Xmas

the run of bad weather took a break for the Christmas holidays (4 days off work), finally the sun came out and the sea calmed down. With Matt home for Xmas we put out the crayfish (like Lobster but without the claws, all the meat is in the tail) pots for Christmas lunch. We took the rods and zoomed round to Coopers bank its only 5 kms offshore, Tzar radioed they were doing real well, they had left when we arrived at my marks, after a couple of hours Matt managed a nice 3kg snapper and a big Blue cod 2.5kg. we moved closer to the ramp to a spot called ramp rock and managed a few Tarekihi and a couple more small snapper.
Christmas day we checked the pots and 3 legal crays went in the live bait tank and back home to cook them up.
Boxing day another 3 legal crays went into the live bait tank, and again Craig from Tzar called us over to Coopers bank saying it was fishing well, this time we arrived to find them about 1.5 kms away from my mark so we dropped the pick on some sign near them and watched them catch fish after fish - nothing big, all around pan size, we managed 10 snapper enough to feed everyone.
The day after boxing day we checked the pots again to find 10 legal cray fish waiting for a ride in the live bait tank. I was going out deep to take Matt Hapuka fishing but the sea breeze was already starting to blow so we headed over to coopers again, only to find it a boat parking lot. Finding a spot was easy but staying on it was the problem, 3 boats were on the hot spot and holding and were doing well while the rest of us were dragging our anchors and catching nothing. we tried for 3 hours and gave up after multi resets of the anchor.
The forecast for the New Year break has a tropical storm heading our way so it looks like fishing will be off again, when is our summer going to kick in is the big question??????

15.12.11 The weather sucks

Sorry about the lack of posts but Gazebo hasn't left the driveway since the last contest, we have had weeks of easterlies - on shore winds, humid, cloudy and light drizzle so far the summer totally sucks. The only good bit is it is pushing warm tropical water closer to Gisborne, so hopefully when we are able to get out there will be Tuna about.
Merry Christmas and a happy new year to all those who read my blog.

20/26.11.11 The discount fishing deep water contest

Wow where do I start. If you have been reading my earlier blogs you will see that we have been fishing the deep really well. Not so this contest, we travelled over 200 Kms and caught nothing - I mean not a fish did we bring home, this must have been our worse ever 2 days fishing.

The fist days fishing was postponed until the following Saturday due to a southerly front that turned a flat calm Fridays sea to 4 metre storm tossed mess.

Sunday - the sea had calmed down to around 1.5 metres and the wind had gone, so the contest was on. We travelled the fist day 120 kms visiting nearly every deep rocks we know, fishing from 180 metres deep to 350 metres - and nothing. At lest we were not alone, the majority of the fleet had the same story, except for 2 boats skippered by ex commercial long liners who went out to their old grounds (out of our range).
We have been having a few deep sea earthquakes of late and maybe that has upset the fish, who knows what goes on down there.

The following Saturday the conditions were good, but a southerly was forecast to arrive around lunchtime. Again no fish and again we weren't alone, except for the 2 ex-commercial fishermen. But the southerly turned up at 8.30am and with the sea turning to custard the contest was called off and all boats asked to return home on safety grounds. So for all the practise we had done we sucked big time.

Fish species that we catch in the sea off Gisborne

Here are some of the fish species we target in the waters off Gisborne New Zealand. Our fishery is in good shape after years of over fishing, with the introduction of quota management for the commercial fishing fleet, it has allowed most of the species recover, still away to go yet - but they are on the right track.

Skipjack Tuna.

Up to 8kg. Seasonal January to June.

Good eating, better bait.

Snapper.

Up to 17kg. My favourite fish to catch.

Very good eating

Trumpeter.

Up to 25kg. From 50 metres to deep.

My favourite fish to eat

Terakihi.

Up to 6kg. 25 metres plus, main commercial catch off Gisborne.

Very good eating

Red Snapper.

Up to 10 kg. 50 metres plus.

Good eating

Kingfish.

Up to 45kg. All depths, a very good fighter, pound for pound better than a Marlin.

Good eating.

Gurnard.

Up to 2kg, Caught usually in the shallow sandy areas.

Good eating.

Gemfish.
Up to 10kg. Caught in deep water 150 metres plus.
Very good smoked


Bluenose.

Up to 40kg. Caught in the deep 200 metres plus.

Very good eating.



Hapuka.

Up to 50 kg. Use to be caught in all depths, now in deeper water 100 metres plus

Very good eating.



Bass.

Up to 100 kg. Caught in the deep, 200 metres plus

Very good eating

29/30.11.2011 The Hunting & fishing Inshore Contest

Saturdays forecast wasn't that good, so with that in mind and a light Southerly (on shore wind) Friday we did a bit of a late start. We hit the ramp at 7am to find calm conditions. We headed to Aerial Reef 20km's out from the ramp, to the spot we caught our Snapper last year. We berlied for a couple of hours and nothing "a big fat zero", we pulled the pick and headed another 6km's out to South Rocks to our spot we have been fishing lately. We dropped the pick and put the berlie bag in and I cast my first bait, and it hadn't even got to the bottom and a big hit. I played the fish in thinking a double hook up of Barracuda and got a shock to see a nice big fat snapper. After another hour we were getting snaked (Barracuda's) on every bait. Managed to catch a nice big one and it went in the bin as they were in the contest. Lunch time found the sea dead glassy - not a breath of wind, so we decided to take a lunch break from "inshore fishing" and head out to the Hapuka fields. Still glassy we dropped our baits and sat on 200 metres of water, I caught my usual shark and Murray a double hook up - Hapuka and a Bass. My next drop was a small Bluenose and Murray a shark (his turn). With lunch over we headed back in to Penguins and back to snapper fishing, by mid afternoon the sea breeze had arrived and with nothing else happening we headed in.
Sunday the weather forecast was better, but the sea breeze was already up at 7am, we headed back to south rocks only to find every barracuda in the world had turned up. By 10am the sea breeze was howling and the snakes were destroying baits and gear, by 11am I had enough and pulled the pin and headed home.
The snapper 7.340kg won first place in the snapper section and the barracuda 5.420kg also won first place in the barracuda section.

