from fish that size by then. With as hot and consistent as the bite was all morning, I have little doubt we could have filled the boat plenty early with just the fly rods as well.
An amazing day. Great captain of course, and an excellent boat to fish from. Multiple fish brought us completely around the boat due to their size this trip, and the full walk around deck was great for that. We even fished two fly guys off the front simultaneously a couple of times which required a bit of casting choreography and trust, but was doable.
Last trip of the year for me and most others on this trip. If I had more friends or a bigger family I’d be trying to haggle my way into one more with fishing like that. Alas, the 12 weights are now put up for another year. For those of you with trips left this year, I hope the bigguns are still around when you head out.
Some pics.
Take home for 3 fisherman. Tallguy had already taken his share…
. I barely got 4 in the cooler I brought.
