Mar. 22, 2009 - Drama
We are going to have to invite Dai and Loraine again, not only has the weather finally perked up but we’ve been having adventures. On the way to Guadaloupe we were treated to a leaping whale – in this case a juvenile Sperm whale – we also think we saw mum next to him, probably telling him not to show off. Then on the way to Dominica we had a pod of Dolphins who also wanted to show off their jumping skills as well as playing in our bow wave, followed by a nice supper, oops Barracuda. We checked with the locals as to whether it was safe to eat and they all agreed they were fine, so he got the barbecue treatment. However on leaving Dominica, I put two trolling lines out and about 5 miles South of the Island a large fish hit one of them. It was clearly a very large Marlin – ‘cos we saw him doing the ‘Ernest Hemingway’ leaping out of the water thing. Now I know some of you won’t believe me (Ablett) but I reckon he was at least 100 pounds as after half a dozen leaps he simply snapped my 80lb line. We definitely didn’t want him on board but it would have been nice to get him closer for a photo. During this entertainment I asked Dai to get the other line in but he couldn’t get the reel to move. When I checked the reason was simple – there was another very large fish on it. This one did not want to come to the surface, it did the exact opposite and headed for the bottom. We slowed the boat down but I could barely get some line in before he took it all off again, consequently I made the error of stopping the boat and he immediately went underneath and snapped the line, at one point the rod was bent almost double. Not sure what this was – possibly a large Tuna as they can behave like this, either way even if we could have got him up I doubt we could have landed him. So, two good lures lost but great fun nevertheless. We then had a great sail to Martinique where we are planning a lazy Sunday to get over all the excitement.
The photo is of our chum Troutbridge heading North from Roseau, as we sailed down South to meet him there!! Better luck next time Peter – see you in Bequia at Easter.
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