# MBGFC Jr Angler Tournament



## MSViking (Oct 11, 2007)

*MBGFC Jr Angler Tournament (pic heavy)*

Fished the MBGFC Jr. Angler Tournament Saturday. As always MBGFC puts on great events for the entire family. Crew was me, my sister and her two teenagers as well as my two teenage daughters. Everyone enjoyed the cookout and capt meeting. We made the tough decision of going long and chose to head to a rip that was in the vicinity of Nakika, 130 miles out! We left around 10 pm and made great time and arrived at Nakika at 3AM. There was zero activity at the rig so we ran over to Ensco 8501 with same results. We ran back to Nakika and bump trolled live bait till sunup with zippo happening. At sunup bonita were breaking on the surface and we caught two nice bonita and a very small YF then it shut down.
We made our way east looking for the rip which we easily found, great blue water with a nice weed line to boot. We trolled and we trolled and we trolled yet all we could manage to catch were small dolphin that would jump all over any ballyhoo we put out. Around mid day storms pushed us northward so we ran by the double nipple with only green water at best. In route to the elbow we crossed an awesome looking E/W weed line that was in green water on the south with yuck on the north. We trolled it till time to run in and picked up a nice dolphin.

Ran back at 55 mph, which is referred to as “turning on the AC” on our boat!

The technology in these new large CC continues to amaze me. Being able to fish 130+ miles offshore in a one day tournament comfortably! Radar, Auto pilot, sirius weather map were all critical this weekend to making the trip fun and safe.

Wound up with third place bonita. On a side note,

I continue to make myself look like an idiot around the wiegh dock :bangin:. Memorial Day I called a large white marlin a blue and this week I brought an undersize YF to the dock. I had the regs printed out with me on the boat. My nephew and I looked them over looking for “yellowfin”, which we found showed 20” TL so we thought we were good. Only problem was we were looking at Yellowfin on the grouper page! As I new and should have known Yellowfin tuna is 27 FL!!! :wallbash: Thankfully they were real nice about it and I put my tail between my legs and acted like I knew what I was doing and all was fine. I will rack it up to sleep deprivation. Second weekend in a row going 36+ hrs with no sleep. I think it might be time to buy a bigger boat with a real bed and a shower, just need to win the lottery first!


My Jr Anglers










Settled in their "staterooms" for the 130 mile run out











Rip we fished










My jr anglers hard at work, clearing lines, rigging ballyhoo, and cleaning deck! Ha Ha!! 












My daughter with one of the 1/2 dozen small dolphin we caught










Undersize YF








zipping back at 55mph










My nephews Bonita which came in third place














Sydney's dolphin


----------



## devinsdad (Mar 31, 2010)

Love to read your posts! Looks like a great trip!


----------



## fish head (Jul 6, 2009)

Nice report! Looks like it was a fun trip. You may have misread a regulation in the heat of the moment but you obviously don't miss anything when it comes to safety! Thats what's most important.


----------



## Snatch it (Feb 17, 2009)

Great post!! Thanks, one day I hope to get a chance to see bluewater!!


----------



## Go Deep (Oct 30, 2007)

Looks like everyone had a great time which is all that matters! Gotta love those bean bags for the long runs offshore.
Ed


----------



## samoajoe (Dec 28, 2010)

Great report! That's a mean bonita. Any reports of billfished raised, seen, or released?


----------



## horse sense (Oct 4, 2007)

*more mbgfc report*

We left at midnight and caught some large snapper on the way out ( not big enough though) then headed to the spur around daylight. Found green water and not much else. Ran into two samll rips with grass and a few chicken dolphin. We did catch an honest 3 pound hard tale but could not get anyting to eat it. Continued south until we were 98 miles off shore and only had one hit (Bonita on a read and white cedar plug). We thought we had the third place bonita until MS Yellwofin showed up just at close of scales with one a half pound heavier. Thats fishing! The kids were great and really had a great time but I'm getting old because it has taken me two days to recover. We logged 226 miles in less that 24 hours. Bean bags are great and very comfortable but I still have troube sleeping way out there. MS Yellowfin your pics will cost me four new life jackets as my kids now want the smaller ones that they saw on the pics. Oh well, cant be too safe the auto inflates are really handy if something goes wrong in the dark. The folks at the tourney did a geat job and we had a blast. 

Keith


----------



## MSViking (Oct 11, 2007)

Keith: It was good to see you again. sorry about the bonito! It was hands down the biggest bonito I have ever seen and I was convinced it would win, I was amazed there were two larger!

I make my kids as well as myself wear the auto inflate suspender type jackets when we run at night. I have also added water activated strobes to each one as well. I enjoy running at night but you can never be too safe doing it.