23.10.11 More of the same

Sunday was very like last weekend except it was the first long weekend of spring (Labour day), as usual Friday was our first real taste of summer and as you guessed it a southerly front came over early evening. Saturday was ruined with messy onshore conditions. Sunday there was a light Easterly leaving the sea sloppy - but we went out anyway, to the same spots as last week and ended up with one snapper and 24 Tarakihi. The forecast had Monday as freshening northerlies (not good for our coast) and with Rugby world cup victory to celebrate we decided to leave the rods at home and just pick up the crayfish pots we had set on Saturday, as per normal it was flat as and not a breathe of wind and so with only 2 legal crayfish we came home in a rather foul mood. I later heard that the northerly was howling out to sea and it wasn't that good, with most struggling to catch a feed. So a day at home wasn't that bad after all.

16.10.11 Bin full

The weekend had a good forecast which is great as the last 2 weekends it wasn't that good, I had decided to stay at home and do some of those "I'll get round to it" jobs around the house. Saturdays forecast looked good so I dragged Murray kicking and screaming out to sea (he was waiting by his gate at 6.30am to be picked up). The wind was a 8-10 knot offshore, making the sea a little sloppy, but it was supposed to drop off to nothing. We went to South rocks which is 20km's out to sea to try our luck as the next contest is an "inshore" one. As we don't have a "inshore" as such, the species that we are targeting are caught in the shallower water around the various reefs found off shore rather than the deeper water around the drop offs.
The rock we went to showed good sign so we dropped the pick and missed to spot we wanted by about 5 metres, but we dropped our lines and managed a couple of good snapper. Over the next hour or so we managed 6 nice snapper, we thought we would re anchor on the rock and did so only to find the rock was surrounded by school sharks. so we pulled the pick again and headed over to the rock we caught the snapper on in the last contest. The sounder showed 5 metres of fish, so down went the pick again and we were straight into Tarakihi, good sized ones and 2 at a time. In an hour we had 37 in the bin before the wind changed and we drifted off the fish. The limit is 20 each and with 3 short we decided we had enough, so at midday it was time to head home to do some serious filleting. Deb and Murray did the afternoon fish run dropping off fish to all our friends and families so there was no waste. It turned out to be a beautiful day out on the water.

24/25.09.11 Tui contest

Well how time flies, the Tatapouri Sports Fishing Clubs 2011/12 contest season has started. I was up north for The Alice Cooper (very good) concert Thursday /Friday and drove up and back along the Bay of Plenty coast line and the sea was as flat as could be, as far as you can see and no swell at all both days. I got back Friday night and Saturday was the first day of the Tui (my favorite Beer) contest, so it was load the boat and try and get some sleep with a 4am start and with the rugby world cup being played in New Zealand that's not easy. The last time I looked at the weather (Wednesday) web site it looked real good for the weekend.

24.09.11 I pick up Murray at 4.30am and we head up to the Tata ramp and have to wait 30 minutes for enough light to launch the boat and notice there is a bit of swell breaking on the reef, a good metre, we launch and head out wide to our far Hapuka spot 50km away, by the time we get there the northerly wind is up making fishing uncomfortable. Catching nothing by 9am we move back to TR1A 10k's away and spend the next 3 hours getting punished by a building sea for one 8kg Hapuka and one Trumpeter(not in the contest), we decide to move 17k's down the coast to BR1A and start to do our first drift, by now the sea is just not nice and we manage to catch 4 small Bluenose in the 2-3kg range. By 4pm we call it a day and head home, the last 15 k's to the ramp the sea improves greatly with a northwesterly wind (offshore wind). We hear most of the fleet haven't done very well in the shitty conditions.

25.09.11 After little sleep. (Rugby world cup, NZ's All Blacks played France in a pool game and won and in rugby league, NZ's Warriors won and made to the grand final) as well as losing an hour to the start of daylight savings. We finally get to the ramp at 6am to find the swell is a bit bigger (a solid 1 - 1.5 metre) and a strong northwesterly. We head out to south rocks and half way out the wind drops and the sea smooths out so we change plans and head to BR1A again and in beautiful conditions catch another 8 Bluenose, but still no Hapuka. We decide to head back to South rocks to try and catch some of the other species in the contest. After trying several of our more productive rocks and finding nothing we tried a rock that had fished well in the past, we saw some sign and dropped the anchor in desperation. The sign looked like barracuda and the first drop I caught one....damn. So down I went again and straight away a double hook up of good prime snapper, Murray dropped down and again a double hook up, half an hour later we had 16 snapper in the bin before we dragged the anchor and lost the school of snapper. We managed to weigh in a couple of 2kg snappers - not big ones but at this time of year snapper are hard to find in our waters.
At prize giving Murray managed 1st place in the Hapuka section and 2nd place in the Snapper section and I managed 1st place in the Snapper section. So we managed to start our season with a good result.

10.09.11 Mixed bag

All week a large high has covered New Zealand giving beautiful settled weather, as per usual the weeknd it all starts turning to custard. Saturday gave us to only window of fine weather before the rain arrives Sunday, So with that in mind we head out at 6am which is not bad seeing I have been laid low all week with the worse case of man flu you can imagine, haven't had a real sick day off work in years and as the weather starts to warm up I get sick...great, hopefully that's it for another 5 years. Anyway getting back to real stuff, the sea is looking good so we head out to the puka fields 40km out to sea, The sea has a light sea breeze on it already but conditions are still good. I drop a 3 hook puka (Groper) rig down, 2 large circle hooks and 1 smaller one, straight away good bites and a nice fat Terakihi in the bin, 2 drops later and with 3 Terakihi in the bin that's my wife's dinner looked after. I change rigs to 1 large circle hook and one medium sized circle hook and straight away again and large 6.6kg Trumpeter is in the bin soon followed by 2 smaller ones. Murray catches the 3rd Trumpeter and finally gets on the board and unbeknown to me is where he takes over and I stop catching. Around lunch time he catches a nice 15kg Kingfish down in 180 metres of water, followed by a small Hapuka. With the fishing or lack of - we decide to head south to look at new areas around Baistow's (17 km away) but on the way home (well sort of). Between the 2 areas, both are at 180-200metres deep is a trench that goes down to 550 metres, there are a couple of good sea walls to look at that rise up from 400 metres to 260 metres that should hold good fish. One of these we stop at and drop our gear down. Murray doesn't muck about a hauls up a nice 5kg Bluenose (excellent eating) and tops it with a double hook up of 2 more, meanwhile I'm just winching bait and empty hooks up and down but that's fishing.
All in all a good day on the sea.

