Quick shoal run

Yesterday morning Dad I took a quick run to the shoals for a long awaited bluewater fish. We took Dad's boat as mine is now in at Townsville Marine for sale. It was to be a very quick run indeed, I needed to be back at the ramp no later than 9am to get my car in for some work. So we met up at his place about 3.30 and were in the water and off by 4am. Despite the good forecast, the ramp wasn't overly busy.

As we headed out we experienced quite variable conditions. Patches of calm water and some patches with almost white-capping conditions. Maybe it was from the back end of a small storm cell we could see headed out to sea? What ever it was, it made going a little slower than anticipated. But still a good run.

We pulled up on our mark and I immediately threw over a 7in Gulp soft plastic on my TwinPower 6000fc combo. It hadn't been sinking for more than a few seconds when the line stopped going down! I gave it a jig to see what was going on and SMACK, it ran off at a million miles an hour. Now I'm only fishing 30lb on this outfit as its intended for Spanish Mackerel spinning, so I was a little nervous about this fish. I'd gain line slowly and loose it all and some in another big run. The spool was starting to feel warm from the friction of the drag and it was becoming clear this was a quality fish. But everything held and eventually the fish was in gaffing range. A perfect head shot from Dad and the fish was on the deck. A beautiful cobia!

After re-positioning the boat Dad was next with a fish. He hit the fish and the fish hit back! This was a freight train. It ran, and ran, and ran....and then it ran some more! There was no stopping this thing, even with the 50lb Jigwerx he was using. So eventually we fired up the motor and tracked back on it. After recovering all the line a massive GT came into view. Expecting a large cobia I had gaff in hand ready. So it was then a quick scramble for a towel so I could tail the fish. I grabbed the fish around the tail wrist and....now what? I seriously struggled to lift this thing over the side! I then struggled with Dad to get the fish onto his lap for a quick photograph. We pulled it through the water for a moment and it swam away happily. Turned out the fish had been tail-hooked. Any wonder it ran so easily and didn't look like stopping!

We then anchored on the mark to get in some bottom fishing. I was determined to fish plastics for something a little different. And despite landing a small Barracouda and a couple of nice Bludger Trevalley on the Gulp, the only Nannygai I landed was a 45cm specimen that fell to a 4in Prong. But Dad did well on the Pillies. My final Cobia fell to the 4in Prong! This particular Cobia followed up a Nannygai on Dads line. He held the Nanny beside to the boat to keep the Cobe interested. I flicked the Prong in the water and as soon at the Cobia spotted it he was off! Not as big as the first fish, but still nice to see take a plastic.

By about 7.30 am we had an eski full! A good half a dozen Nannygai and our bag limit of Cobia. What a day. On the water at 4am, back and at 8.30am with a good feed of fish. Now I remember why I like fishing the Bluewater so much!! Here is a little video footage from Dad's GT.