Epic Adventure to Vanuatu 2008 - Big Yellowfin, Sailfish and GT's
Trip Report
On our first Epic Adventure to Vanuatu in 2007, everyone hooked into some huge Blue Marlin. Usually our Vanuatu trips are timed to coincide with winter so we can escape the cold to the tropics but this year, the 2008 trip was timed to coincide with some hot yellowfin action in November. During a year spent working the boats in Vanuatu in 2002, Carl had hooked his biggest yellowfin of 74kgs during November.
Flying out from Auckland was a top crew of Glenn, Euan, Bushie and Bill
We struck some awesome weather, the usual trade winds weren't blowing which bode well for smooth seas, but after a cool winter in New Zealand it was straight into the water and a few beers to avoid deyhdration....
Pete gave the crew a good run down on the gear while the supplies were loaded for our five day trip to Epi Island, just the essentials....
The next morning it was up at first light and it didn't take long before the first mahimahi jumped into the spead
Bill had dinner in the bin - mmm, fresh mahimahi sashimi doesn't get much better!
And a few minutes later the next one was on
Bonze gave me a new prototype to take to the islands to see how it ran - The Grimmel
Didn't take long before a nice 20kg Yellowfin pounced on it. A nice fin to the Bill Collector
A bit further on we got on to a nice patch of birds and there were fins slicing through the water everywhere, birds sqwuaking and bait being busted up, the perfect yellowfin work up. The first reel went off......Pete kept the boat going.....the second reel went off.....Pete kept the boat going.....the third reel went off......still going.....and we had the fourth on!!!!
Four nice yellowfin over 20kg joined the rest of the fish in the bin and we were assured a very warm welcome at the village that night!!
To round a pretty special first day off, a billfish decided to jump into the spread, knocking down the rigger. Pete gunned Shogun and turned hard to port and this got the response we wanted as the 50W Tiagra howled. Euan was in the chair and got stuck into the fish
What we thought was going to be a small marlin, turned out to be a very respectable sail over 50kg
A quick pat on the head and we sent him off
We arrived at Epi, settled into our bunkhouse and the catch of the day was divided up amongst the village before the ladies put on an awesome spread for us
You don't go hungry on these trips, plenty of fresh fish and local fruit and veges!
The weather stayed pretty settled while we were away and we were greeted with mornings like this every day
We took plenty of metal with us this year and some bling jigging kit (just a pity that Air New Zealand stuffed up and ran over my rod tube, then decided to send it via Australia and Fiji to turn up as we were about to leave!!) we made by putting our Ocea Jiggers on some of Pete's popping rods.
Bill Collector got into a nice tasty jobbie, which was cooked in a coconut currry that night
A Bushie nailed a nice GT on a pink spear
Over the reefs livies turned up the best fish, and Busie nailed this primo 25kg GT on a live rainbow runner
The rest of the trip saw plenty of mahi's and yellowin pouncing on the lures
And we hit another big yellowfun workup that had Euan sweating on this BIG fin, a typical November yellowfin for Vanuatu, weighing in at 62kg
ahhh, it felt nice to stick a flying gaff into something substantial after the long winter
We had plenty of fish to swap for pineapples on the way back to Epi that night.....
And if we already hadn't eaten like kings, the last night on the island the village put on a pig for us and we got to see the whole process from it being cleaned up, marinated, wrapped in coals and leaves and put on the fire....
The billfish didn't really play ball but thats fishing, we had one up in the lures on the last day but he didn't seem hungry. We still saw some pretty awesome action, had some superb weather and saw some amazing sights. Big thanks to Pete and Leanne for once again being great hosts.
There was also a fair bit of banter on this trip as you can probably imagine....what goes on tour stays on tour, although .....the quote of the trip has to be "It is really hard to get pissed on this beer" quote from Bill Collector about to keel over after his tenth MARGARITA on our last night.....
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