We ventured over to Samoa for the recent SIGFA tournament and fished with Mike off B-caus alongside other NZ crews mostly White Pointers but also a Kingfisher in the mix this year.
It began with a shotgun start
These guys had their posies sorted for later in the day
Gamekeeper and Girlfriend
We had a jump start on the field but it wasn't long till the Girlfriend put an end to that. For those that saw the 840 pro sportsman at the boatshow this is its sister but with a Volvo D6 and 997 litres of diesel, it is a beast of a trailer boat.
We finally got on the board on the second day with a t&r small blue
It was the 49th marlin for the boat and also the quickest as well coming to the boat, tagged, hook removed and swimming away within 5 mins. Hopes were high for cracking the half tonne.
The next day started quietly with a small mahi and then mid arvo the shotgun, connected to a custom trophy lure dubbed the Samoan slayer, starts screaming.
Initial thoughts were a better marlin and number 50 was looking hopeful, midway through the fight things went deep, we started circling while trying to pump hard and get the fish up with thoughts now on a good yellowfin, after 10mins of hard pumping trying to get some line back the big yellow sickles could be seen coming up from the depths.
This fella wasn't finished though and tried to be a handful on the leader but some good work was put in and the gaff sunk home and over the side it came.
Awesome colours
Back at the weighstation it went a solid 130lbs and we were stoked.
After that fish, the tagged blue and a few smaller fish we went into the last day in the lead and looking good for the prize money.
We started off well hooking another marlin but dropping it after 15mins not far from the boat and had another shot in the arvo that didn't stick. The last day was a big day on fish. Gamekeeper tagged two and lost a double right at the end of the day otherwise they would have been in the money, Mawhai was up there, Rodfather had a hard time dropping over 5 marlin for the day, Girlfriend after tagging a blue on the first day sunk a gaff into one with it going just on 100kg and taking out the heaviest marlin section as well as first tagged marlin, a good comp for them.
But the victors were a local boat, Black Pearl, with 3 marlin and other smaller fish to push them over the line, two other local boats rounding out the top three, with one of them tagging 3 marlin on the final day to rocket up the board.
All up on the last day there were over 15 marlin tagged or weighed for 20 boats, considering some of the local boats were only 13ft that is pretty good fishing.
The locals did have a secret weapon though, they were immune to the squirts, with all the kiwi crews suffering the butt clenching experience. We were lucky, at least we had a duck-board unlike the Girlfriend.
While we didn't get the prize money it was pretty hard to complain seeing as we had scored a sweet fin which took out second place and the conditions weren't too bad either with 31 degree days and the water the same temp.