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Day 2 was very slow. We had a lame  bite at something small maybe a spear but probably and small mahi. The morning of day 3 was slow but picked up for the fleet in the afternoon. We raised a nice blue on the short bait. Tracy saw it and said it look about 200. It came up between the short bait and the short rigger and grew as it surfaced. It turned out to be easy 600 pounds. She made a fast move to the outside of the spearfish lure we had on 50 pound test on the short rigger and nailed the lure from the outside in. Awesome bite! It lasted for 30 seconds of the reel screaming and without a jump in free spool we broke her off. Martha did great, the fish was just too fast for us. I got trolling again and the lures were still out. We were reeling in the broken line when we had another big bite. This one turned out to be a nice tuna. It would seem that marlin was following these tuna. I marked 4 more on my screen while we fought the tuna.

The pressure cooker to catch spears began today with Martha and Larry. if you remember last year Martha came to catch a spearfish to finish her billfish slam for the IGFA club. it is the rarest billfish in the world and last year it proved to be. We had a great week of fishing catching 6 blues and 8 stripeys. On the the blues was 650 on 50 and the biggest hit the boat and died weighing 740. The video of this is to the right of the page. Pretty awesome watching the fish hit the boat like that. Last year we had a spear to the boat but pulled the hook with 30 yards to go. We saw a blue and 2 spears but didn’t catch any of them today all we landed was a small mahi. A good start with nothing to show for it.

We went out today for a shake down cruise and see how the boat fishes here in Kona. It had done well in Costa Rica and in its travels but we will see how she does here. It was Sunday and a perfect day to put the spearfish lures out and see if we could catch my girls something. We had a great time and got a ton of bites on small fish. Perfect day for the girls and good to see what the boat trolled like. It really felt good,very smooth and very comfortable. Here you see uncle Rob and uncle Mitch holding up tuna the girls caught.

This morning we found the sheep coming down from the top. They were headed straight makai and it showed me that I was too early the day before. Our timing today was just right. We were running a little late and it proved to be a blessing. We saw a few coming down and a few turned into a bunch in a short time. We hiked into where I though they were headed and we waited for them to come down. It turned out to be a situation where we were too close to them and we didn’t get to look at them long. We had 5 big rams in our range the smallest right at our feet at 12 yards. A little lamb jumped up on a rock at 5 yards and had to run off. The sheep got restless and we had to decide which of the 5 we were going to take. It was a harder shot for Rick but he had to twist around to make the shot but took this nice mufflon black hawaiian cross. The other sheep we passed on were nice but they are still there for next time.

The week to follow the splashing of the boat we took to finish the engine room in the water. We had a few leaks on the motors and needed to make sure the boat was running right before we closed it all up. It is a job to put it back together. The maze of parts needed to close her up get put back together like a puzzle. A dock full of parts fits together in the cabin and it is a surprise it all goes in there. Of course there are lost screws etc to replace but all in all it looks finished when all the parts are back in and all the cushions and hardware is back on.

What a great feeling to be floating. When the boats are in  the boat yard I don’t get any sleep knowing that everyday we sit up there it is costing money. The hard work and planning keeps us up at night. There is always the worry about the budget and what new broken thing we are going to find. It was a smooth dry dock this time. The boat was in great shape when she got here it just needed our touches put on her and a bunch of TLC. The maintenance of all the systems cost some money to get all tuned in and 10 years of varnish needed to be stripped and redone. We had a great team this time and she really came out great. All of the long hard dry docks we have had on the 37 Merritt really helped us going into this job. The team of guys that have helped me with the 37 over the last 11 years  were here to help get this one done on time. Mike Akazawa of Akazawa Painting and his partner Roberto Martinez were a big help with keeping on schedule. Paint can hold jobs up and we stayed right on track.Dan Issacson and his guys Greg and Doyle of Honokohau diesel service got the engines all ready to go. Scott Davidson got the electronic shifters back in shape. They really needed work and he got them all straight and calibrated. Rob Ellen got the get set in and fixed the plumbing to the air con which will really helped the systems. Tracy and his dad Steve did a great job on the varnish, not to mention helping with getting the boat back together.  Tracy was our utility guy from varnish, to refitting, to polish, to fishing he was there. We had a great swell at the end of the job and we really missed him in the mornings for dawn patrol surf action a couple days.Wayne Knight and Jonny got the tower back together like new. The welds came out great. Charley at Honokohau Machine helped put that all together and was a big help the whole job with our machine work. The boys at the yard Dave and Dennis really  helped with the lifts and yard details.The crew and Kona Marine were great getting us our paint and supplies many times special ordering things to keep us on track. Tracy Melton of Melton Tackle was a big help as always getting us parts and helping me with leg work with his friends in the biz. I really want to thank Rob McCarthy for sponsoring the whole project. Without his sponsorship of the project we would have not been able to get the work done the boat needed. From everyone on this dry dock team that I mentioned we thank you for the work and wish you all the best of luck with your new boat. Thanks everyone for all the help- Time to go fishing- Aloha Kev

Here we all wait for the boat to be picked up so we can put the last touch of bottom paint on  her and set her in the water. Here Juliana gets to be carried by Rob and Judy as we wait.

We are in crunch time on the boat. We go in the water tomorrow so Tracy and his dad ran the 37 today.They went south looking for the south dolphin pod and caught a nice 50 plus pound spearfish. They got in the dolphins and with a ton of pressure from other boats and caught a 155pound ahi. As we merge in a 2 boat program Tracy is going to begin to run one of the boats. He has developed into a great captain in his own right proving it today with a great day.