Over the last few years, Eddie Smith and his mates have been slowly building knowledge up of the vast area of seamounts, drop-offs and canyons behind the Mokohinau Islands. It was time for the payoff…

It’s a tough ask to get the required weather window to line up with a weekend on top of family schedules, but it is possible! Leading into the generally settled autumn period that coincides with bluenose spawning activity, the common routine of checking the Windy App each morning and evening indicated that a high-pressure system was forming over the east coast – by Thursday night it was showing a large purple blob spanning from the southern end of Great Barrier Island all the way up to the Poor Knights.

This looked too good to be true – all existing arrangements were canned, and a plan was hatched to go fishing. A keen crew of Speedy, Jem and myself headed up to Omaha after Friday knock-off to launch the boat before sunset. A crew of three helps to ease the pain at the petrol pump and is also a comfortable number when overnighting on Speedy’s 7.5m Dickey Custom.

An epic sunset as the boat heads past Little Barrier.

We launched in good time, leaving the harbour at approximately 6.30pm to start the steam out to the planned anchorage on the northern side of Burgess Island at the Mokohinaus. It’s a fair hike to get to the Mokes, let alone the deep grounds, but there are harder challenges to overcome than covering the 60nm distance. These include not being distracted by the gannet workups as you pass, Little Barrier, or, as you approach the Mokes, the massive schools of trevally, kahawai and koheru with the inevitable monster greenback haku lurking below. Blindfolds would be a handy aid during travel, but the crew is usually simmered down by the call “we’ll get them on the way back” – sure!

We awoke in the early hours and pushed onto the promised lands. There are a few well-proven knolls that are kept in reserve, but prospecting interesting, submerged topography (marked on Navionics during lunchbreaks at work) is generally the priority. You always hold hope that you may be the first to stumble across a new spot X loaded with monsters!

On this trip, we had true variable five knot winds with 0.2m swell – what dreams are made of! While scanning the seafloor around some tight bathymetry contours, a few large, scattered patches of red flecks were spotted on the sounder. A drift was set, and the electric reels and ledger rigs loaded with squid were deployed into the abyss.

This continued over various marks through the course of the day and the result was the same – we were battling through patches of the dreaded spiny dogfish with a few consolation gemfish but were yet to crack the bluenose or wreckfish.

We moved a bit shallower and came across some sign on the sounder in 220m that was just too good for there not to be any target species around, so Jem dropped an 800g pink and silver Jig Star jig attached to his Jig Star PE10 combo over the gunnel for a prospect. Almost instantly, BOOM! A solid bend in the rod and some peeling line – finally! The gimbal was tightened and the scrap was on. As Jem was winding up, Speedy and I got the electrics in and rigged up our deep-water jigging combos.

Jem with a great bluenose.

From the start of the fight, it seemed this was a good fish and of target species. About halfway up, Jem’s rod about bent in half, with line screaming out – uh oh, daddy shark was here. After a further 20 minutes of straining, the leader was at the boat, with a solid Bluenose hooked on the top assist hook, and a large, rather annoyed, thresher shark hooked in the tail by the second assist hook! A great result with no line tangle, no lost gear, a bluenose for us and the shark swimming off unscathed.

For a couple of hours following, we enjoyed some solid fishing with bluenose, bass and hapuku joining the ice bath in the 300L Icey Tek. However, with the good inevitably comes the bad and some Category Five tangles were experienced, which tested our patience and focus trying to sort out – especially during a hot bite!

Coming into the evening, the fishing started to die down as we drifted off the mark and onto the flat muddy bottom. With no sign showing on the bottom, I thought I’d give it one last go before we settled in for dinner. I grabbed Jem’s PE10 Jig Star combo and 800g pink and silver jig to deploy the last drop for the evening.

After around five minutes of jigging action, I was beginning to get hungry and was ready to give up when suddenly the rod absolutely loaded up, and I was buckled over the deck guard rail! I did my best to pump and wind to stop this fish in case there was any foul around, finally managing to turn its head. It took around 25 minutes to play the fish out and slowly bring it to the surface – the massive bubbles breaking behind the boat and the line angle suggested I was into a solid fish.

Boom! The big belly of the fish broke the surface 30m behind the boat, creating a wave action on the oily calm water. We pulled it in and identified it as a bass. After taking the obligatory photos and bleeding it, we slipped it into the ice bath to cool.

Here we were, approximately 60nm from the boat ramp, and the sea was dead flat. We shared highlights from the day over a couple of cold ales and some of Jem’s signature chicken wraps before hitting the hay. Sleeping on the Dickey is a luxury, with two people easily fitting in the cabin, and another bed becomes available by lowering the table and reclining the seats on the port side of the vessel (although I prefer to lay a tarp down on the deck and sleep on an air mattress for ultimate comfort, this is risky if using the Mrs’s sleeping bag).

Eddie with his bass – a great way to finish the day.

The next morning, we awoke to another cracker day. After a quick breakfast of bacon and egg wraps and a strong coffee, we boosted over to a new rock we had found the day prior. The electrics were dropped for a prospect, and we were happily provided with a solid bluenose and a hapuku/bass double-header on the first drop!

By now, we had enough fish on ice to last ourselves and our families a couple of months and knew that the weather was going to kick up in the early afternoon, so it was time to head in. The trip back was a cruise; with a light north-easterly tailwind pushing us along, we excitedly discussed what worked, what didn’t work, and what we want to try next time.

Undoubtedly the star performers for the trip were the jigs, with the pink and silver Jig Star 800g in water deeper than 300m, and the 350g white Shimano Pebblestick fished on light line in depths around 200m. Also, it seemed the PE4 class braid was best for combating line drag in the depths, allowing fishing to continue vertically for longer (the calm conditions also helped this immensely).

Back on land, the real work started with Jem and me taking the fillets off, and breaking down, then brining the wings, heads, and roes for smoking – all while Speedy washed down the boat and tackle. With the fillets vac-packed and on ice in the chilly, we all set off on our respective ways home – what an epic weekend in ‘God’s land’.

November 2022 - Eddie Smith
New Zealand Fishing News Magazine.
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