03.09.11 Tatapouri Sports Fishing Club prize giving

This year it was Murray's turn to collect the silver ware. The RA Lane Snapper Cup (12.380kg Snapper - Pinfish). The Silver Tray for Heaviest Hapuku (71kg Bass - Pinfish). The Ole Tuck Trophy foe Heaviest Hapuku over the Tata ramp. The Ray Webb Trophy for the Bottom Fish Fisherperson of the year - 3rd year in a row Team Gazebo has won this trophy, so all in all not a bad year competition wise hopefully we can do just as well this season if not better.

28.08.11 Sea of glass

A week ago the country was in the grips of a icy polar blast, with snow down to sea level in the south. A week later spring is here with the night time temp around 5-8 degrees and the day time temp up to 20 degrees, what a difference over 7 days. We missed out fishing Saturday due to work and family stuff and hear it was a perfect day on the water, so Sunday we were keen as. We headed out to Kell's for a Terakihi fish (10k's out), we found plenty of sign but couldn't catch a thing, we re anchored 3 times and still nothing. we then headed out to the back of Penguins another 8 k's out to sea, we found 4 metres of fish over the reef in 50 metres of water, dropped the anchor and sat on a flat glassy sea with a lazy half metre swell and not a breath of wind - absolute perfection. over a couple of hours we managed to catch 30 Terakihi between 800gm - 1 kilo, enough to feed everyone and headed home. The air temp was warm and the sea was one of those days we dream about - as we fish in the open ocean, no islands or land masses, the next stop from Gisborne is Chilie, 5000 miles away over the Pacific Ocean, so to get a day like we did is very rare.

13.08.2011 Finally a calm Saturday

Heaps of good eating
Just what the Doctor ordered - a dose of calm sea.

Murray hauling up a Hapuka

The weather forecast had New Zealand surrounded by 4 Lows and a storm warning that has a polar blast coming direct from Antarctica racing up the East coast over the weekend. BUT Gisborne was right in the middle and we were forecast for calm weather Saturday with no wind turning to crap Sunday.

So Gazebo was loaded up and by 8am Saturday morning we were heading out to sea, we decided to go where we fished last time, straight to Thunder rock 38k's out to sea. The sea was glass with a metre swell, we set up for our first drift over the rock, Murray managed a nice Trumpeter around 4 - 5 kgs. With a full moon at the time and the lack of much current tends to make fishing hard, over the next hour we had a lot of small bites before I managed a nice Hapuka (Groper). Around mid-day was bite time and we managed another couple of Hapuka and then things slowed right down and we started to pull up sharks (which isn't fun in 187 metres of water, no electric reels on Gazebo). 3pm was another bite time and we managed another 3 Hapuka. With the day light going just after 5pm and an hour to drive back to to ramp it was time to go. It is good to see the weather people are getting the forecasting right.

Sunday - the bad weather is starting to arrive.

29.07.11 Mental Health day

After all the crap weather we have been having, this weekends looks like another wipe out, but Fridays forecast was really good so Muz and I both took a Mental health day off and headed out. We went to Baistows which is 30K's out, the sea was a little choppy and a 1.5 metre swell running but the wind was forecast to die off by lunch. We found a little sign over a couple of rocks 210 metres down and managed to catch our usual sharks and a few reef fish - nothing we were after, so time to move. After a quick 17 km run up the coast to thunder rock we found a lot of sign at 180 metres. Our first drop yielded a lot of good bites (felt like Trumpeter) with the wind now playing to plan and completely dropping away we let Gazebo drift off the rock and picked up our first Hapuka (Groper) we zoomed back to the rock and dropped our gear again, still good bites and a drift away and another Hapuka. Next time I rigged a second rod with smaller hooks and a minute later a Trumpeter (really good eating) went in the bin (I love it when a plan works) and another Hapuka at the end of the drift. We ended up with 5 Hapuka and a trumpeter, doesn't sound a lot, but enough fish to feed both our families, parents and friends, no need to over fish a spot, as they say the best way to keep fish fresh is in the sea. So in the end we both got our fishing fix and had a great day off from work.

21.07.2011 Winter is here

A rare sight in Gisborne, snow on the hills the day after it fell.
There hasn't been much action out at sea for a while now, every weekend since my last post has been terrible, with the odd fine day mid week. We have just had our first proper frost which is about 5 weeks later than normal and with that there was a great day for fishing but sadly mid week (should have taken the day off work). This weekend the forecast has a heavy rain warning for us...great. The skiers have had their prayers answered down south with a good dump of snow on the snow fields, so we up in the east coast of the North Island really haven't had it too bad so far. Hopefully we'll get a fine weekend soon so we can get out to sea.

11.06.11 Whale of a day

Whale Island in the background (Where the movie Whale Rider was filmed)

2 of the whales (Humpback whales)
Our golden weather continues, the forecast for the weekend is for northerlies dying out and calm sunny days. Saturday morning we out to BS1A our spot 30km out to sea for a Hapuka (groper) drift in 200 metres of water. The sea was a bit lumpy with a 10 Knot northerly we spent about 3 hours trying for a Hapuka at various rocks we know in the area with little success, I did manage to boat a 10kg yellow tail Kingfish which is good eating. We headed out to the 350 metre mark for a look and managed to have a hook bitten off by a shark, we headed into Penguin reef about 10 km's inshore of us to find after 5 km the sea just flattened out and there was no wind at all, perfect, we did a couple of slow drifts in 50 metres of water to find a lot of small picker fish but nothing big enough to catch, the water was clean and blue unusual for this time of year and with a lot of rat kingfish under the boat we got the jigs out for a bit of practice. After half an hour we got bored and headed into Kells for a Tarakihi fish for the table. The wind had gotten up again inshore but we were able to find a school of fish and put a dozen in the bin. While we were fishing we saw a very large mass of dolphins heading towards us there must have been hundreds of them heading out to sea, about 2 km away they turned and start to hi-tail it back towards shore, we then noticed a couple of large splashes behind them and saw a couple of killer whales (Orcas) herding them by doing large breach's behind them (we suspect the rest of the pod of killer whales were lying in wait for the dolphins in the shallows). Cool I've never seen an Orca before. We pulled the pick and headed home, about 5 k's from the ramp Murray saw a couple of water spouts and then we saw a whales tail as one dived, we thought the Orcas must have moved up here but these turned out to be real whales (Humpback whales) 3 of them surfaced near the boat and were heading up the coast, probably the ones we saw a few months back. Amazing to see 2 groups of different whales on the same day.

