May 28 2008
Well I have been slack and neglecting the website for the last month or so, but there are good excuses 🙂 I have been busy editing video, fishing all over and getting all of my wonderful clients dates sorted for the big Cairns season coming up!!!.
We fished the Certifiable in the World Sailfish event in Key West and just got flogged!!! It was very frustrating, fishing side by side and watching everyone around us catch them one after another, whilst we just could not raise any fish. We did manage a couple, but after 3 days of fishing were really looking forward to heading home and over to the the Bahamas for some blue marlin fishing.
Off to the Bahamas and back to Boat Harbour in the Abacos after more than 5 years since I was last there. It hasnt changed at all, same place and people that we have known for nearly 15 years wheni first started fishing the BBC events.
A half hour in the computer and all my old event markers are in the GPS and we fished the first day catching a blue and a white. Glad to see the fish still know where to be!!! The next 2 days we got 2 more small blues, so not too bad.
The Bertram Hatteras Shootout is one of the oldest events in the Bahamas, and with only 30 boats this year was nice and fun. We all cought up with lots of friends, and made some new ones as well. The weed had been brutal, basically with 4 guys in the pi and me on the bridge constantly winding in, de weeding and resetting the baits and lures for hours on end. Really tough conditions. As a result the fishing as slow to say the least, and my previous days efforts were not to be repeated!!!
We did mange a sail on a pitchbait, and Mark again did the damage. Shortly after we did get a bite form a nice fish around 400, but just knocked it out and went away. The boys on the Fish Tales, a 60 Hatteras won with a few fish, and took the double, having won it also last year, a great effort. Hatteras took home the trophy for top manufacturer for the unpteeenth year in a row!!!
Our fine Bertram lived up to its reputation as the crappiest sea boat ever built!!! Coming back in the south Man of War cut, just following a few boats and with the Hatterascal behind me. Just rolling along in the tower and making the turn before the bombie, the boat broke loose and turned right as hard as you could imagine was possible. I had absolutely no control over the boat at all, no steering and heading for the breaking reef about 200 feet infront. I grabbed the controls and pulled it back to neutral, but of course with electronic controls the big 16V2000’s were not too keen to slow down that fast. When it finally stopped the bow was over the breaking waves and I was able to find reverse and get back into deeper water. It was the scariest situation I have ever been in, in my life. Who ever designed the hull should be shot!! a giant keel and tunnels on a 40 knot boat is just a recipe for disaster. We found no failure in the steering, nothing broke, the shitty hull threw dirty water in the rudders and she just broke loose. Dave on the Hatterascal said he saw my entire port rudder out of the water it was leaned over that hard.
With the boat back home in florida we went back down to Bertram to look at the new boat, and after 3 weeks since our last visit, they had not done a thing other than put it into the water. And as a result we know have to take the current boat north for the tournament season.
Anyway I am off home for 10 days to do some work on Tradition, (the finest sea boat ever built) . I am really excited about taking her for a run, and spending some time with my family. I have been gone since December, so will be fun to go home for a week.
Well I have about 2 weeks open for the Cairns season this year and just cant wait to get home and fish on a real fishing boat that handles, rides and is such a pleasure to be on!!!
Then back to Florida to head north for the mid atlantic tournament season.
If you want to come and fish this year, let me know !!!
Tim
www.TraditionCharters.com
