boonga

Well done Mike another great catch for you. Hopefully they will hang around for a while and people chartering you will get some great fish.

Hi Ifish I could be interested as well if I can manage to get the 19th off work. The weather for next week looks like it will clear up & get some sunny days with light winds....perfect conditions for chasing marlin. I have fished with Mike quite a few times and always had a great time. Lets see if anyone else is interested over the weekend then have a chat about it.

StellaFella - We fished with Mike two weeks ago and he charged us $1650 per day mid week with all tackle, food & soft drinks supplied. We fished 5 people and it cost us $450 each for the day fishing, return bus from Sydney & one nights accomodation at Salamander Shores Hotel. We had a great time and great fun with my mates - it was an absolute blast to see one of my mates catch his first marlin. If you ask me at that price it is a bargain!

I have oranised a few of these trips with Mike at Port Stephens and have always had a great time. If anyone is interested in any of the details such as bus or accomodation let me know.

no problem how did you guys go up there?

Thanks... we will be heading up today and hopefully the weather will be good so we can go wide chasing blues for the Shootout. Will let you know how we go.

We organised with Mike of Reef Magic Charters to help him take his boat to Port Stephens for the up coming season with charters and tournaments approaching. We left Sydney in beautiful conditions at 6.30am on Saturday with "the carpark" the intended destination for an afternoon fish. We steamed north for 3 hours and with water colour & temperature looking good we deployed the bonito skip baits & teasers. We trolled for an hour and a half through the Newcastle canyons with little bait or bird life until we came across a marlin attacking what looked like a trap float, on closer inspection it was a puffer fish and he was giving it a good old bill whacking. We pitched him a live bait but wasn't interested so we proceeded on with the "car park" boats in view. Upon arrival around 1.30pm there was around 15 boats walking live baits with very little action. We marked some bait & jigged up some fresh slimies and put them out on the riggers, one on the surface and one down deep. As we got closer to the tide change the bait was starting to stack up and a bite was eminent so we were checked the baits. As my mate Steve was bringing his in he said that it felt a bit heavy, I had a feel and sure enough the fish has taken our bait and was swimming with us. Steve gently increased the drag pressure and up came a nice striped marlin how decided to sit on his bum and shake his head trying to throw the hook but it had pinned him in the corner of the mouth. After a short fight we tagged him and let Steve continue his fight. When we hooked up most of the other boats around us started hooking up as the afternoon bite was on. Steve got the fish back up within 10 minutes and we had him swimming nicely fully lit up behind the boat for release. Steve was stoked as it was the first time he had been game fishing and his first marlin and celebrated accordingly. We got more baits in the water and had one other hit but no hookup. There was very little action after the 30 minute bite so we decided to pull some lures and headed for the port. No more action on the way in but a lovely ride with great conditions. Another great day aboard Reef Magic and it was great to see Steve get his first fish. Reef Magic will be moored at Soldiers Point for the next month or so and anyone interested in a charter should contact Mike. All his details can be found on Fishraider as he has just become a site sponsor or on his website www.reefmagiccharters.com.au

Thanks for the replies.. yes it was a great day out. Hopefully the sign of a good season to come. I bet it will be packed out there tomorrow.

We left at around 10am as our skipper thought it would be better to fish till dark. We trolled till 2 then started cubing at Mikes secret spot. About an hour or so in the 24kg bow rod with a live yakka got a bit excited followed by a good strike. The fish decided to do a full lap of the boat on the surface with most of us calling it a shark but 45 minutes into the fight he had gone deep them come back to the surface many times but Mike was sure it was a big yellowfin. Anyway about an hour later we had him up and saw a lovely yellowfin with sickles as long as my arm just out of gaff length.. Mike estimated this fish well over 80kg! Unfortunately this is as close as he got as before our eyes the hook pulled. About half hour later we could see fish jumping in the setting sun over Sydney in perfect conditions and slowly watched the fish move around behind our trail. Finally we had our next hook up and boated a fin of 22kg followed by a double hookup with one 28kg and another 35kg. We still had fish in the trail but decided that 3 fish was enough and by this stage it was about 6pm. All in all another great day out.