After talking to the Dept of Conservation it seems that the whales were Humpback not Southern Right.

04.06.11 Queens Birthday Weekend

Ancient old Pohutukawa tree

Looking up the road to Cape Runaway

Across the road from the Bach on Sunday

The Bach at Waihou Bay

Back after Saturdays fish

Queens birthday weekend is our last long weekend before summer, so Johnstone, Ethan, Evan and myself booked the Bach at Waihou Bay again. Hopefully the weather would be a lot kinder this year than last year, but the forecast wasn't that good. We headed up after work on Friday night in 2 4x4's with 2 small boats. The 4 hour drive was longer than usual due to the road conditions, since we were up the coast for our cricket trip in the end of May, there has been several large rain storms that has dealt to the roads with slips and washouts everywhere.
Saturday morning reveals a light to moderate northeasterly so we head to our cricket rock which is sheltered from the easterlies. We get the berlie out and are soon molested by Kahawai, it is real hard to get a large stray line bait to the bottom for the snapper to have ago at. When a bait does get to the bottom the snapper drag us into the weed or over a ledge and we do our best to keep the fishing shops in business for another year by losing trace after trace, but over the day we manage to catch 9 nice snapper and one small but legal Kingfish. As the day gets on the wind picks up and at times we have to hang on to the rocks in the gusts, so by 3pm we call it a day and head back to the beach, only to find the swell has picked up from flat to over a metre, it took some good seamanship to get the boats in safely.
Sunday turned out to be the same as last year - heavy rain, big swells and strong winds, so it ended up a day of cards and emptying the chilly bin.
One of these days our luck will change and we will get, great weather and even better fishing.

29.05.11 The perfect weather continues

With only a couple of days to go before it is winter in the southern hemisphere our run of perfect weather continues. Saturday I sleep in and decided to do some jobs around home, what a mistake not a breath of wind all day flat calm. Sunday we got up early to find a light southerly (our bad weather comes from this direction) so off we went. The sea wasn't as good as we had hoped with a 10 knot southerly the sea was choppy, we headed to Ariel reef for a snapper stray line and shallow water was quite rough. We gave the berlie time to work and perservered all morning for only 2 snapper, I must say Murray who hates stray lining was very patient and didn't start moaning until lunch time, at 1 pm we pulled the anchor and where heading out to south rocks when the cell phone went with a problem at work, so it was time to head in. About 8km's from shore the sea just flattened out and turned to glass, amazing how different the sea can be over a few k's.

footnote: It looks as if the Blue fin caught last week may be a world record, the heaviest world record Pacific blue fin on 60kg line is around 145kg even though NZ records are over 300kg. (may be the cost of registering for a world record puts us Kiwis off)

21.05.11 Perfect weather

Ethan posing next to Robbies 155.05kg Southern Blue Fin Tuna

For the last 7 days we have had perfect weather no wind, sunny and warm during the day at least and a couple of light frosts at night, all thanks to a large high pressure system covering New Zealand. The only downer is we have a 2-3 metre swell and I'm at work. Saturday it still looked good and the usual weekend weather turn to custard didn't happen. Murray and I were at the ramp at 6.30am and the sea looked perfect, the swell had dropped to a metre and the surfers and fishermen were in for a great day. We headed out to BS1A which is 34km out to sea and about 16 km out we came across 20 plus Albatross sitting on the ocean a sure sign of fish. The water temp was 17.4, a bit cold but we set a couple lures and 1 minute later Murray had a Skip jack tuna on board (I had thought they were long gone to warmer seas) we then hooked a couple of rat Kingfish which were released. With fresh bait on board we didn't want to waste the day we continued heading out to BS1A. On arrival we had a look around and found 8 metres of sign over the rock Murray caught his big Bass, we set up our first drift and to our disappointment we both caught sharks (full moon and slow tides....recipe for sharks) over the next 4 hours we managed to catch 4 Hapuka (2 each) in between numerous sharks. A lot of other boats were complaining of hard fishing so we think we did ok with 4 Puka we headed home with the conditions just getting better.

Footnote. Sunday morning I received a text from Johnstone that his son Ethan had been out all night on the boat Houston Broad bill fishing and they hooked a 155.05kg Southern Blue Fin tuna not far from where we were.

26.04.11 Cape Runaway

Johnstones green jacket winning 7.59kg snapper

The white Pointer Cricket teams annual fishing trip.
Well where do I start............At the beginning I guess.
Tuesday .. had to do the shopping for the trip (food etc) and load the car as well as sort out my gear for land based rock fishing, and pick up Evans small boat. Did I mention there was a gale and it was raining, not ordinary rain but torrential rain, rain that caused severe flooding, washouts and slips 100km's away in Wairoa.
While I was loading the car I said to my self, "self watch those steps they are slippery", and on the "hundredth" time coming down I ended in a tangled mess at the bottom, no real damage except to pride and a couple off bruises - good start.
Wednesday day morning the rain had stopped in the night and I was just getting out of bed and the phone went. Work - There has been an armed robbery last night, "Oh shit", A quick phone call to one of the boys "I will be late". Luckily no one was hurt and it looks like no weapon was used and they didn't get away with much. Two hours later I make it to our meeting spot. The boys had used the time well and had found out the road we were going to use was closed due to slips so we were able to use the only other route in.
We arrived at the farm house to see the front paddocks under water,and a quick check of the sea showed it was fishable, so it looked good for the next day.
Thursday... We load the small boats and head to Cricket Island, the wind had picked up again, but the island was sheltered and calm. We managed to catch a slow but steady stream of snapper and rat Kingfish (all returned to the sea), I managed to weigh the heaviest snapper for the day at 2.5kg.
Friday ... We head to Lottin point to launch the boats and go to a favorite rock island I love (Hams rock). Cod starts the day off with 7 baits and 7 snapper, the rest of the day is steady with all fish returned except 4 for tea, far cry from the old days when all fish were kept or wasted. Johnstone caught only one snapper all day but it was a good one 7.59kg. Back to the farm house and to a power cut that went to 9.30 that night, candle light tea cooked on the gas top.
Saturday .. was a great day weather wise hot and sunny and no wind, we went back to Hams rock and with the clear skies the fishing was hard but we all manged a couple of snapper or two but nothing to beat Johnstones 7.59kg fish that won him the "green jacket" for the third time. Again we had power cuts and the hot water still hadn't come on.
Sunday .... as we were leaving the clouds were gathering and the heavy rain returned and 3 days later it is still raining up there, so all in all we were very lucky to get 3 good days fishing in. Next year is our 20th year up there, so it will be a big one.

