The Ladies Ribbons certainly know how to have a good time! Not only were there plenty of fish caught yesterday, but the girls had a lot of fun starting with the ‘dress up’ for the sailpast (and water balloon bombs) right through to the weigh-in at the end of the day. We stayed right away from the main balloon firing line, mainly the girls on Cool Runnings, Kalira and Moana III! Fishing with us were Kelly Barnes and Katherine Thomas from Brisbane (Mooloolaba GFC). Despite suffering the effects of nasty bronchitis, Kelly fought and landed a foul hooked 25.2kg yellowfin tuna on 10kg line (after over an hour’s fight!) Later, Katherine had two shots at…blue marlin, on 15kg and 24kg but unfortunately we couldn’t stay connected. Coming from a pretty good blue marlin bite down at home, Katherine hardly expected to be hooked up to not one, but two blues at a black marlin event!

There were a few sailfish caught, and plenty of other gamefish weighed – dolphin fish, mackerel, wahoo etc – and a couple of hard luck stories including the girls on New Moon who fought a marlin for just over two hours before losing it and to Greg Sims’ team on Square Bear who hooked up to a 150lb black marlin literally minutes after cease fishing. The presentation is tonight – until then the results are a closely guarded secret.

Capt. Tim Dean on Calypso returned to port after his week out wide and reports another great trip with up to four shots a day on what was almost potluck marlin – it could be a black, it could be a blue (even a grander blue, hey Corey They finished up the trip yesterday with a small black on the edge. [Deckie Corey was on the receiving end of one of Graham McCloy's practical jokes about a 'grander blue marlin' via the radio in the saloon. We heard it nearby, and our boys were similarly devastated when we found out too.]

More blue marlin, owner Grant Thomson on board Cjig for the journey back to the Gold Coast reporting more good blue marlin fishing, this time at Noosa Canyons. They had planned to troll out wide but the weather put paid to those ambitions and they came via Hervey Bay and the Wide Bay Bar instead. Grant says the bite was red hot with 3 shots in 2 hours on the northern shelf kink. The first fish was around the 500lb mark but it threw the lure back pretty quick. Grant didn’t get a good look at the 2nd but finished up releasing one 250lb model.

We also heard from Capt. Dean Beech on Castille III who finished up his trip out wide into Townsville yesterday on a high note with plenty of dogtooth etc speared and the boys getting shots on marlin on the lures.

I’m happy to announce that Cresta Motor Yachts Australia have launched their brand new website. If you have the time to visit, its well worth a look through!

We finished up our trip yesterday on a high note adding another marlin to our tally making that 6 in 6 days to 850lbs – four blacks and two blues.  As it so happens, we trolled lures all day Wednesday hoping for a blue marlin (because there have been some around) and got two blacks instead.  Yesterday we trolled baits for a black marlin and got Scotty’s second blue marlin for the trip!

The main photo is another novelty that the boys discovered when we were squid fishing behind the boat the other night.  In a bucket of water for the squid, this little fella, which we can only assume is a baby marlin (Dr. Julian?), was swimming around at speed in the bucket.  Dingo says it was less than a centimeter long and though you can’t see it in the photo, had its dorsal up when it was swimming around and was quite translucent at the tip and the base of the bill. They ended up getting three and had them merrily swimming around for some time. So Capt. Luke is claiming we caught four marlin that day.  Of course I slept through it all!

The briefing for the Ladies Ribbons Tournament is tonight and we’re looking forward to catching up with the remaining fleet who are fishing. Its a little lonely here at the Marlin Marina now that boats have started to leave town.

In our big trip wide on KEKOA we’ve caught a lot of everything, as well as marlin (four blacks and a blue), including this one above on dusk last night at 850lbs for Jason – which was a really stubborn fish and gave him a tough time for the almost hour and a half it took to get her to the back of the boat. Jason managed to get the peg mark onto the rod several times, but each time she managed to take it back again. The last time, he wasn’t going to give in, taking it bit by bit, half turn by half turn, until finally we had her at the back of the boat so that Dingo could retrieve his Oskie Rice made lure (I won’t even tell you what happened to another of his most precious lures!) at the side of the boat for the release.

We’ve been trolling lures not only to cover a lot of ground but because there have been good number of blue marlin seen on the tuna aggregations this year.  Capt. Tim Dean on Calypso had 8 bites in three days and most of those were blues.  I heard that Capt. Brad Craft on Reelistic broke the line on an estimated 800lb blue on the way back in on Tuesday and caught at least one more.  We got a feisty little blue for Scotty as well.

