Soooooo, another trip report from last weekend. Shot down to Whangamata at the leisurely hour of 3:30 am for another solo mission. Loaded up on liveys easily, with some monster Jack Macs in amongst good sized ones, all about one minute from the harbour. The first spot for Kings was a flop, only getting one Barracouta bite after a few hours of trying.... Decided to hit the Tarakihi bed for a feed, and arrived to huge schools showing on the sounder! First two drops got two nice ones, including a real nice 42cm specimen, then it went quiet.... Hooked a big John Dory on a livey after a while but that spat the bait half way up... I hooked up another livey and connected to something big time! I ended up doing two laps of the boat before eventually landing a solid 42 pound Kingy for the bin. Sweet! I dropped another livey down, and this time managed to get a nice John Dory to the boat to also join me for dinner. The Tarakihi sign was still thick as f$@k, but after plenty of effort I only landed one more for the bin. I couldn't resist the urge to jump in for a Cray dive any longer, so shot back to the coast and suited up. The first spot was crawling with Red Crays! I got what I needed and spent another 10 minutes swimming around gazing at good numbers of good sized Crays π Decided I'd give them a break, so jumped out with half a tank left. Cruised back to the ramp mid arvo and shot to the old man's house for a shower and a feed, and a few hours kip.
Decided to go have a look for some Packhorse Crays the next morning before heading back to Jaffa land, trying a different spot with the last half of my tank. After setting the anchor I followed the anchor rope down (to make sure the anchor wasn't snagged in the boulders and to make sure it was well set so I didn't have to swim home), and was stoked to see a nice nest of good Packies within a meter of my anchor chain, and a solid Red Cray about 200 mm away from the anchor itself! I grabbed two nice Packies that ended up going 1.8 kgs a piece. There were plenty more good Crays around, so I spent the rest of my air-time observing them up close and personal.
Another great trip in paradise, with another good smorgasbord of treats π