Report 058 My old fishing spot saves the day… 10th of March 2011

Mid morning Thursday with some inviting weather conditions, I decided to set off on a spur of the moment adventure to the Coromandel! I launched at the Bucklands Beach boat ramp by 10.40 am for a quick trip in some reasonable sea conditions, with a goal of a big Kingfish! I have ventured this trip many times before, but this time was with shorter time frame and I was keen on obtaining some further fuel economy statistics at speed… I maintained an average speed of 80 kph for the first leg across to Channel Island, taking the short time of fifty minutes! At Channel, the sea conditions are always more challenging and unfortunately with the large swell pushing on to Channel Island my jigging spot was very difficult to fish… I persisted for an hour at the same area to only be plagued by Kahawai, eventually calling it quits and heading to another spot at Anchorite Rock. At the new area I was on to the fish straight away!

After catching and releasing plenty of barely legal Kingfish, I decided to head on the return trip towards home…

Consciously questioning my catch after covering over a hundred and fifty kilometres, the trip was looking pretty grim, as I hadn’t even kept a legal Kingfish I had caught… It was looking like a big ride without dinner, so I decided to try a spot at Motuihe, only five minutes from my launching boat ramp. I use to fish there regularly with my kids, three years ago when I started fishing from a jet-ski. The area I was fishing was as shallow as five metres of water, in sight of the water tower. Within a minute of setting my drift, the first fish to hit the Gulp New Penny/Grub, was a Kahawai.

It was a quick release of the Kahawai, as Snapper was destined for my menu… Snapper landed on my next cast!

The fish were in great condition and with the excitement of shallow water soft bait action, I continued for another…

I decided three would be plenty for dinner, so with one more cast about twenty metres away from the ski, the New Penny was hit again on the drop. Being in the shallows, it is an added challenge allowing the fish enough drag for its runs, yet not too much that it can break the line on some of the foul area. After a sporting couple of minutes fight, the fish was beside the ski ready to be netted. This one was a bonus, going 520mm in length and adding to a nice feed of Snapper.

I arrived back to the ramp by 4.30pm, only using just over 60 litres of fuel on the 1812cc WaveRunner. Sadly no records broken on the Kingfish jigging today, yet I learnt more attributes of the Yamaha with the high speed fuel range… This adventure also had me appreciating how hot the Snapper fishing is at the moment, with the fish being so close to home. For those Jetskifishos just wanting a feed of Snapper, don’t miss soft baiting close to home first!