Saturday 1st April

Today I had agreed to go out deep sea fishing with Rob, so was up at about 5:30am with plans to leave at 6am.  We asked a couple of times, but they wouldn’t pick us up from the ocean front here, so we schlepped it along Devil’s Point Road once more.  At the end of the road we met an un-talkative French local fishing guide called Stephen ("Stefen").  Along with 3 rods we piled into his little hatchback and drove back to his place where the boat was moored. 

It was a small boat – I think maybe 4 people could fit in there at most, but I’m certainly not one to judge these things.  We set off down the harbour inlet at a slow pace.  At this point it had started lightly raining, with deep thunder and lightning, but we seemed to leave it behind when we hit the open ocean fortunately, and looking back it seemed quite heavy and ominous.

On the water the weather was great, a combination of light cloud and sun which would come back to haunt me later.  Rob and Stephen talked at length about fishy things, and every time Rob asked Stephen which lure he thought would be good, Stephen asked if it was a sinky or floaty lure.  If sinky Stephen didn’t like it, he only wanted floaty ones.  OK fine – Rob put floaty lures on.  We boated out to a FAD (Fish Attracting Device) that Stephen knew about, and cast out with our floaty guys.  Nothing.  Meanwhile Stephen cast a sinky, and low and behold hooked something.  He called me over to reel it in, which I did under his shouty French tutelage – a “Skipjack tuna” appeared – not very big (9-10kgs) and apparently not very tasty.  We threw it in the esky and moved on, chasing flocking birds, splashes, and other FADs.  At another spot Rob and I were casting floaties, Stephen had a sinky on, and once again he hooked something.  Once again called me over to reel it in.  This one was about 150m down apparently, and pulling hard.  I reeled it up maybe 20m, and then it “ran” – pulling the line out way further than I had reeled in.  Probably a shark chasing it they said.  I continued to reel in but it was hard work (on top of this it was a left-handed rod, so things were a bit backwards), and after about 10-15 minutes I had to hand it over to someone else, my legs and arms were too wobbly.  Rob spent probably another 2 minutes on it before he had it to the surface, and we pulled in an 18kg yellowfin tuna!  This was going to be some tasty sashimi.  While pulling it in Stephen tried to use what’s called a “gaff” – basically a big hook with a handle that you slam into the side of the fish when pulling it in.  The tuna wiggled a bit and the gaff slipped from his hand and fell into the ocean.  All fish must now be pulled in by hand.  We got the tuna on board and Stephen whacked it with a bat and stabbed it in the head a few times with a screwdriver, bled it out in the ocean then put it in the esky.

At the next casting location, Rob got the hell in with floaties and cast a sinky.  It worked, and he hooked a fish.  Couldn’t have been too deep, because he spent a few mins reeling it in – a dolphin fish.  He was excited about this, as apparently it’s really tasty.  Whack, stab, bleed, esky.

Next Stephen caught a Wahu with a sinky.  And then all biting stopped.  We boated around for at least an hour, casting and casting, no love anywhere.  Even when it looked very promising – we could literally see fish jumping out the water and birds going crazy.  Nothing.  At this stage it was hard to be unhappy – we had caught all 3 fish that Rob was hoping to catch, and Stephen said we would try one more spot and head home.  He mentioned Romina was going to be mad at him because we were already an hour late.  The last place was like the rest – no bites.  Stephen had a trawling line in the water, and just as we were about to take off (I had already taken off the rod belt and was getting ready to have some water from the drinks esky) he got a bite!  Those kind guys once again let me reel in the fish, this time on a right-handed rod.  After 10 mins I was hurting again, and Stephen put on this special rod harness thing that meant I could just lean back to pull it up rather than having to pull with my arms.  This made it heaps easier, and I reeled for probably another 10 minutes, to pull up this monster 45kg yellowfin tuna!  Wowee

Now it was really time to get home.  We had been out in the sun for hours, and I was getting nervous – I had applied thick sunscreen in the morning, but it had been a long day in the sun and I could see my knees were starting to look a bit red.  On the trip back we had to sit at the front of the boat where there was no relief from the sun, but the gloves Rob had lent me found a new home on my knees in a pathetic attempt to block the sun.  I could see my arms were a bit red now…

The way back was long and bumpy, kinda reminded me of something else.  The storm was still hanging over the island, and we motored into what looked like a solid wall of dark grey.  As we got closer it started raining harder and harder until it was almost torrential, sailing headfirst at full throttle.  All we could do is pull our hats down and look at our laps.  Maybe at least this would wash the blood and fish guts off my clothes.  Instead of taking the slow route back to Stephen’s house, he dropped us off at a jetty near where he picked us up in the car, and asked us what we wanted to do with the fish.  Rob told him that we’d like all of them except the skipjack and the big yellowfin.  He didn’t look very happy at this, and mumbled something about how this “wasn’t what usually happened”.  We figured most people he takes out give him the fish and then he can sell them for extra money.  It seemed strange to us – we paid him to take us fishing, why would we not be able to keep the fish we caught?  Romina and him had had a chat in the local language, and Romina informed us that he usually kept the fish to sell as the money we paid him for the tour only really covered his maintenance and fuel etc.  This was news to us, and according to the local expert (Rob) this was definitely not how these things usually went down.  There was further heated messaging on their WhatsApp channel, it sounded like Stephen was being… moody.  Romina explained this away again as a French thing, and also tried to smooth it over by telling Stephen that she would pay for the fish (because she would have had to buy them anyway).

Back at home we piled the fish into a big sink in the kitchen and Romina got to work on them.

At this point I was able to get a good look at the damage done to my skin, it was acute and extensive.  I had a shower and slopped some aloe vera gel on it, but the full force of my stupidity was coming – I was in constant pain from the burn.  Burn areas:

• Wrist up to mid-bicep, whole way around (fortunately was wearing the gloves all day)
• Knees and about 20cm up the legs, front only, light burn on my left shin
• Entire neck, excluding my beard area (which I have thankfully been letting grow for a few weeks
• my face – even though I was wearing sunnies and a hat the whole day.
• Lips copped it

Hotspots are the inner elbows, and tops of knees, I continued applying aloe every hour or so, but there was no escape.

Tuna sashimi turned up a bit later, and it was delicious and plentiful.

Dinner was cooked dolphinfish.

 

Things of note:

• Lizl and Lisa went stand-up paddle boarding in the early afternoon with Bill, it sounded like they had a good time.
• A FAD is just a rope tied to something heavy (ie an anchor) with some floaty things on the other end.  It basically kick-starts the aquatic lifecycle – algae grows on the rope, which attracts tiny fish, which attracts bigger fish, etc.
• The rain and even a proper wash didn’t help my clothes, I think my shorts are ruined.  Yet to see what my shirt looks like.
• The rain we experienced was apparently only on one side of the island, the property only got light rain in the morning around the time we left. 

 

The 45kg yellowfin

 

 

Post downpour