Hey Snappa Geoff it’s certainly up there, this one had my scales touch 20lb, not sure but I think around 25 is top weight so far.
By good luck again this week the planets aligned, the Matrix was happily humming along and the wind was set to drop, long enough. Gt Barrier islandbound.
A big lazy seal was sleeping in the middle of nowhere, so I glided by and left him to it, he barely moved his flapping fin. If it's that quiet no point to stop n drop.
Some stunning natural art forms WIP out there, I had a quick tiki-tour around a few too.
Gently guided to a very spread out area of interest by some high flying gannets, and despite the presence of bottle-nose dolphins rampaging through the mackerel and other bait (here was bait a-plenty)
a steady stream of 10-15lb snapper up to a couple of
lb snapper were keen enough to give the fishing tackle a good workout. (I need to sort out a few pics from day one snapper yet). The snapper weren’t crazy fired up, and several forms of jigs were a case of ‘just say no’, but one particular smaller inchuku in green with red (Nuclear Chicken-esque), seemed to be the key, and with a slow steady wind up off the floor, quite along way it tipped the bite trigger.
On the lightweight spin gear the bouts lasted a good long time. Excellent times. Excellent fish.
An overnight planned with the option of a go wide and see, first anchorage in Katherine Bay just sorted and, ah no, a local generator fired up, along with a slight change in wind direction to more westerly from NW so it was anchors up to find another state of peace. Nagle was the answer. The stars were out after a while, the Milky Way ridiculously bright and captivating...snore button hit.
The morning brew was unfortunately catapulted back undue force, the days health was not looking top notch, no to go wide.. well, back to snapper land it is.
The bite was OK, nothing frantic, some bait schools still around. A mako materialised, and the snapper on the line was fighting very erratically, with good cause. I stood in the boat and caught the next few fish rather than sittin' on the side cooling my feet..
Nothing over 16lb was brought aboard before high noon, some fish released, and with the wind at zero....that reminded me, it's time to go rather than wait for the inevitable afternoon chop.