The David family of Hollywood, Florida had one of the best days of fishing that I have ever seen here or anywhere for that matter. We had a unusually late start 8:30 in the morning. We started south in front of town and saw some boats hook early fish. We worked the area and raised our first fish at 9:00. Due to our bad hook we went to the switch which means we would tease the marlin to the boat and switch them to a bait with a circle hook on it. The fish came to the Polu Kai tube and we switched it to the bait. They caught the first blue on 50 pound stand up which put up a great fight. The leader got tangled under its belly and made our work tough for awhile. We worked the area and raised a second blue. This blue switched and we were able to get the fish to leader. It was a wild fish on the leader and had everyone safety in mind as we neared the tag. It got more and more wild and the tag at that point in the fight didn’t mean as much as it would later in the day. If I charged bad on the fish aiming at the boat we would have tagged the fish. I took the safe road and the fish turned the right way and jumped a wild jump. Right then the hook ripped out of its mouth. We got great pictures and a good catch but didn’t get the tag in. Everyone was safe which was my main idea at that point. We worked our way north to the ground where we had fished with Masa yesterday and after our hole dried up went for new ground for the tide change. As we worked our way north my neighbor Kevin told me he had good fishing at Otec buoy up north. We trolled our way up there to check out the action and raised a 400 pound fish to the teasers that probably due to the depth it was at probably would have surprised us with its size. It didn’t come to the bait and the north current pushed us up to what would be one of the best afternoon of fishing I have ever seen. We got to the buoy at 2:30 out of regular day due to the timing. We are usually heading home at that time due to the early starts we have. We had a late start which meant our day would shift late so we had enough time to be where we were at that time of day. We went 6 for 7 on blue marlin and 6 for 11 on ahi from 94-165 pounds the marlin were between 140 and 250 and all but one fish were hooked on circle hooks using techniques Dingo has learned in his travels. It was a great afternoon to try new things and try to learn. I once didn’t have much faith in circles for live baiting here in Kona but found some new confidence with those results. It was a day I will never forget and that fish we didn’t tag cost us equalling our record of 8 blue tagged twice in 2005. We caught the 8 we need to tie but didn’t get the tag in that second fish making it an official 7 and 6 tuna. The last bite was exciting to see what would appear on the leader at near dark. Would it be number 9 or a tuna. When the glow of a yellow fin shined in the spreader lights we had to call it a day. The David family has a charter business of their own and the seamanship of their young kids( 7 and 10 years old) and skill in fishing really made the day for us. Thanks for the day and sharing one of the best days of fishing I have ever seen here.
