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tf211

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    Sydney - previously San Francisco and Baja (Mexico)

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  1. Ben, we had the same experience yesterday. See my post. I don't think it's anything we are doing wrong. Just uncooperative fish. Tony
  2. Had another try. After a later-than-planned start we went to the Artificial Reef for bait. Got about a dozen or so nice baits and headed to Long Reef. Put out two rigs on downriggers down 5 metres. Trolled around for about two hours looking for a structure we had heard about called "The Wall". We don't think we found it, at least nothing that fitted the contours on the GPS chart, but we found that the chart isn't accurate around that area. Got one good hit that didn't stick. That's all. With a decent swell coming through we decided we had had enough punishment for one day (we were the only boat out there). Headed back to the Harbour and made a couple of passes at Old Man's Hat, then a few passes of the Eastern and Western Wedding Cakes, all for nought. I hate going home skunked. ("Skunked" is what they call it in California if you come home with nothing). Tony
  3. Five of us started out with intention of getting bait in the harbour then going outside for kingies, dollies and snapper. We tried for squid at Dobroyd for zero. Tried across face of Middle Head and eventually got three. Decided to head for Artificial Reef for bait fish. Very tough conditions. Short steep seas and fast drift. Eventually the driver figured out how to drift through the bait balls and we had quite a few yakkas and slimies. Skipper (me) decided it was very uncomfortable bordering on dangerous fishing conditions outside so we headed back into the harbour and anchored near the Western wedding cake. We landed a couple of rat kings on squid bait then hooked into a bream that was followed to the surface by a huge kingy around 1 metre. Unfortunately he was not interested in the live slimies we offered him, he seemed intent on the bream. We then put the downriggers down and did some passes of the wedding cake and picked up another rat king. Tried same trick at the Eastern wedding cake for zero. With the weather looking nasty and a bad forecast coming on Ch 16 we decided to call it a day. Great crew, fun day but tough conditions. Tony
  4. Alan, you are the best. Good luck with your retirement. I guess you'll start something new, like servicing fishing reels ?? Great looking Lings. Tony
  5. tf211

