My first southern bluefin

[alantani]

very nice!!!!!

[Hardy Boy]

Super cool !!....................... great fish. Report back on the sushi !!


Cheers:

Todd

[Crow]

Great catch !

[scrinch]

Congratulations, Justin! Great fish. Looking forward to your description of the action!

[Maxed Out]

Your grin says it all Justin. Congrats on scratching one off your bucket list that you thought may never happen !!

-Ted

[redsetta]

Thanks lads.
Sorry to hear the SA fishery is in such bad shape Cor.
Hopefully the pressure will ease up as it becomes 'uneconomic' to continue fishing them.

A bit of background to the bluefin trip:

I got a text last Wednesday night from a mate, Carl, who runs a charter operation called 'The Provider' out of Tairua on New Zealand's Coromandel Peninsula.
Rick (roosterfish) and I had a great time chasing kings with Carl earlier this year - he's a class operator and a great bloke.
Carl said he was heading away for a week's holiday in Waihau Bay, about a seven-hour drive southeast, on the northern side of East Cape.
As well as R&R, the aim was to get amongst the midwinter Southern Bluefin migration that passes by the Cape each June-July, and Carl asked if I'd be keen to get into some weekend action.
I was 'in like Flynn', as they say.
I had surgery on Thursday - arthroscopic follow-up to a gallbladder removal I had a few months ago - then worked Friday, quickly packed that evening, had a bite to eat and got on the road for East Cape.
I arrived at 3.30am and was greeted by the sight of crews prepping and launching at the boat ramp.
Being midwinter, it was only about two degrees C (~35F), but I love the cold so I couldn't have been happier.  
Carl and his mate Ants were ready to go, so we hit the water at 4am and headed out into a pitch-black, moonless night.
I lost count of the shooting stars overhead.
Being winter, moonless, cloudless and so far from civilisation, the night sky was utterly mind-boggling - hypnotic even.
Deep water runs close to the coast in this part of Aotearoa, as the Kermadec Trench and Hikurangi subduction zone run right past the doorstep of East Cape.
One of the benefits of being on the Ring of Fire, I s'pose!
Within about half an hour, we were over 1000m (~3300ft) deep and a hop, skip and jump from the target 1500m (~5000ft) contour line.
We dropped out seven lures (tuna like a bit of excitement) and started trolling just as the first pink hints of the coming day crept over the northeastern horizon.
They were mostly versions of Red Gills, with half being lumo that we 'charged up' by holding against a bright LED light before deploying.
Two 37kg rigs, four 24kg and one 15kg (on the shotgun) were out - being five Okuma Makairas, plus my 30/50 and 50/80 Beastmasters.
The sea conditions were much worse than forecast, with a good 20kt sou'west having picked up overnight and a short-period wind swell joining the party.
We spent the day getting tossed around in our 7.7m (25ft) Senator by steep, jumbled, fast-moving, white-capped peaks that slammed the hull hard when pushing upwind and tossed everything everywhere when taking the wind abeam.
Unfortunately, perhaps due to having fasted since the previous Monday (for the surgery), the lingering anaesthetic and/or having driven all night and not slept since Thursday, I was suddenly afflicted with a bout of seasickness - something I never suffer from.
This made the next 10 or so hours fairly unpleasant, but what can ya do...
We returned to the boat ramp at dusk empty handed, but - right at the end of the troll - we'd found and marked the fish on the GPS, so tomorrow was on!
Sunday began much the same way - 4am launch, on the spot and deployed predawn - but with a moderate improvement in the sea conditions due to a slight swing to the south.
After a good night's sleep, a great breakfast and a sensational cup of coffee, I felt like a box of birds, so hopes were high!
The change of light is generally the best time to have gear in the water, and today again proved that maxim.
Ironically, as we'd jokingly expected but still failed to notice, the reel that was struck was the only one with a broken clicker.
About half the 50lb mono was gone before Ants yelled to started clearing gear.
I donned the stand-up harness and set to work getting it back.
Having not fished mono in many years and never fished in those kind of depths, the whole experience was an education.
Ants is a blue-water guru (check out his Blue Marlin record here: https://www.fishing.net.nz/forum/new-world-record-blue-marlin-on-spear_topic9496.html), so I got plenty of instruction and soon had my first Southern Bluefin alongside.
We hooked one more Bluefin later that day - it took the shotgun lure on the Mak30 - but it ran like an absolute freight train, stripped a massive amount in seconds and broke off before we could clear the gear.
We returned to the boat ramp in the afternoon, mostly satisfied with our efforts.
We broke down the catch into thirds and I hit the road, arriving back home at about 8pm Sunday.
We've already started planning the next trip - this time chasing Broadbill Swordfish in spring - then it's off to the legendary 'Three Kings' in January.
Righto, hope that was of some interest.
All the best, Justin

[Swami805]

Thanks for that, felt like being there!  Hope you find Elvis on your next outing

[oc1]

Yes sir.  That was good.
-steve

[jurelometer]

"box of birds"

The best part of reports from around the world are the local idiomatic expressions.  I just  HAD to go look that one up.

Nice report BTW. It has been awhile around here so I am living vicariously off of these reports.

-J

[Alto Mare]

Very nice report Justin! I really enjoyed that.

Sal

[redsetta]

Thanks lads - a modest achievement by AT standards, but something I'll never forget

[Bill B]

Congratulations on the blue fin brother, and a most excellent report.....Bill

[redsetta]

Thanks Bill

[Benni3]

Fantastic job man,,,,,,,

[redsetta]

Thanks Bennie.

One thing I thought was quite neat, but forgot to mention...
When we returned to where we'd marked tuna the previous day, we saw a flock of sooty shearwaters wheeling and diving on a particular spot, though not actively feeding.
From time to time, magnificent giant albatross would join the shearwaters, swooping down to delicately bounce their feet off the surface, before gliding upwards again without a beat of their wings.
As we trolled near, we saw something big in the water, maybe four feet below the surface.
A pod of about 12 Orca had been working the tuna alongside the fishos, leaving telltale oily plumes on the surface above where they'd no doubt feasted on a barrel bluefin, so we figured it might be the remnants of one of their kills.
On our first pass, though, it looked too big for that, so the next hypothesis was a dead broadbill, as it had distinct dark and light sides.
We decided to get a closer look, but the wind and swell made it tricky to locate or approach without fouling the lures, so it took a couple more attempts.
On the third time around, with me on lookout swinging wildly from the roof railing, we finally got up close and personal with the submarine curio and discovered it to be... the body - around six feet in length - of a giant squid.
Nothing remained of the kraken but the sleeve-like body.
I couldn't help but picture squid-rings the size of hula-hoops 
One of the many things I love about being out in the deep blue is you really never know what you're gonna come across...
Cheers, Justin