Easter Break

With a 4 day holiday the family headed over to the sister in laws bach at Bowentown, a five hour drive towing Gazebo. The forecast for Gisborne was great for Bowentown not so great... typical. Good Friday was fine with a light on shore wind just enough to lump the sea, I managed to grab Bruce to crew for me and we headed out the bar, he said the snapper were in the 20 metre mark, true to word at 22 metres we went over a large school of fish on the sounder (moral to story... "listen to locals"). So down went the pick and the berlie, we had to wait 40 minutes for the first snapper to be hooked. Over the next 2 hours we landed and kept 12 pan size snappers and would have released another dozen legal but smaller fish, as quickly as it started it was over, I pulled the berlie pot up to find it was totally empty... (moral to story "good berlie brings in fish"). After pulling the pick we headed over to a spot called Steels Reef, interesting area, caught nothing but worth a second look at a later time.

Saturday took Cliff (doesn't like bumpy seas)and Gary (second ever time out in a boat) out over the bar, conditions hadn't improved any from the day before and Cliff was not looking good while we were going over the bar (the sea was a bit uneven), so I thought I would be nice and take them back inside the bar so we could fish the flat calm of the harbour. After 5 hours we gave up trying as the snapper were not there. Sunday had a harbour only contest but I decided to give it away as the fishing was so hard, good call as very few snapper were caught, if hardened local struggle what chance has an outsider got.

Came home on Monday to find the weekend weather had been fine and calm, great for fishing...bugger.

Tuesday.. Now I'm getting ready for our 5 day Cricket fishing trip up to Cape Runaway on Wednesday. The weather has turned to custard, gale force winds and heavy rain, flooding and road closures..great we leave in the morning... wait for the next installment.

16-17.04.11

16.04.11. I took the day off from fishing to do maintenance on Gazebo's trailer. As usual the weather kicked me in the goulies, on and off drizzle and not a breath of wind, the guys who went out said it was a perfect glassy sea with no wind all day...great and here I was grinding and trying to spray paint my trailer in between showers.

17.04.11. Having finished my work on the trailer Muz and I went out for a fish, we went south (I hate going south -never do any good). Bank rock - empty-nothing. Westpac grounds - nothing - empty again. Went east to south rocks, to one of our favorite spots - good sign, we dropped the anchor and missed to spot by metres but Murray caught a nice snapper so we gave it a go. Over the next few hours we managed to put 8 snapper in the bin after much work, we had to get our gear down to the bottom through the hoards of Barracuda that have returned for the winter, we are back to keeping the fishing supply shops in business.

10.04.11 tui average weight contest

71kg Bass and 8.4kg Hapuka (dinner for the Bass)

Hapuka and Bass and Deb

The Tui average weight only contest is a new idea and a strange contest to fish in, 7 species of fish, 1 fish per species per angler per day can be weighed in. Trying to work out what size fish to catch and to weigh in would be the problem.

09.04.11 Day One. Canceled due to massive seas and strong on shore winds....Ugly.

10.04.11 Day two. Slow start to the day, the swell and wind had dropped and the contest was on and by the time we loaded up and launched it was 7.30, we headed out to Aerial reef to our snapper spot for a stray line. The fishing was slow with the odd fish coming in, Murry's good run continued with his first fish weighing in at 4.9kg we ended up with 7 snapper, Tzer who were fishing not far from us radioed they were catching some large fish. As the current slowed down we pulled the pick and headed out to south rocks to see if we could find any work ups, but there were none the sea temp had dropped from 20 to 17.8 in a week. Plan 3 was bought into effect - go out to Baistows for a Hapuka drift, on arrival we found Tzer already there they had skipped plan 2 and gone straight to plan 3. Tzer were already fishing the main group of rocks, so we headed to a small group that we had found earlier this year and found good sign the sounder. My first drop I caught a small Bass (really small) Murray a small Bluenose, our second drop, we both had a pair of Blue nose. By now Tzer was following our drifts. Our third drift I had a 8kg Hapuka and half way up from 200 metres my brand new OKUMA (top of the range) rod snapped 30 cm from the tip, I managed to wind up the fish with much swearing. Mean while Murray hooks something big, it takes him 10 minutes to finally get the fish off the bottom in 200 metres of water, another 10 minutes later a huge Bass breaks the surface, we gaff it and bring it on board and estimate it at 40 - 50 kgs. with the fishing good I try another drop with my broken rod and hook up on another 7kg Hapuka. With 2 fish to weigh we leave and go back to plan 2 on south rocks, with no work ups we head home and weigh the bass. It pulled the weigh station scales down to 71kg's - wow - Murray is on fire, two "in a life time" fish in 3 weeks and 3kgs short of the club record caught in the same place last year.

At prize giving Murray manages first in the snapper, I am second in the snapper and second in the Hapuka.

My view on the Average weight only contest is that it still needs at least 1st and 2nd heaviest and then the average weight, it's sad a 71kg Hapuka and a 10.7kg snapper caught by another boat and Tzer's 3 - 8kg snappers didn't win anything, so hopefully changes will be made for next year.

