HelenH Canyon Party Boat trip 2011

[PRBuzz]

Maybe everyone will post discussion and pics here? SB Team: Niko, ThrowingTimber, FishOn, Fish4striper, Bill Sr. and Bill Jr., PRBuzz
There is already chatter to make this an annual event so stay tuned.

Trip left 7AM Sat, lines in the water 2PM Sat until 10AM Sunday, returning to dock 5PM Sunday. I will post a video later and the only picture I have is the last, biggest fish brought in on the boat: 71.5lb WaHOOOOOO reeled in by the 12 yr old Capt's son (lucky position in rotation).

During trolling there were 3 teams of 7 rotating (this will vary per cruise, we only had 21 fisherman on this charter and 1 birder watcher) every 20-30 mins. All 7 from the SB group were on the same team. Each time up moved one reel position in the spread. Trolled from 2PM until about 7PM Sat and from 7AM until 10PM Sunday. When fish on in the spread, jigging over the side was permitted.

The only mahi was Sat morning, ThrowingTimber from the SB team got a 12lber. Niko had a 72lber yellowfin on the troll Saturday to win the pool. Bill Jr landed a big yellowfin pulling in a 78lber Sunday morning on the first troll of the day. Not sure of the final counts but well over 50-60+ yellowfin boated, 6? skipjack, 3 mahi, 2 albacore, and the wahoo (guys please help here). No swords.

The night fishing (chunking butterfish or sardine) started slow but hooking up several 10ft+ tigers helped the time go by. From 12 - 1:30am FishOn, Niko and a gent from NY decided to battle an unknown beast from the sea giving it their all and pushing the rod/reel to its limits against an immovable shark before breaking the line. Some serious effort and sweat went into this battle but the fish won, never even got it close enough to see the outline. About 75 min into the fight the shark made a serious run probably putting the fish at its farthest distance away from the boat, seemed like it could run anytime it wanted.

Yellowfin fishing picked up about 3AM with several being taken on the surface and most by bait.

Myself and FishOn stuck it out all night. Sleeping could have been tricky for those that did as seas pretty rough throughout the night. Sunday morning trolling was in something like 6-10ft seas.

OK, so my tally: boated 1 albacore tuna, jigging Sunday morning on a spinning reel (Saltist 6000, Fin-nor jigging rod, 80lb PowerPro, 6oz gold jig). Wow was the pressure on to bring that one into the boat being one of the last to boat their first fish (maybe the last)! I hooked up several times jigging but just couldn't close the deal. I'd go again in a second!

Birdwatcher: saw his target species, white faced storm petrel, early Sunday morning so everyone went home happy!