Rhino has been putting his considerable photography and editing talents to work again compiling this photo montage to celebrate Capt. Adam’s son Bailey’s (Boof) first marlin.

While Capt. Adam and Capt. Trent are still getting into the fish on board Iona – last Sunday they raised 13 and caught 6: 4 black marlin and 2 striped marlin – it was on a fun day out on board Weapon with the Hyland’s this week that put Bailey onto his first. Congrats Bailey – to the first of many!

I’m heading to Cairns tomorrow to meet up with KEKOA which passed it first real test with flying colours yesterday. Capt. Luke decided to run north to get a head start on our trip around the Cape and out of the path of Tropical Cyclone Ului which threatened the North Queensland Coast between Ayr and Yeppoon yesterday (fortunately after crossing at the Whitsunday’s overnight as a Category 3 the communities seem to have faired very well considering – it was actually a bit of a fizzer here in Townsville!) Running at 25knots in 25knots downsea, Capt. Luke reported that she handles incredibly well (and just as the good as the 47, which we’d grown accustomed to.) You can see my photos from the boat test earlier in the week here.

This post was imported into WordPress from my old Black Marlin Fishing Blog website without any accompanying photos. If you’d like to see the original post, with the accompanying photographs, go to the original Black Marlin Fishing Blog site and navigate to the post using the archive navigation links on the right-hand-side.
Reports from the 2010 NSW Interclub tournament at Port Stephens are still coming in however congratulations must go to the Newcastle/Port Stephens Team who have taken out the Champion Team Tag & Release trophy for the 5th year running and to Amoukura for Champion Boat Tag & Release with 15 marlin released for the 4 days. I’ll update as more reports filter in.

In the meantime, some great stories out of the tournament include that of 12 year old Jacinta Thomas fishing on board Amoukura who released 10 of her team’s combined 22 marlin (15 for the Interclub and 7 to give them runner up on countback from Little Audrey for the AIBT held mid-week). An amazing effort for a 12 year old which also landed her the Champion Junior award. Congratulations Jacinta!

Also congratulations to Karen Wright fishing on board Sydney GFC boat Tantrum, skippered by president Glen Wright who weighed a 96.5kg striped marlin on 10kg which is a pending Australian Ladies record.Also congratulations to Daniel and the team on Little Audrey who won the AIBT mid-week with 7 fish over the two days, 4 striped marlin and 3 black marlin, marking Daniel’s first win as captain. I hear that for the final weekend the weather was a bit ordinary at times which will explain why we had glamour weather up here yesterday for the electronics sea trials for the new Furuno gear aboard KEKOA.

Final Results:

Champion Team T&R = Newcastle & Port Stephens Team 2 (Born Free, Billistic, Gunrunner, Diversion, Seaka)

Champion Team Capture = Lake Macquarie GFC Team 1 (Offshore, Ba’ja, Head Hunter, Blue Blooded, Victory)

Champion Boats T&R = 1. Amoukura, 2. Born Free, 3. Gunrunner

Champion Boats Capture = 1. Offshore, 2. Gloriana, 3. Askari

Champion Male Angler T&R = James Holt, Diversion

Champion Male Angler Capture = Chris Harris, Offshore

Champion Female Angler T&R = Katie Lee, Gunrunner

Champion Female Angler Capture = Karen Wright, Tantrum

Champion Junior Angler T&R = Jacinta Thomas, Amoukura

Champion Junior Angler Capture = Claire Jones, Headhunter

Champion Visiting Team T&R = Mauna Kea fishing for GFC of South Australia

Champion Visiting Team Capture = Nuvatu fishing for Gold Coast Y&GFC

Congrats to the boys on Offshore (Lake Macquarie) for their Champion Boat Capture win for the second year running. Rob tells me their captures were 103, 106 & 88kg striped marlin all caught on 10kg. On board Headhunter, junior angler Claire Jones caught a massive 418kg tiger shark on 15kg.