27.03.11 Cossie club surfcasting comp

Saturday lunch time found me (by chance) in the Discount fishing shop and one of the Gisborne Cosmopolitan fishing adjunct committee members came in, being a member of the club I asked him when the club was having it's surf casting competition. The answer was "tomorrow at 7am", Bugger. The rest of the afternoon was spent sorting out my surf gear , making traces and getting organised as I haven't competition fished for over a year. 5am I'm up waiting for light and the rain is steady but there is no wind, I leave home at 7, thinking this is a waste of time (probably be a big swell) and I find the sea flat and calm. By 8am I have 2 rods set up and baits in the water, I soon have a Kahawai for weighing (not big but alright). About 20 minutes latter I have a kilo snapper for weighing as well, while it was being collected I land a Trevally (small but legal). At 11 the marshal tells me I am leading all 3 divisions, 10 minutes later while picking up a smaller snapper I had just caught he tells me my Kahawai is now in third place, 10 minutes later while up at my 4x4 that is parked at high tide my rod goes off with a big bite, as I race down to my rod my foot sinks into soft sand and I feel myself falling, I manage to drop my shoulder and execute a perfect commando roll and I'm back on my feet running to my rod. I manage to pull in a nice Kahawai and back to 1st. I managed to take out all 3 divisions heaviest Snapper $500, Kahawai $500, Other Species $200 and 3rd heaviest snapper $100. Not a bad result for the day I wish all contests can end like that for me.

19.03.11 Hunting and Fishing comp

Sunrise 20.03.11 The day only got better Murray's Snapper 12.36kg - 90cm long Too big for the bin (75 ltr)(almost with a bend )

With the way the weekends have been lately (in fact nearly all summer) I decided to take the day off work on Friday as the weather and sea conditions looked great. Managed to find a crew in Gnome and the two of us went out for a Skippy hunt, we didn't need to go far, 1km from the harbour entrance we saw a large flock of birds feeding and sitting on the water (a sure sign of Skippie's under them). Out went the lures and an hour later we had 20 Skippie's in the chilly bin and in the fish storage tank under the floor and back home before 11am to spend the rest of the day filleting the sides and berleying the bodies. 19.03.11 Day one of the Hunting and Fishing contest. Friday was a brilliant day fine, calm and hot. That night while being thrashed at darts by our neighbours it started to rain, but the morning the sky was cloudy and calm and the weather only got better. We headed to our snapper spot up the coast to FR1A, a good 30Km run. We set the berley bag and sent out the strayline's and waited, I managed one 1.5kg snapper and the wait continued, there was a large splash and our berley bag and 10 litres of berley disappeared into the jaws of a large Mako shark 100kg's or more. Out went another berley bag and the wait continued again punctuated by a 8kg Kingfish to Murray and another small snapper each. By lunch time we decided to move to the shore and try close in and that plan didn't work that well either so we then went to under the cliffs but the back wash was ugly and we saw a lot of birds working not far away, so we hightailed to them and managed to put another 12 Skippie's in the bin for bait. We then went back the our original area and tried another spot with the same results except this time we managed to save the berley from the large Mako that turned up again. 20.03.11 Day two. We headed out to the Aerial Reef to the shallows, the morning was perfect no wind , no swell, warm and sunny. The berley started to work and we managed a couple of snapper at 1.9Kgs and a kingfish 13.3Kg. By lunch time the moaning from Murray about straylining being boring was starting to get to me so we headed out to South rocks to try our luck there, all we managed was another 6 Skippie's for the bait bin. So back to Aerial and to my AR8A spot. In went the berley again and a couple more small snapper later Murray's reel screamed he grabbed it and managed to play in a large snapper that weighted in at 12.360kg, a beautiful fish that took out the competition. So much for being bored, Murray caught a fish of a life time - the world record for snapper is just over 17kg. Footnote - Monday and the rain has set in, so for once we have had a perfect weekend.

12.03.11 Bronwynkay ladies contest

Deb, Trish and Leann AKA Priscilla Queens of the Desert

After last weeks postponement we were ready, Friday night 8.30 the boat was loaded and the girls were ready, lunch made and then the terrible news from Japan a 8.9 earthquake and a tsunami alert for New Zealand..oh we'll see what happens in the morning.

5.30am the girls are here and we are watching the TV and seeing all those clips from Japan, next minute all our phones get a text message "Delay to start, 8.00am", so on goes the kettle and we settle in to watch the news updates. at 6.00am the Tsunami alert is canceled for New Zealand so we head down to the ramp at 7am and launch Gazebo and head out to Aerial Reef. The sea conditions are not so good, a light southerly is blowing and the sea is sloppy. we arrive at Aerial at 8.00am and drop the pick on the same spot we were on last year. We soon had berley in the water and baits on the stray lines. Trish caught a snapper at 1.35kg followed by Leann with a couple of smaller ones. Deb not to be out done pulled in a Kingfish at 6.3kg. The sea and wind kept on getting worse and we started to drag the anchor, we caught a couple of other fish that weren't in the comp and by noon the sea was getting ugly so it was time to pull the pick and head home. We hadn't realised that all morning we were getting Tsunami surges that were going against the tide, the biggest was about a metre drop in the harbour basin followed by a metre surge (no damage done). we arrived back safely on land at 2.30. The girls did really well no one was sick although they had moments when they weren't that good. Deb managed to come third in the Kingfish division and the girls won the fancy dress at the prize giving.

06.03.11 girls contest canceled

The ladies contest was canceled on Thursday due to a bad weather forecast, but as usual the day wasn't so bad. Poverty Bay was flat and as calm as a mill pond, but the further you went out the sloppier it got. Murray and went out to catch Skippies for the bait freezer, we left at 9am and 50 metres from the harbour entrance Marry saw a Small school of skippies and then another 6 or seven splashing on the surface so out went the lures and for the next half hour we went up and down the back of the reef at Kaiti beach for nothing we just couldn't get them to take anything. So we headed out to fluke rock 16km's out, the sea got quiet sloppy and there was no sign of any skippies any where, so back in we went to Kaiti beach and out went the lures again, we struggled to land 2 nice sized skippies over the next hour or so, the main school of skippies were in 7 metres of water, 150 metres off shore. Maybe the shallow water spooked the fish too much but they weren't interested in our lures at all. Hopefully next time as we need to fill the freezer up for the years fishing to come.

17-20.02.11 The Eastland Port Tuna Hunt

Day three.. Team White Pointer
Waiting

Still waiting and waiting

Day Four. And still waiting

And still waiting .. and the sea got ugly

still waiting and the sea got uglier

Day one ...... Work - bugger. I have jumped on to a 8 metre White Pointer Boat owned and built by Rex (owns the company that builds them). Because of work commitments I wasn't able to go out but the boys(the cricket team I play for) went out and managed to get a double strike and landed 2 nice Short billed Spearfish 31.50kg on 37kg line (club record) and 23.60Kg on 24kg line would have been a club record if Cod had been a member. So far only one Marlin has been landed 103.9kg stripey.

