Kona Fishing Book a fishing trip with us!

Day 3 we had Rick. AKA Malahini. Malahini is the name given to the newcomer to the tournament. Rick has been trying to come the the TART tournament for 15 years and been invited to fish with Ken but never could get away to fish it. We started off the morning with a bang and it seemed like it would never end. We went 4 for 7 on Blues all around 120 pounds on all the lures in the pattern. We had a great day with Rick and really enjoyed talking to him in between bites. The 4 fish put both of us out in front by a good margin with the Ihu Nui on our tail. We really would need to catch another fish to have a chance.

Today we had Donny on board for the 2nd day of the TART tournament. The weather was different with winds out of the west. It was sloppy and choppy. The lures were having a hard time. I heard through the grape vine that the current was good and that it was moving inside again. We had a shot right away outside of the harbor on our way to the spot that we caught our fish yesterday. The fish jumped all over and we pulled the hook. I had found a place to fish. We pounded the spot and eventually caught a fish that jumped all over the ocean. Check out the jump shot we got! It gave Donny his first fish of the tournament and got us our 2nd. At 3:00 we had a fish come to the short rigger on the Polu Kai blue tube and I missed the bite. Mat saw the fish and kept saying “its a nice one” The fish jumped once but through all the white water I couldn’t tell how big it was. It went down deep and pulled and all we could do was wait. I made a few moves on the fish and tried to get it stopped and couldn’t. It got 400 yards of line out and we neared the dacron as it swam out to sea. Donny inched up the drag and inched up the drag and it still didn’t stop. Finally the hook pulled. We had put to much drag on it. It was at that point of the fight where we had to get aggressive with the drag and pulled the hook that was probably fowled. Day 2- we are still in first.

Today was the first day of the Tag And Release Tournament.We had the host of the event Ken Corday on board. Ken took off from his busy schedule producing the show Day of Our Lives to fish with 4 of his friends here in Kona. He and 4 of his buddies switch boats everyday for the 5 day tournament. The Northern Lights, the Humdinger, the Ihu Nui, the Pacific Blue and the Chiripa rounded out the field of boats the anglers will fish on this week. It was good to see Ken again this year. We talked about the 2 granders we had caught in Madeira the hay day of fishing we had there and cught Mat up to date on our history together. I told Mat to get the grander tube that Ken caught his second grander on in his honor and put it out. No more that 30 minutes passed and I couldn’t believe it we hooked a great fish. After a tough fight we took the fish in due to the 300 pound minimum. It would be close but it made the mark and gave us 334 points for the first day. Good start!

Angler Ty Meyer a good friend of the owner of the Northern Lights fished the Big Island Invitational with us. The Rob McCarthy fished on the Lightspeed and his 2 boats fished the tournament. We were on the fence on weather to team up on the Lightspeed or fish the 2 boats and with the way we had been fishing this week I felt that we had a really good chance to do well so we entered the 2 boats. Our plan was to catch big fish. It is a big fish tournament. To place in the over all you need to qualify a fish over 300 pounds. We stuck to our plan and staied where we had been seeing the big ones but the fishing had moved way outside to the 1500. Boats made their way out there from early reports of a couple of boats finding them out in a unusual spot. The boats protected the spot early on by not calling in the right area to protect the nest of fish they had found. It proved to be a good area for numbers and by the 3rd day most of the fleet covered the deep finding the stray marlin that had wandered out due to the bad current inside. On day 3 we raised a qualifier on the stinger. Our plan to catch a qualifier would pay out a good sum and the fish didn’t bite. It followed and followed and didn’t bite. The lightspeed also had a qualifier on day 2 that would have done well. In the end we had a great time and the light speed got one of the daily pots for one of their tags.  For us it was humble fishing. Hopefully when the current come back to normal inside we will get back on them