    The Basin

    A couple of years ago my wife got a really nice Spanish Mackerel inside Pittwater. If another one has wandered in, that could explain the teethmarks on your leader.
  6. Well, here's the scoop. I've done a fair bit of fishing, but mainly in California and Mexico. My cousin has done a fair bit of fishing, but mainly in the tropics. So, in short, we don't know what we are doing fishing around Sydney, and today proved the point. A picture perfect day all day. We dragged soft plastics on downriggers at 3Kts past Old Man's Hat and North Head, hoping to find a Kingie. Nothing going, and didn't see anything of any size on my new CHIRP Fishfinder. Picked up and ran to Long Reef. A group of about ten or so boats were fishing NE of the reef. We dropped our soft plastics back in on the downriggers, and did loops and circles. Lots and lots of bait in the area, with bait balls breaking the surface. Nothing of any size on the meter, and no hits. Decided to troll East, so switched to two surface "feathers" lures and a Rapala. Trolled about 9 miles East at 7Kts. No hits and nothing on the meter. Turned and trolled back to North Head with the same result. So - a beautiful day on the water, the boat behaved perfectly, the new instrumentation looks fantastic, and no fish. Just goes to prove we don't know what we are doing. I guess we'll learn in time. Cheers, Tony
  7. How about a bit of a hint as to where you were fishing.
  8. Alan, I can't believe it. I'm in Sydney, checking the local fishing equivalent of "Coastside" and there's a posting from you. Makes me feel I'm in California! Reason I was checking the fishing site is that I have just taken delivery of my "new" (10 years old) Riviera 33, and can't wait to get onto some fish. But there's no way I'll get onto anything like you got in Puerto Vallarta. Just hoping for some Yellowtail (they call them Kingfish here). We will be coming back to California, as we need to sell the house (and the Riv 34) before we come back permanently. The good news is that Australia has approved Dianne's permanent residency visa, so we are more or less set to go. Now if I could only find someone who wants a nice San Rafael house. Tony
  9. Just back from a week on the East Cape of Baja California, Mexico. Fishing in general was slow, but we got into a double of big Roosterfish. Pretty exciting to have two big Roosters on at once. Wife's Roosterfish didn't make it, although we tried three or four times to revive it. We measured and weighed it - 130cm and 23.5Kg. Mine was noticeably bigger. I figure it was over 28Kg. Wife also got a good sized Jack Crevalle. Wow, those guys really punch above their weight. And on the last day, wife got a 130lb Striped Marlin to the boat, using the same light gear she used on the Jack Crevalle. She did great - I'm so proud of her.
  10. That's really tough, in every sense of the word. I had a similar experience in Mexico (NE of Cabo in the Sea of Cortez) when I hooked a blue. Not as big as yours, only 91Kg. It got tail-wrapped about 20 minutes into the fight, although I didn't know at the time. The next 30 minutes were as tough as I've had to fight. When I got it to the boat, the fish was clearly dead, so we brought it in and weighed it (then gave away a lot of the fish and smoked the rest - delicious). As I was getting the fish close to the boat and not knowing it was dead, I said to my wife: "I hope this fish doesn't have another run in him, because I don't have another run in me!" It sounds from your report that you did everything right. At least now you have the experience of fighting a big marlin, and know some of the things that can happen. You'll be so much more confident on the next one, so good luck and keep trying.
  11. Valentine's Day weather started out not looking too flash, but we went anyway. Left the dock in Pittwater around 6:30AM aiming to see if we could get some Kingies. Four of us - friends Ken and Nolene, wife Dianne and me. Headed over to some moorings off Church Pt. to find Yakkas, and they were there. As we were catching, we started to see Kingies around our baits. We put a livey on one rod, some squid on another and started jigging with a butterfly jig and also a chrome and blue ironman. These Kingies, often four or five of them, would swim all around our offering, nudging and almost eating it, but they just wouldn't hit. It was like they weren't feeding. Then one grabbed a dead squid bait on my rod and we had one (just legal) Kingy in the boat. Twenty minutes later a much bigger one took one of the Yakkas and wife had a great fight until it broke off. I HATE that! I HATE losing a fish to gear failure, and especially as it must have been one of my knots that let go. No matter how many fish I catch, the ones I remember are the ones I've dropped. Isn't that amazing. We stayed there for about five hours, but it was clear that things were slow and getting slower, so we decided to head up Pittwater, trolling at six knots. Ken was driving, Nolene was relaxing, I was in the Starboard stern trolling a Halco LaserPro and wife was in the Port stern trolling a Rapala. We trolled all the way up the Western shore, then across to Barrenjoey, around Barrenjoey and back to the Basin. Nothing. Not a scratch. Trolling back South along the Western shore, we got a massive hit on the LaserPro. It didn't stick, but the LaserPro gained some serious battle scars. I figured it was a big Kingie, but based on what happened ten minutes later, maybe it was something else ..... ? West of Stokes Point, wife's Rapala gets a solid hit, and it sticks. We all assume it's a big Kingie, and we get pretty excited. As the fish comes to the stern, I'm watching it and shake my head in disbelief. No - it can't be! But yes it is, a beautiful Spanish Mackerel, right on one meter long. None of us can believe you can get a Spanish Mackerel in Pittwater, but that's what happened. Oh, and by the way, I HATE treble hooks, so all my diving lures have been re-fitted with 5/0 Stainless BARBLESS J-hooks. Wife did a perfect job of keeping pressure on the fish, ensuring it couldn't spit the barbless hook. As we brought the fish into the boat (a pretty hilarious exercise, as we didn't have a gaff) the hook fell out of the fish's mouth. Gear (if you're interested): Rods: Shimano TCurve Revolution Offshore Travel 693GP Overhead 2.06m by Ian Miller (these are fabulous rods) Reels: Avet JX 500m of Jerry Brown 30Kg white solid braid 7m of 40lb Fluoro wind-on leader 150lb snap swivel (Sampo ball bearing) 1m of 80lb Fluoro leader (note - NOT wire) 160mm blue mackerel diving lures (see photo) ps: Cameldownunder asked "why barbless hooks?". I fish a lot for King (Chinook) Salmon offshore in Northern California. The regs there require that hooks used for salmon be barbless, and we very rarely lose fish. I read somewhere that barbs were originally put on hooks to hold the bait on. After removing the trebles, I just fitted the same 5/0 stainless barbless J-hook that I use on my salmon lures. If the fish is played well, the absence of a barb doesn't make much difference. Just keep the pressure on the fish.
  12. I have decided to get a shimano tyrnos but can't choose between the 20/30 and whether or not I get single speed or two speed. Its use for now will be an initial all rounder to cater for live baiting, trolling and jigging. Running 30lb mono. I'm also looking at a 15kg tcurve rod to match. Targets would be small to medium game. Need some help in making my decision from you by telling me the difference between sizes and if I need the 2 gears or not. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------ I have fished overheads for years, and still fish yellowfin and Mahi Mahi in Mexico annually, so I think my fishing is similar to your "small to medium game". A 15Kg T-Curve (I use 7 feet) is ideal for this. I like "20" size reels, as it's easier to level-wind a narrow reel. I string mine with 65lb braid, although 50lb is enough. I have about 7 2-speed reels, and I have NEVER ONCE gone into low speed. I am convinced all you need is a single speed, and a fast one at that. You are not going to winch in the fish, so the reel is really just a take-up spool, and the faster you can take up, the better. What is important is the condition of the reel, and especially the drags. I have all my reels worked over before I use them, and in particular get the drags lubed with Cal's grease. They are smooth as silk, which really helps avoiding break-offs due to jerky drags.Set your drags every day before you fish - I set mine to 4.5Kg at strike. I have caught marlin up to around 100lb on this rig, so it is certainly up to some heavy lifting. Good luck
  13. Alan Tani is kinda the Northern California guru on reels (www.alantani.com). I know Alan well, and he is a huge fan of Makaira. He has fished them extensively, mainly on long-range boats out of San Diego, For more info crawl around in his website.
  14. I think you have picked a great rod. I just bought three for fishing the Sea of Cortez, which we do every year. We got sick of lugging a rod tube through airports. I haven't given them a workout yet, but I'm very happy with what I'm seeing so far, and Ian Miller knows a thing or two about designing rods. And you can't beat the price. Not so sure about the Tyrnos 50. I don't like wide reels much - I'd prefer to get a Tyrnos 20 and load up with 65lb (30Kg) Spectra Braid. It's more expensive but it really lasts forever and you get both length and strength. I'm still happily using some that is over 12 years old. On a rig like yours I run it with a 20ft wind-on leader of 80lb (37Kg) Fluoro. I have also run it with about 50+ metres of mono topshot, but I'm moving to the "all braid" approach to see how that works out. Braid isn't for everyone. If you go with Braid, the downsides are: 1) Never, ever get an over-run - they are really, really hard to get out. 2) Be much more careful - this stuff can cut off a finger without any trouble. And, realize there is no stretch, and fish accordingly. Now, the most important thing - what drag are you going to put on the reel? With that rod, I'd set it at around 16lb (7Kg to 7.5Kg). That should work for most fish around Sydney, and your rod and reel should both be able to handle that.
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