|
There
have been so many great trip logs / fishing updates already this year and
after reading them I have been itching to get out and do some fishing.
Last weekend I finally got the opportunity. JW, RB, JM, and I were
signed up for two tournaments, the Pink Squid on Martha's Vineyard and the
YDYH Bass & Blues in Dennis, MA.
We
left out of Bass River, Cape Cod
Friday afternoon and stopped halfway across the Nantucket Sound to catch
some scup/porgy for bait. It was
raining and the chop was kicking up so much that we almost fell in a few
times. Despite getting tossed around a little, we were able to fill
the live well with bait and also caught plenty of small black sea bass which
were released. The weather had gotten a lot worse than the forecast
and the trip over to MV was a little bumpy even in a 32' Ellis Downeast
cruiser.
We
got over to Edgartown at about 7:00pm and headed out for a bite to
eat. We hit up the Seafood Shanty for dinner and then had a few
cocktails out on the town. The weather was still not that great so
there was not much going on. We called it an early night and
went back to the boat. Around 6:00am we motored out to a spot
recommended to us by a MV local. We set up and started drifting live
scup. We got a few hits and our scup kept being bitten in half which was
encouraging. We continued fishing the same area but there were no
bass and few blues. We managed one small 6lb bluefish and saw some
large dogfish following our bait up. Since there was no dogfish
category in the tournament we decided that drifting
bait was not the way to go and set out to do some jigging. We jigged with wire for a short
time but there was too much grass in the water and eventually we had to
switch over casting lures. We tried for a few hours but only managed
to catch one 28" bass. We gave it our best effort but there were just
no fish around. Luckily RB had brought a grill so we were able to
do some barbequing. We had mixed results with grilling on a moving
boat. Trying to heat a frying pan full of scrambled
eggs while cutting through the waves does not work so well but burgers
and dogs turn out great. We got back to the dock around 3/4pm and
felt a lot better once we learned that a lot of other people had the same
luck. The tournament winning fish were a
22lb Striped Bass and a 10lb Bluefish. Although we had no fish to weigh
we had spent the day tossing back silver bullets and barbequing on the water
so no one had any complaints.
We
were scheduled to leave the next morning to fish in Nantucket but we
realized we were low on diesel and all of the fuel docks on Martha's Vineyard
were closed until 9:00am the next day. We decided to head to
Nantucket because we were fishing there the next day any way and RB had a few friends
he wanted to see.
Edgartown
Lighthouse |
 Bass
river to Mashpee, to MV, to Nantucket, and back |
We
pulled into Nantucket harbor at around 8:00pm. After docking up, one
of RB's friend's, Nick, stopped by the boat. Nick said he had been
out the day before and that the fishing was great. He gave us some
great local fishing intel which would prove to be right on the money the
next day. Once the boat was secure we headed over to Slip 14, www.slip14.com
, a restaurant owned by another one of RB's friend's Jonas. I had
met Jonas before but had not had a chance to eat at his restaurant.
He is a fisherman and has a few fishing boats. He also runs a the
Nantucket Bluefin Blast Tuna Tournament www.bluefinnantucket.com
. Before opening Slip 14 he had worked at Bluefin, a sushi
restaurant, and has a lot of experience with fresh seafood so I expected
the food to be great. We started off with some appetizers - cod
fritters, smoked bluefish pâté, and calamari, and artichoke dip.
They were all were delicious. For the main course, Nick recommended
the sea scallops so I gave them a try. They were excellent and
everyone else's main courses looked just as good. Overall, the food was amazing and the
seafood was super fresh and cooked perfectly. I highly recommend stopping in for lunch or
dinner if you ever have the chance.
After
dinner we hung around and had a few more drinks. The restaurant has a huge bar outside and gets pretty
packed at night. At around 11:30 we headed down to some local bars
for a few more cocktails and then headed back to the boat around
1:30am. Thanks to Nick, Jonas, Christie, and everyone else who helped us out
last weekend for their hospitality and for showing us such a great time in
Nantucket!
 Slip
14 |
 Jonas |
We got up around 7:00am the next morning and headed out to fish off
the east end of Nantucket for the second tournament. We left in
think fog but it eventually burned off as the sun came up. Nick had
given us a location of where the fish had been the previous day and said
to fish under the birds with poppers during the slack tide and jig when
the tide was moving. He could not have given us better
information. Immediately upon getting to the spot we saw some birds
working. We sped over and saw other boats bringing in some large
fish. We started casting out poppers and other lures in hopes of getting
them to bite. Within a few casts we had fish between 10 and 30lbs
chasing out poppers back to the boat. TW hooked into the first of
over five fifteen pound bass using a Yozuri squid lure. The largest
fish was about 19lbs. He was
fishing on top of the cabin and fought the fish to the boat close to 15
feet above the water. It was impressive and amazing he did not fall
in the way the boat was swaying back and forth. I was using a white
popper and had fish chasing it but no bites for the first 10 minutes or so
until I saw a large fish chasing it and then my line started peeling
out. I had seen the size of the bass that were chasing it and
thought I had a keeper striper for sure. It turned out to be a big
bluefish and it took some fight to get it back to the boat. We worked the fish until the birds dispersed
and the tide started running. We then jigged the remainder of the
afternoon and pulled in a few more good size bass. What a day of
fishing! We had a cooler full of fish and the weigh-in was in Bass
River on the south side of the Cape at 4:00 so we started heading back
around 2:00pm. We got to the weigh in location and brought up our
fish up to the scale to see how we did. The winning bass was 26lbs
and had been hooked through the back with a bunker spoon. Talk about
luck! Although we were about 6lbs short in the striped bass category
we did end up winning 1st place for the bluefish. The 9.3lb bluefish
I had caught in the beginning of the day turned out to be the winning
fish. We were all pretty spent but psyched that we had taken 1st
place in one of the tournaments that weekend. We grabbed some food
at the tournament dinner and then took off for home. After a rough day of fishing Saturday we ended up
having an insane day of fishing on Sunday and an all
around awesome weekend. Thanks to JM for letting us live on his boat
for the weekend and to JM/RB/TW for putting the weekend together.
-JH
Nantucket
Lighthouse |
Fog leaving
Nantucket |
Capt JM at the
helm of the "Echo" |
RB - Ready to
fish early Sunday Morning |
TW with bass |
JH with 1st
Place Bluefish |
Fish on the
deck |
TW cutting up
bass |
 |
 |
|
