Left the dock at 4:30 and headed over to check out. Caught the darn train bridge…thought we would miss the first train but caught it. The checkout was much more organized and civil than years past when boats were circling to check out and racing out from the monument.

Broke the inlet set our course for our spot some 50 plus nautical and had a very uneventful ride out. Didn’t see much life on the ride out and the water was pretty warm the whole ride out and didn’t start dropping in temp till we were almost 45 off. Ride out took a little over 2 hours 30 minutes but was a nice ride out compared to the last two years.

Got the slick setup and rods out and before we got the last rod out had our first bite. First fish, mako, and released about a 100 pounder. Got reset and about 20-30 minutes later we get our second run off. It played with the bait for a while. Then hit another rod, fought the fish for a few minutes, get it near the boat and another small mako released. Get reset again, change all the baits out to what had the first two fish, bonita fillet and squid and reset all the rods.

Had a couple of run offs and a stripped bait. Then we get a double header, drop one and hook one for our third fish. I’m on the rod and get the fish to the boat and it is another small mako about 50-60 pounds. Released that fish, reset the rods and then it was quiet for a little while. We put a time limit on moving back up our slick and we get another run off that never came tight.

We moved back up the slick, about 45 minutes later we get another run off that quickly went slack. Then as we are getting ready to call it a day we get a real good run off. Get the other lines cleared, fight the fish for a little bit and nice dusky comes up. Released that one and got cleaned up and headed in.

We never found the fish we were looking for but had good action with several run offs, three makos to the boat, one pulled hook near the boat and a dusky.

We never found the cooler water but there was tons of life out there. Turtles, bait, birds. The guys a little further off in the Toms and Hudson were picking YFT and eyeballs but were covered up in bluefish and it was tough getting through them to the tuna. On the ride in the water ranged from 74 to 77! It looks to be shaping up for a good inshore tuna season.

On the ride in we heard from a friend of ours from down our dock that was racing in with a nice fish to weigh. They ended up hanging a nice fat 232 to put them in 3rd in Mako Fever and 4th in Mako Mania at the end of Saturday. We wish Brian and the crew of the Bella Mia the best of luck in maintaining their position through today.

Headed out Saturday morning late (7 am) in order to avoid Saturday’s checkout for the tourneys  to get some fresh bait. We headed out to the Manasquan Ridge and the Southeast Lump. All sorts of live out there, we had porpoise, turtles, sunfish, bunker and sand eels but no bluefish. Just an occasional cocktail blue. After a few hours of getting frustrated we moved in on the Axel Carlson for sea bass and ling. It was non stop action with almost no short sea bass and the keepers were all over 17″ and the ling varied in size from 1.5 to 4 pounds.

Sunday morning we checked out and headed offshore with the front of the pack. Made it to our spot in just under 2.5 hours. Upon arrival the water was blue, clear and 68.5 degrees. Had good life on the wrecks but nothing came to investigate the slick.

Had a really slow drift despite the wind and swell. We went to make a move to get setup back at the beginning of the slick and halfway we had a free jumping mako about 200-225 pounds. Stopped immediatle and got baits out right away but was unable to raise the fish.

Ran in to the fingers to give that a shot for an hour or two and had nothing there. The drift was even slower, at first we just doing circles and couldn’t get the lines away from the boat.  We did see tuna busting a couple times while running and lot of really big debris out there so if you are running off keep a close watch. Lots of pilings just at or below the surface.

Fished aboard a buddies boat in my marina on a 32′ Albie for the tournament. We first setup in an area of some smaller wrecks between the Triples and the Toms. We had a nice 68-70 degree temp break early in the day and 70-72 in the afternoon. We were a little concerned about the warmer than anticipated water there but it produced all day.

Our first run-off was within 30 minutes of setting up. The 50W started screaming, way too fast to be a mako…then just as I picked up the rod it stopped. Reeled in to check the bait and not a mark on it. Five minutes later again…screaming drag. Few minutes later we released a small bluefin.

About 9:45 we had the first mako in the slick, and two more after that but none of them took baits, just swam around and looked…both were probably in the 150-180 pound range. After they disappeared we had another run-off, Mike set the hook, took two cranks and the hook pulled.

Then we get another taker, Tommy grabs the rod, sets the hook and this time is stays hooked. After a brief 20 minute battle we had 140-160 pound mako boat-side and decided to release her.

Ten minutes after that we are blessed with another run-off…Mark grabs the rod, hits the fish for the first hook set and the rod doubles over…he screams big fish and sets two more times. At first the fish just sat there for a second. Mark took a few cranks in and then she came alive peeling about 50 yards on the first run…then turned and charged the boat. A few minutes later she was about 30′ behind the boat, we got our first look at the fish…and it was big…about 250-280 pounds. She took one look at us and the boat and went straight down. Fifteen minutes later the line parted. Then she came back and gave us the finger buy jumping twice…once off the stern tapping the tip of the port rigger on the way up and then a second time off the starboard side just missing the side of the boat on the way down. I was standing on the bridge and when it did a somersault-tail over head the head was about two feet higher than eye level. Man what a sight…It was so close I could have reached out and grabbed the wire with the hook still it its mouth.

At this point we figured it just wasn’t our day. We made up new rigs with longer leaders…our first mistake. We did have a few more fish come up on the slick throughout the rest of the day and a few more run-offs but no more hookups.

All the run-offs and hookups were on the deep bait, nothing on the top or mid water baits all day long.

It was a great day on the water, we all had a lot of fun. It was my first sharking trip and the first time for both me and Tommy to see a mako jump in real life. At the end of the day we had 9 makos in the slick, 6 run-offs, released a small bluefin, released a small mako and lost a big mako. We also learned some for next time…we will never go shorter than 14′ leaders again!