Excitement quickly turned to nerves on the morning of our voyage (yes I’m being dramatic but I was so excited.) We drove the boat to the harbour, Dawn’s mum backed us into the water and we were off. Bumping along the waves was great and I was in for a real treat as the porpoises came to swim alongside the boat too.
Once we’d caught our bait (which was big enough in itself) we then had to drive around trying to tempt the big fish. This was the worst part of the day as my sea-sickness started. Dawn and I spent about half an hour feeling rough but once we’d thrown up we were much better!
I could waffle on for a long time about this day as I really enjoyed it but to cut a long story short after about an hour of driving around we finally had a bite. Dawn’s dad obviously had to do everything as we were like tourists and I was too excited about seeing him catch a big fish to be much use.
After a while the fish finally broke the surface in its attempt to break free. I was so excited to see that it was a marlin but as I looked at the others, their expressions showed slight panic. It turned out that instead of catching a 100-200kg fish (which is what we’d been hoping for) we’d landed one more like 500-600kg!! It was longer than our boat and way too much work for dad to land by himself. Even if he had managed, it was too big for the boat so we’d had to have dragged it back to shore in the water which, I was told, could attract the sharks!
I could waffle on for a long time about this day as I really enjoyed it but to cut a long story short after about an hour of driving around we finally had a bite. Dawn’s dad obviously had to do everything as we were like tourists and I was too excited about seeing him catch a big fish to be much use.
After a while the fish finally broke the surface in its attempt to break free. I was so excited to see that it was a marlin but as I looked at the others, their expressions showed slight panic. It turned out that instead of catching a 100-200kg fish (which is what we’d been hoping for) we’d landed one more like 500-600kg!! It was longer than our boat and way too much work for dad to land by himself. Even if he had managed, it was too big for the boat so we’d had to have dragged it back to shore in the water which, I was told, could attract the sharks!
We were over an hour into the “fight for the fish” now and it was time to call people to come and help. Dawn’s dad had a friend who wasn’t too far away and he agreed to come help us land the fish. It was an odd experience as I was too excited to comprehend just how big the fish was whereas the other two knew just how hard it would be and were secretly hoping we lost it.In the end it was two against one and it was a blessing when the fish managed to wriggle free and get away. We’d already been out for 4 hours by this point so we decided to call it a day. I think I have overtaken my dad now in the race for the best “the one that got away” story!
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