Day two ..... Work - bugger again. Should of been there... Gnome caught and landed a 117kg striped Marlin on 37kg line, put him into the lead

Day three .... Finally I'm out fishing, the weather is good and the sea is settling down. The two days I missed the conditions weren't good but were fish able. Well, we trolled and trolled and trolled and trolled ............. nothing - not even a touch, 12 hours and nothing (beautiful conditions). Tzer weighted in a 137kg Stripe Marlin so our day in the sun was over.

Day four .... We are up Early as it is a short day, we head out and the weather has gone to pieces, in fact as the morning went on it just got plain ugly. A lot of the big boats stuck their noses out of the bay an turned around and went back to port, few of us gave it ago, we managed to catch a small albacore and a small Marco shark (released). We came back to port at 1.00pm in the rain and low cloud in the end we should have stayed home. Gnome managed to come second with his Marlin and Rex won the Short Billed Spearfish.

13.02.11 they are back

Went out for a lazy fish at 9.30am. the day was fine and the easterly had gone, well all most. We left the ramp for a Skippy fish, found some just 3 km's out but we just couldn't get them to bite the lures. We decided to head out to Kells (12km off shore) for a Tarakihi fish for the family (they had put their order in "Tarakihi for tea") on the way out we hooked and dropped 2 Skippies. on arrival at Kells the sea breeze and swell were picking up but we managed to anchor over 12 metres of sign. After about 2 hours we had 40 Tarakihi in the bin. It is great to see that the fish are back.

05.02.11 Nauti Girls

Still flat as
The Tuna lures

4.00am Deb, Trish and Lianne and I are up for the Nauti girls contest, I'm a bit worried about the boat channel from the ramp as it is dead low tide and last year Murray and I had to push the boat down the channel cos we keep getting stuck. No problems this year but we managed to scrap the hull on the sand a couple of times. The morning was warm and calm, the fishing was slow but I managed to help the girls to catch Kahawai and Trevally over the day, and they weighted in 8 between them, no prizes for them but Debs sister Jan managed 2nd in the Kahawai section fishing off their boat Tidal light. The snapper fishing for us was a disaster, couldn't find one to save myself. The girls redeemed them selves by winning the morning fancy dress section, winning $250 to split between them selves.

01.02 - 05.02 Bowentown

Bowentown Bar flat as
Bowentown harbour - it doesn't get any better

My youngest son Jordan and I took the 4 hour drive up the coast to Bowentown Waihi. One road was still closed due to flooding and there were numerous slips on the way. The Tauranga Harbour was flat and calm but a wee bit dirty.
Tuesday Jordan and I had a fish in the harbour and managed to catch a couple of small legal snapper and a whole lot of stingrays, Jordan was happy fresh fish for tea.
Wednesday we went out over the bar which was flat calm, we dropped anchor in 20 metres of water and managed to catch Kahawai and Trevally all which were released, we then went out to the 40 metre mark and put the lures out and managed to catch 2 Skippie's and 4 albacore tuna (fresh bait for the Nauti girls contest on Saturday).
Thursday we hitched a ride on a brand new Rayglass 2800 for the day, a bit of luxury compared to Gazebo we went out to the 40 metre mark for a troll and landed 12 Albies and Skippie's for the bait freezer and dropped a long line a couple of times ending up with a dozen or so snapper, Gurnard and Trevally. we also caught a few Kahawai for the smoker. the sea was flat as all day a big change from fishing out of Gisborne.
Friday we took the day off from fishing and took Jordan for a sight see around the area.

28-30.01.11 Bay Bonanza

Bluenose (from last year)
Bass (from last year)

A 22kg Hapuka we caught last year

How times flies, the clubs big contest the Enterprise Nissan Bay Bonanza with $65,000 in prizes is here again.
Day one, 28.01.11. We leave home at 3.30am to try and get to the ramp and to be as close as we can to the head of the queue for the tractor, we arrived to find we were number 3 with the 2 boats in front having stayed the night and sleeping in their boats (cheaters). Today we have Evan back on board with us as the boat he is crewing on isn't going out today, bad move we think as the weather forecast is bad, with a ex-tropical cyclone bearing down on us, expecting to hit us tonight. We get the all clear and head out into a sloppy sea from a southerly change last night and head out to our Hapuka spot TR1A, on arrival we have a look around to see if we can find any good sign - plenty of small fish sign but not allot of big sign, so we back up to a spot and start our first drop. Soon we are back into small sharks again in 185 metres of water, the good news is the wind is fading away and the sea is glassing over - still a metre swell running the bad news is - 2 other boats join us. After an hour Evan haul up a nice 16kg Bass and soon after the other two boats depart. We decide to leave as well and set out our lures for a troll for Tuna and head towards EB1A which is about 14 km's away, half way there we spot to our right, the bigger of the 2 departed boats on the horizon. so we decide to head over that way for a nosey, as the area is a big blank on my GPS map. We arrive to find both boats there and both are fishing. The area has a good rocky area above a nice 30 metre drop (we named it EH1A). Evan soon has a 10kg Bass on board and I am back on to the sharks, the other 2 boats are pulling the odd Hapuka and sharks as well, by 10am the sea breeze starts to make it's presences felt and it is time to move. We troll to CO2A a 125 metre rocky outcrop 5 Km's away, we anchor up over good sign, I drop over a small hook rig to see whats there and the boys drop their big hook puka rigs down, I soon catch a couple of Tarakihi, Evan changes rigs as well and sends down small hooks, straight away he hooks something large and after 5 minutes of heaving brings up a 18 kg Bass and I'm soon on to a 8kg Hapuka (so much for fishing the deep). By 3pm the wind and the sea is getting up and the sky is darkening to the east were the decaying cyclone will be coming from, we decide it is time to go and throw out the lures, after an hour of trolling we have 3 Skip Jack Tuna (3kg's) in the bin, with the skies getting darker and the sea rising we pull the lures in and slog our way home.
29.01.11 Day Two...Cancelled .....the storm came Friday night with heavy rain and strong winds, we were lucky, the Bay of Plenty copped the worst of the storm, with flooding, slips, road closures and a bit of damage. The storm was very fast moving and was gone by Saturday lunch.
30.01.11 Day three. Just Murray and I today, 3.30am leave home, a small snag Murray's slept through his alarms, forgot to set one and sleep through the other 2, never mind shit happens. We arrive at the ramp a wee bit late but are number 2 in the queue, the sea is still a bit sloppy and a 2 metre swell is running. We get the all clear a head to EH1A again, we are first there and again the wind is dying away, we manage a puka each and a small Bluenose, soon we have company again the 2 boats from Friday join us, Murray quietly hooks up and hauls up a nice sized Hapuka (21kg). by 10am the fishing has gone quiet so out go the lures and we head toward the inshore reefs 30km's away, by midday we have 3 small albacore tuna in the bin and the sea breeze is rocketing in, we pull in the gear and seeing the rough conditions on the reef head home.
Murray's Hapuka manages to "get us out of jail" and comes in second winning us $500 (which pays for the 3 days fishing Yay).
31.01.11...The day after... Jordan my youngest son and I load the boat and hook it on the Prada and head over to Bowentown in the Bay of Plenty for a weeks Holiday (hopefully the storm damage is cleared).

