In the words of the imcomparable Otis Day (frontman for Otis Day and the Knights).."It feels so good to be back at the Dexter Lake Club"..the summary for the report is grease, wrenchs, tuna, marlin and snapper!!
For the rest of you with some time read on; it was a pretty interesting week which began and ended with a little drama..everyone made it back to Venice from the shipyard in the nick of time to make thier trips..some cutting it closer than others..I guess the report starts well before the fishing and trying to make a long story short and interesting will be a real challenge..the first part of this report goes out to anyone who has spent time in a shipyard either doing the work themselves or waiting on others to do it..Hunter had significant fiberglass work done to the twin vee and I had both heads and injector sets replaced..aftercooler and heat exchanger tube bundles cleaned..everythign tuned, props and shafts checked, bearings replaced and bottom touched up..finally found the source of the ever nagging vibration and nipped it too..too long a story to tell but suffice it to say we didnt have a good fit in one of the couplings..when we left Seabrooke at Midnight on Wednesday she ran vibration free and turned up all the way clipping along at 30 knots on top..anyway we had to leave late from New Orleans and decided to have two captains share the load..got cleaned up after the test run and departed at 12am Thursday for our Thursday morning charter..Capt Lance and I made it with 2 hours to spare for our charter..Scott L had gone down the night before with our gear, food and clothes..everyone met at the dock to load gear at 5..trip went great..I had Ken Lutgsh et al Scott Leger had the Savant transportation crew; Hunter arrived at the marina later that day from the yard..Fishing and weather was great Thursday and were both in the fish all day..it was great..calmand warm and lots of action too..most fish came on the topwater poppers..when the dust settled we each had 8 and 9 yellowfins 30-60 pounds respectively..it was nice having both Lance Walker and Little Jon to help with the sleeping and driving and fishing..boat ran great for both Scott and I and we are both glad to be out of the yard..wehad one fish spool us ona spinning outfit..looked like an 80-100 pounder at the strike so fish are bad a@#es!!!
Thursday..total opposite..rough and cloudy and plagued with minor boat troubles all day..I had a turbo act up on the way out which slowed us down to trolling speed and into a horrific headsea..also had electrical issues, steering issues andan engine that would stall dueto idle setting and all in the same trip..and it was too bumpy to make inspections and repairs difficult so we concetrated on fishing and fishing we did..came up short on the catching..a complete contrast to the day before which everything went right and the boat ran better than ever..the fish were there again, we just couldnt connect..
We had two groups out today between 4 boats..I had the Miller Welds crew and we managed one decent yellowfin, 2 sharks and a barracuda on the popper..the wind put a stop to the popper bite today..wind complicates things especially when dealing with power pro; accuracy and and sure footing were also scarce..almost too dangerous to try and cost from the bow..seas were 3-5ft..if we did get on top of the busters the popper wouldnt stay in the water with all the waves..Scott Leger had 1/3 of the Mobley bachelor party..they spent the most part of the day fighting a 300 pound blue marlin which hit two live baits before getting stuck on the kite bait..they had it 20 ft from the boat for a half hour before it went nuts..they have some pics boatside..think they got 8 jumps out of him in the last 2 hours..they did not get top pet him though, as he popped off short of the leader..went through 4 guys..they also had a decent tuna for camp meat..Hunter and Josh teamed up with the other 2/3rds of Mobley crew, splitting 7 yellowfins between them..off bite today and not the greatest sea conditions either....after cleaning fish and the boat I spent another 6 hours fine tuning the engine idle, fixing and replacing wiring and hyrdaulic rams..thank God for the stockpile of new parts I keep in my shed..had everything but an exhaust housing for the turbo so we'd have to deal with some smoke on opening day of snapper season..I discussed it ahead of time with John and Alan Mundy and knowing the turbo might hold us back we found we could do anything but run on step in a headsea..the new one is on order..seems things always fail when I dont have a spare and its after 5pm COB on Friday...did our best to make a day and we did..it was a happy sunny day for ther most part..we got our 4 man snapper limit in 45 minutes then decided on wahoo..no real monsters but plenty 2-8 pounders..will fetch the sows on a calmer day when we can get to where we want to and there is no threat of weather or boat issues..also picked up a 65 pound wahoo after hitting every rig on the shelf on a following sea..seas built to 4-6 by mid day so we called it early...happy crew and captain...Capt Scott Leger got left at the dock by a no show no call for opening day..ouch..he got his revenge onthe snapper yesterday..looked like there was no shortage of snapper and tuna at the cleaning table as I left Saturday night..made the most of my first days off in weeks..didnt know what to do with myself other than to sleep it off and write a proper report..shower and food have also been a nice luxury..more fun tomorrow..Paradise Outfitters - 985-845-8006
