Crabman
Lieutenant Commander
- Joined
- Oct 2, 2011
- Posts
- 181
- Likes
- 57
I recently sold my downeast boat, ELIZABETH, to Captain Mark who renamed it, DELIVERANCE. I was along during his maiden voyage for tuna to the Hudson Canyon with Bob, Steve, Kevin and Tom. Conditions were perfect and the area was obvious with 50 boats already trolling. We moved out of the fleet and found a single, fat bigeye just before dark. It was a nice fish and fought hard. After thirty-five minutes, Captain Mark, darted it. We continued trolling for another half hour with no other results. We setup for dirft chunking and after an hour while Steve was free lining a live squid, he was hit almost immediately by an unknown large fish. Steve fought the fish around the boat and we had to clear the lines for this big boy. Feelings were high that we had another bigeye. After thirty minutes, a large swordfish showed up in the lights. Unfortunately, we went "light for the bite" on the leader and the bill chaffed the leader real bad. With the final lift before the dart, the line popped. A futile attempt was made to harpoon the fish while it realized it was free. We missed by inches and it swam away to fight again. Very slow for the rest of the night. We were eager to begin trolling. With the sun rising, we dropped the spread in the water. Five minutes later, five lines exploded to the crashing of a wolf pack of bigeyes fifteen feet off the stern. Within seconds, one line snapped with a loud crack after being tangled. The other four were boated in forty minutes. Final tally was 5/6 on quality bigeyes. On the way back to the barn, we could not wipe the smile off Captain Mark's face. Way to break in the new boat. Seems the name change didn't change the boat's mojo.
Mark (center) with Tom and Steve.
Wolf pack subdued.

Mark (center) with Tom and Steve.

Wolf pack subdued.