Speaking of blue marlin, Capt. Daniel Carlson on Little Audrey who have finished their northern season and are almost half way back to Sydney, had some great blue marlin fishing at Cape Moreton on the way through going four from five on Tuesday at 450, 300, 200 and 150lbs.  Dan told me that 3 were caught on the 130s and the other on 50lb and that he even had to climb down from the tower to catch one!  Hopefully they hang around a bit longer for when we are finished up here!

But the black marlin fishing isn’t over yet.  Capt. Daniel McCarthy on Moana III tells me they caught two at 300 and 350lbs on their run out wide as well as a big dolly and a couple of yellowfin around 65kg.

We really get to see some awesome sights fishing on the Great Barrier Reef and beyond. And the last few days, taking advantage of a run of well-deserved good weather for a change, we got to see a whole lot more of it out further afield.  We spent the first two nights at Flora Reef, which is over 100 miles off shore.  The water is so clear out there that you can see the wave patterns in the sand under 8 metres of water under the boat at night in the transom lights.  Tuesday, the weather was so good, we spent the night on the drift out on the tuna aggregation with just Capt. Tim Dean on Calypso and a couple of long liners for company (and a bunch of squid in the transom lights overnight as well.)

While the tuna aggregations were a bit harder to find this year, once we found them, we had a ball with the big yellowfins. There have also been a lot of wahoo and dolphin fish still (no whale sharks this year although we did see whales.)

Many of the fleet have now fished their seasons for 2010 and so reports may start to taper off. We’re still up here and fishing through to December 10 (with a few days off in between).  It’s Scotty’s last day today and we are back out again on Saturday for the Ladies Ribbons Tournament.

A quick report this morning as there is still much to do to prepare for our next trip out. I may add more as any reports come in.

Expatriate Kiwi deckie Dean Nichols, who you may remember spent some time with us on KEKOA while Dingo was still in transit, is this week on deck on board Ralph Cybayski’s 56 foot Viking Sparticus with Capt. James “Jimbo” Bladin. We heard from Dean while they were still fishing their way down the Ridge after a day at Linden Bank – 150, 400, 750, 900, 950lbs! Not long after they added their sixth at 600lbs and were trying for number 7~! What another awesome day and enough to make the boys sitting on the dock cry not to be out there.

I also heard from Peter Teakle and partner Nina Mattingly who are still enjoying the island hospitality up at Lizard on board Peter’s 70 foot Riviera Born to Battle. Nina tells me that the island boat has been catching fish daily and released another fish that Capt. Craig “Brutus” Newbold and legend deckie Billy Fairbairn put at 1100lbs for in-house guest Susie who has visited the island for many years but perhaps just released her first 1000lb fish!

Catch up report from Capt. Brett Thomas on Gorilla who reports 6 bites on Saturday for two at 950 and 800lb, the bigger one to Brad ‘Budgie’ O’Connor the smaller to Mark ‘Chucky’ MacMillan and 3 bites for 0 on Sunday and 1 bite for an 850 yesterday for Chucky.

I also heard some more blue marlin reports this time from Andrew Earle (thanks Andrew!) fishing on board SCGFC boat Bangalee off Cape Moreton who went 4 from 5 blues on Sunday including two at 500 and 600lb. Andrew reports the water colour is excellent and a lot of mid-water bait. Great stuff!

Ben on the leader for another nice fish for Adrian on board KEKOA.

Tradition started their 2010 campaign out of Cooktown Tuesday heading north towards the rock with Lester and Liz from New York on board.  Enjoying the calm 10 knots, Tim reports the fish cooperated as well as they went two from four with a real nice 750lb-er for Lester and tough 300lb-er for Liz a little later. A great start.  Late addition – At Escape Reef, Capt. Trent Vischer on Iona released two as well including a great fish Trent called 950lb (mobile photo at bottom – click to enlarge).

Further south at Linden Bank, it was a much quieter day with boats reporting very few seen. On board KEKOA we were lucky to hook both fish we raised for the day starting with a nice little guy for 12 year old junior angler Blake, who quickly brought in and released his very first marlin.  Later, dad Adrian put the lesson he learned in his big fight yesterday to use with a nice 600lb black (photo).

Phantom returned to port after their first four day trip and raised 7, hooked 3 and tagged a healthy 450lb black and 500lb whaler. They also had a ball reef fishing and Daniel managed to land a bat fish behind the reef on 6kg mono.

It was also nice to see Capt. Jim (Dalling) back on the reef with a camo appearance at the wheel of Amokura.  South Australian’s Jimmy and son Nathan are back with Capt. Jim this week and heading north today.

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