march 3rd; Big Strikes

Log

Date: March 3rd

Weather: sunny

Swell: nil

Wind: light variable

Distance: 23.4

Camp: Moturua Island

Food Review

Meal: Daves Olive and garlic Kawhai fish fry

Impression: looked good, smelt great, tasted awesome

Stars 9 out of 10

Blog

 

Matai had gone to Auckland to work so sharee dropped us down to our boats in the morning. We had called the local newspapers while in town and so they showed up to talk to us and get some pics as we packed. Yes we are attention seekers!

 

We thanked Andrew and Ruth, Sharee’s parents, for looking after the boats and paddled of into the most perfect day for our big crossing to the Coromandel peninsula, The winds where almost nonexistent and the water glassy smooth.

We fished and we paddled across the open channel, and we had two big strikes. First Dave who wooped with joy, and then swore like a pirate! A big fish had hit and stopped him in his tracks, though as he wound it , it got off. Next was my turn, I was paddling along, when unexpectedly I was stopped dead in mid stroke, and pulled backwards. As I reach for the line and started pulling in the fish suddenly dove hard pulling the line through my hand, and then nothing (I later found that one of the hooks on my treble barb had snapped off!). I guessed Kingfish, as boy what power it had to stop me dead! Finally Dave landed a good size kawhai and we had dinner.

Paddling up to a cluster of Volcanic Islands that reminded me of the Karst islands in china and Vietnam, we found a great little saddle beach between two, to camp on. We enjoyed a great feed of Kawhai and olives once the sun went down, out came the rats, they were everywhere, not a problem but boy there were a lot, the island is also known as rabbit island though it should be called rat island. That night the winds picked up and we were worried what we had in store for the next day.