We had the Paradise Fishing Club out today for the first of 3 days they have booked from now through Sept. They were able to keep our little streak going. Old friends and previous charters Robert and Teresa Oswald active in the club put the trip together. Friends and members Gary and Leroy joined them.Having their own boat now I hardly see them on the boat any more so it was good to have them back. The bite had moved north and really bit good for the fleet. I had heard about the action and couldn’t get a bite. We waited and waited and finally at 11:30 we got our first bite. We had a radical thing happen on our first fish of the day. The swivel and leader tangled around the tip and a wild marlin on the other end made things interesting. I was able to stay with the jumping fish charging back in a circle. Matt had the leader with good wraps on his left hand and untangled the leader with his right hand. Good composure and calmness he worked at it. I saw that he almost had it undone when the fish bolted it yanked Matt forward and our angler Leroy forward and with no choice Matt let go and luckily he had gotten most of the wraps undone before he let go and it cleared out. If they didn’t it would have stripped the guides off of the rod and snapped the line. We got the fish and started to put the lines out when the second fish of the day bit with 3 lines in the water. Gary tagged his fish and we had 2 in 20 minutes.Teresa got these shots of the fish- Good stuff.

We worked our way back the the harbor down the 1000 and really need to get 4 of the 5 in. We had about 40 minutes of trolling to get to the harbor when we raised a fish on the Polu Kai tube on the short rigger. The light was perfect as the fish swam into the pattern. It lined it up and bit and this time we were on! We got a ton of line out while we cleared lines. Like the fish yesterday this one went down and pulled hard. Cole (12) years old)was in the chair and learned the technique fast, mastering standing up in the chair after he stopped trying to reel with 2 hands. The 2 handed reeling always scares us due to the fact that we could backlash the reel very easily. After a 30 minute fight we got the leader and brother Connor (10 years old) tagged the fish and we let it go. Cole’s dream came true and what a first blue marlin it was.

The Coscino Family Chris,Karla,Cole,Connor and Kayla friends of Hobey and Marau Beck of Kauai fished with us today.  The day started out with us fighting with a filter that kept loosing prime. I finally got it to stop and we were able to troll. Our plan was to get the kids some action so we decided to go to the buoy and catch some aku and livebait them. When we got there we saw that the bait was there and it looked great. Right when we caught our first baits everyone starting feeling sick. We gave it a few minutes and the boys caught aku and we caught a shark on the baits they caught before we had to leave. We set the lines and started for home and father Chris found himself hooked up to a nice marlin. After a bunch of jumps it came off. It was early and we had good water ahead. See the next post for what happened next.

About 10:00 Jessica got her turn in the chair. Her fish came up on the short teaser and followed it all the way to the transom. I took it away and watched it go over to the short lure. I picked up my camera and got some shots of the fish eating the lure. It missed and missed and finally we took the big lure away from it and let it drop back to the smaller lures on the riggers. The fish lined up on the small black  Polu Kai tube and took a try at it. The lure dove under and I feared the fish would go away. It charged in and ate the lure and we were on again. The fish fought hard and deep and never gave Jessica any easy line. She had to go to low gear and inch the fish up from a 350 yard dive it took. The tried fish finally came to the surface after an hour fight making it 2 nice fish in one day thanks to lady luck.

Today ewas a perfect example of the early bird gets the worm. We ran out at 6:00 and tried to set the pattern out. The 3rd line hit the water and we were hooked up on the first line that went out. After a 10 minute tough fight Rowland caught a 203 pound ahi. We got going again and got 4 of the 5 lines out and got ‘em on again. This time it was a big marlin that swam out to sea. Hunter Hunt was on the fish this time and did a great job. Father John Hunt and I watched as the fish stayed deep and fought hard. After 10 minutes and a bunch of chasing the fish pulled off.  We got going again and this time got out all of the lines. Matt got the last line out and started on his chores and we were on again 5 minutes later. We caught this one and got the tag in a 75 pound blue. We worked the area and got a 3rd blue bite before 9:00. Rowland got this one this time and it was around 200 pounds. We got through the tide change and were waiting for the 1:30 change and the guys decided they wanted to get in. We were fishing close so we headed in. What a day! By 11:00!

All Bruce and Dana needed to round out their trip to catch all the common game fish we have was to catch a tuna. She did just that whipping the tuna in 5 minutes with great technique. We left at 10:00 to do a 3/4 day and it paid off. The fishing has been good in the afternoon so we tried that plan. We caught the tuna and missed a nice sized marlin in the same area. Right at the end of the day we had a spearfish on and we pulled the hook. Tuna-Long time no see.