PV is EN FUEGO!!!!
October 14, 2005
So we returned from a successfull adventure down to Tnekatita and Bara Navidad, pased a thorough inspection by the Mexican Navy and their machine guns, and returned to PV to greet representatives Jason & John (Agnew North), and Tim (Agnew South). They came down Thursday October 13, 2005 and were ready to fish from day one.
It had been more that a week since we fished PV and more than two weeks since our last fish. Needless to say everyone was extremely anxious to get locked in to some monster Tuna and breakout the hammer. In fact, we were so anxious to go fish on Friday October 14, 2005 that we forgot to provision the boat and were MacGyvering meals out of whatever we could find. Nonetheless, we left the dock early Friday and decided to head out to El Banco. We had heard the fishing was off the charts at Corbitania, the only problem was we heard this from 15 different people who were all going back to fish Friday. Seeing as team NOTORIOUS sets the trend, not follows it, we gassed up and headed to the bank.
As we made our way through the bank we could tell it was going to be a fishy day....the water was flat calm, sun was out, water was a dark blue and......SKIPPPPIIEESSS!!!!!! EVERYWHERE!!! We decided to stock up on skippys before the run out. It took us about 30 minutes to load up the Tuna tubes and we were off.
We pulled up to El Banco and had to check the GPS five times to make sure we were in the right spot. NOT A SINGLE BOAT could be spotted from the bridge. All alone, liquid glass water and we were feeling fishy. We rigged up the skippies for a trolling sesh and boy were we in for it..... WWWHHHHAAAAMMMMMM!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! 10 minutes in the water and the starboard rigger snaps as the Skippy just get completely obliterated. Everyone jumps into action clearing lines while Hunter grabs the rod and drops it into freespool. 1....2.....3....4....5....6.....7....8....9...10 seconds for the fish to enjoy its last supper before Hunter locks up the drag and starts crankin. He's gaining line on the fish when the unexplicable occurs.....The line goes slack and the fish is gone without a trace. The only explanation we could come up with was that it was a sneaky sailfish, but I guess we'll never know.
We fished the rest of our 6 skippies each one getting destroyed to a certain degree, but the hooks just wearn't sticking. Out of Skip Jack, but still alone and armed with a bait tank stocked with decent size Caballitos team NOTORIOUS went to work. John, Hunter, and Jason grabbed the helium, filled up the baloon and dangled a nice sized Caballito 50 feet off the starboard side. Meanwhile Tim and Jeff got a flatline caballito running away from the boat on the Port side. All was looking good and the waiting began.
And we waited.........................................
And we waited.........................................
And we waited.........................................
And we waited.........................................
2:30pm
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ. The flat line gets absolutely hammered and the thing that hit was off to the races; extremely pissed that the tasty caballito snack had a 9/0 circle hook now properly located in the corner of his mouth. As the fish ran for the United States, Jason strapped in to the stand up gear, locked in the 30W Penn reel and got to cranking. The tell tale tail beet soon became visable and everyone knew what that meant.....this was no 3 pound rainbow trout.. this wasn't even a 200 pound Marlin..... this was a devil PV Yellowfin Tuna. Jason had been sick the entire morning but quickly sprung to action pumping and reeling trying to gain precious line on a fish bound and determined to spool him. Jason fought hard for 40 minutes and when we got the fish to color realized it was not the 175 beast we had anticipated, but rather a YFT; 100 pounds of pure heart. A great gaff by Jeff and Hunter, and a hammering from Michael sealed the deal. We were back in the game!
Lines immediately went back in the water, 1 baloon, and 1 flat line. Not 10 minutes later the next torpedo exploded in the water as the flat line got absolutely obliterated. This time it was Johns turn to box the giant fish of the sea. He went to work on this fish like he had been doing it his whole life. Grunting, Straining, but never giving an inch. EEEEEEERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRR! "1 hour John... keep going buddy" yelled Hunter from the Bridge as he sounded the horn marking the first grueling hour. 15 minutes later John was at leader....but the fish was not ready to come in. In the 2 minutes it took Hunter to put on a mask to look over the side, the fish had gone on a 100 foot run back down to Davy Jones' Locker. It would be another 30 minutes before John's huge YFT hit the deck. Fighting pain, hunger, and dehydration John proved the inner spirit of a human is stronger than the body. When the fish hit the deck, we estimated it good enough to enter him in the elite 200+ club.
We still had plenty of daylight and some fishless anglers to take care of. Lines went back in the water and once again the fish gods were smiling on us..... WWWHHHAAAAABAMMMMMM!!!!!! The baloon came slamming down on Mother Ocean as the line sliced the rubber band and the rod bent in half. Tim grabbed the standup gear, strapped in and held on as the rod was transfered to his harness. After adjusting to the 60 pounds of drag now trying to pull him over the transom Tim underwent a transformation. His eyes narrowed, brow lowered, and his face went stone cold. He was in da Zone. 35 minutes later a 120lber surfaced and was quickly and expertly gaffed. The sun was setting, everyone was beat, and we had 400 pounds of fresh Ahi on board. Time to break out the celebration beers and kick our feet up. Got into the marina and had our local friend Pepe clean the fish, prepare ceviche, and freeze the rest.
Overall an extremely great day of fishing. Below are some pics and videos from the day.
Video (Click on the picture to see the video)
