Port Clinton was a great stop over, peaceful calm and good fishing. Can’t stay here forever so the anchor was retreived at 7:30 and we all headed off to the Percys.
The wind so far was not as predicted, blowing from the NNE and on the nose. The jib was pulled but that only gave us half a knot more so we motor sailed at 5 knots. Its a long way to go at 5 knts. Conditions were calm so I served up a very tasty ham and cheese omelette for breakfast and another cup of tea for John. (He gets it way too easy.)
The first waypoints for the exclusion zone were passed at 9 am and we were able to change course slightly. I dont think this helped, as per usual the wind forecast was way off, the winds didn’t materialise at all. The ocean was flat and calm and very easy to spot objects on the surface.
View from hatch in starboard hull, its was sooooo flat.
Even Morgan was super relaxed.
On my watch I saw dolphins and a very large sea snake. It looked like a striped beaked sea snake but by the time I grabbed my camera it had disappeared.
Cameras ready in anticipation of whales
Travelling past low rock 10 nm south of the Percy Islands, John said ‘the rock looks barren but we may catch something hanging around as we go past.
Sure enough, not long after I had taken this photo I glanced at the rod and noticed the line spooling off almost down to no line left. Motors were put in neutral and we went into fish mode, even Morgan.
It was a big strong fish and John slowly got some line back on the reel. We were all waiting with anticipation to see what it was then when it neared the surface we could see the stripes of a Spanish Mackeral definately a large fish.
John gaffed him and we had our metre long spaniard on the transom. With a bit of vodka to subdue him he was out for the count.
It took a fair while to fillet and clean him as there was a lot of fish.
We had lost a bit of time whilst fishing so we upped the revs on the motors and headed north. We had one extremely happy skipper.
Below are the steps we need to go through for bringing a fish onboard when motoring, its even more complicated when we have the sails up as we need to drop them and slow the boat down to play the fish:
- John go and reel in fish
- Jenny, slow the boat put motors in neutral
- Get the gaff and vodka
- Keep an eye ahead for boats and obstructions
- Bring the fish to the back of the boat without letting him dive down under the keels or props
- Yell at Morgan to move out of the fishermans way
- Hand rod to Jenny while John gaffs fish
- Squirt vodka down his gills to quieten him
- Tie up his tail so he cant escape
- Remove lure and gaff
- fillet fish and package
- dispose of carcass or keep for crab traps
- clean blood from transom
- Eat for breakfast lunch and dinner
Continuing on we sighted a large log over to our port, we called up Nyeki and Eva Louise who were over that way to warn them however when they got close it blew a spray of water. We only saw whales breaching in the distance. At one stage the others sailed past mother and calf floating. Most likely feeding.
We arrived at West Percy island at 4 pm and anchored amongst 16 other boats. The anchorages are getting more crowded these days.
After delivering mackeral to Nyeki and Eva Louise followed by happy hour on Eva Louise we dined on Spanish Mackeral for with a lime pepper sauce. Early to bed after all that excitement.