15-16.01.11 Liquorland contest

15.01.11 Day one. We left the ramp at 5.oo am and headed out into an ugly sea, the sea breeze was already blowing and a 2 metre south swell didn't help matters. We headed to south rocks, where schools of Kawahi should be, like the last time we were there. The idea was to jig for Kingfish and then troll for tuna, and have a bottom fish if we could find some sign. Well the plan was working, we arrived to several schools of Kawahi, my first drift past using a jig (we are a bit new at jigging as we haven't done much in the past.) lasted 2 drops and a hit resulting in no jig, in went the next jig bang again no jig, this isn't good so we changed methods, we decided to put out a live bait so Murray spun a nice size Kawahi we hooked it up and let it out, a couple of minutes later a slight tug on the line it was gone trace and all. Murray and I looked at each other and dam the sharks have arrived, they must be rather large Marco's (normally they arrive in October and leave about March, this year they haven't been around to now). We then put out a set of lures and went on the troll after half an hour I had a hit on one of my lures and wound a small albacore tuna to the boat where I quickly lost it, first of the season for us. We found a good rock with lots of sign and dropped the anchor to find the wind and current were going in opposite directions - that was going to make life difficult. Over went another live bait, it lasted a bit longer but it to just disappeared with half of the trace - sharks again...by now we were hearing over the radio of lots of reports of sharks everywhere, one shark cage operator reported 8 Marco's and blues around his cage, the most he has ever seen at one time. By now we were losing traces one after the other so again another change of plan, out went the lures and a motor over to Aerial reef, I managed to get another strike and this time landing a 6.380kg Albacore tuna (came 2nd in the contest). We fished Aerial reef for two hours for nothing, we then put the lures out again and went for a troll home...1 fish and 1 fish to weigh in, another bad day out, but we were not alone a lot of boats reported the same sort of day, sharks and nothing else.

16.01.11 Day two. Again at the ramp by 5.00am and this morning it is blowing a gale - strong offshore winds. New game plan head out deep and hopefully the winds will die away the further from land you are. We head out and 20 km's out the wind has quietened down, 40km's out the north westerlies has changed to light northerlies, the sea is a wee bit sloppy from the swell and the inshore winds. The bottom has plenty of sign at 187 metres so we set up our first drift, yet again all we get are sharks (spotty dogfish) the score is 5 to me and 3 to Murray when finally I haul up a 7kg Hapuka (groper) hopefully our luck has changed, next fish is a Tarakihi and then it's back to sharks except they have gotten a whole lot bigger around the 20kg mark, which is back breaking work hauling them up from those depths. By lunch time the lures are out and we were heading into Gables, the water temp is up to 19.4 but we don't find any tuna. On reaching Gables we find a rock with 5 metres of fish around it, it takes us 5 attempts to anchor on it, only to find the Marco's rule the water above them, the first 2 drops with my gear never reached the bottom before a Marco had swallowed the first lot and was last seen somersaulting on the surface with my gear hanging off its lip, the second I tail hooked and that gave me a fantastic fight before getting it to the boat and releasing it. So with that it was out with the lures again and a slow troll home for no reward. Tally for 2 days fishing = 3 eatable fish. A couple of boats hit it lucky and won most of the prizes and the majority had nothing to show for the weekend(fish or prizes).

New Years break

And better (view to the south)

Kept on getting better

Amazing sunset

The view to the east
(sun setting)

The view

Our camp site (freedom camping kiwi style)


News years day was Easterly so I headed to our camp site for breakfast and had a relaxing day with the family after a hectic day at work New Years eve. Gisborne hosts the Rhythm and Vines music festival attracting 25000 kids (over 18's) to town. Gisborne's population is around 35000 so things can get a wee bit busy.
02.01.2011 For the life of me I can't remember what we did or where we went, I don't think we caught anything again but we put the cray pots out.

03.01.2011 We checked our pots early and had 5 legal crays in the pots and we then headed out to South rocks, the sea breeze was already getting up, we went to a spot that has been good to us in the past and anchored up it was slow fishing but we managed to catch 4 Tarakihi (yay the first ones in weeks) Just off the stern a work up developed so we pulled in the anchor and head over to it. We got the jigs out and slow drifted along side the work up, Murray managed a good strike and after 5 or 10 minutes had a nice Kingfish on board (20.850kg's) not to be out done I soon had a good strike on my jig and after about 5 minutes managed somehow to drop the fish... dam... the language wasn't very good on the boat for a while. The sea breeze was howling by 10am so we packed up and headed home.

04.01.2011 Again we checked the pots early, but we weren't early enough someone else had done it for us, we managed only 2 legal crays in one pot with a large conger eel inside. We were heading out to the drop off, about 5 km's out we went through a bank of fog to find on the other side the sea breeze was already blowing, aa quick change of plans we turned and headed over to penguins reef, we found 10 metres of fish sign on the fish finder. We anchored beautifully on top of them, we managed to catch about 18 Tarakihi while catching and releasing the same number of Red Cod. Again the sea breeze was in full force by 10am, we pulled the plug again and headed home.