Hope to see you at the Limited later in July.

Robert


----------



## Instant Karma (Oct 9, 2007)

Great job Robert! Good looking crew with a good looking boat!

joe


----------



## MSViking (Oct 11, 2007)

SamoaJoe: There were no billfish tagged or even seen to my knowledge. I don't think but a few boats tried to find bluewater. Out where we were we did not hear of anything other than a few mahi caught. Just means they will be there for the next trip! you back in Samoa yet? You need to post some pics sometime of it for us!

Robert


----------



## samoajoe (Dec 28, 2010)

MSYellowfin said:


> SamoaJoe: There were no billfish tagged or even seen to my knowledge. I don't think but a few boats tried to find bluewater. Out where we were we did not hear of anything other than a few mahi caught. Just means they will be there for the next trip! you back in Samoa yet? You need to post some pics sometime of it for us!
> 
> Robert


Not yet my friend. I sent the wife and child off this morning. I don't leave until thurs am. Trying to get a trip set up now for this weekend. Pics will definitley be posted.....:thumbsup:


----------



## DolphinIV (Jun 18, 2009)

In my opinion, running at 27 knots at night with kids on board is a little scary.


----------



## MSViking (Oct 11, 2007)

I will agree with you that it can be scary running at night however with the radar properly adjusted and the gain turned up high especially with flat seas I am able to see anything that is above the surface of the water. what always concerns us most are the objects that are semi submerged. reality is whether it is 27 knts at night are 45 knts in the day time you rarely if ever can see *those objects before it's too late to take any action, day or night. hopefully worst case would be a ripped off lower unit, whether day or night. Sea state and weight of fuel, gear and ice dictate our speed. We usually try to maintain ad slow a planing speed as possible, which ranges from 17 mph to around 25 mph. As u can see in pics, everyone wears life jackets with strobe lights attached, boat had raft, satellite phone, 1epirb and 3 PLBs ad well as a fully stocked ditch bag*

Reality is day or night, 36 or 56 ft boat there are very real inherent risk running the distances we do. It is definitely Not for everyone, but it is something we enjoy doing

Robert


----------



## horse sense (Oct 4, 2007)

*night driving*

I do not know how to get to where the fish are (or are supossed to be) without running at night. (meeting over at 8:30- 50 plus miles to spot, have to be back by 7 next day) It took me several years to feel less anxious about running at night, but as you said Robert we really enjoy the family time and try to be as safe as possible. If the Blue water comes alot closer we will fish the outboard classic. 

Keith


----------



## Reel Rowdy (Oct 4, 2007)

Well said Robert. Running at night certainly has it's risks but I can't imagine being more prepared for a mishap than you are! We too enjoy running at night and just slow things down a little bit and pay more attention to what's going on. There is NOTHING like a starlit sky offshore at night. Great post.


----------



## Water Boys (Aug 13, 2009)

We caught the first place bonita and first place Spanish(both fish the biggest we have ever caught)! That sounds good, but we only caught them because we trolled in one one enginr for 6 hours after losing a lower unit that was replaced three days earlier. We went after big snapper and only caught 16-18 lbers. When the "trolling" started we caught the winners. We crossed under the bridge at 6:50. If it were not for autopilot, we would have never made it. We could have never steered efficiently enough to make the pass in time.

Ditto on the MBGFC Kid's tourney! Great job! The kids won prizes before we left the dock! I believe they had 160+ kids fishing it this year. They treat 'em just like the big boys! Good food, good prizes, good people!


----------



## MSViking (Oct 11, 2007)

waterboy: It just goes to show you that anything can happen fishing! I had some friends that fished that are very very new to blue water fishing. I set them up with lures, teasers etc... well on way in they came across a floating TV set. they dropped a jig on it and caught the winning wahoo. Again, you never know!

I couldn't believe our bonita was only 3rd, I thought the thing was a def. winner! Biggest bonita I had ever seen!

Glad yall had fun! sorry about the LU!

Robert


----------



## skindeep (May 31, 2009)

Thanks to all of you that entered your kids to fish. I was in charge of the tournament this year and was overwhelmed with the turnout. We have averaged 119 kids over the last 3 years. We had 169 this year. We ran out of buckets and tshirts which I felt terrible about. Luckily we had tons of raffle prizes to give away. With the blue water so far, very few boats targeted billfish. None were caught. We tried hard, fishing about 50 miles south of the spur. We caught the winning dolphin of 36.6 lbs. I was so rushed on the weigh dock with making sure things were running right that I forgot to get a picture!


----------



## MSViking (Oct 11, 2007)

So skindeep and Chris H. are one in the same?


----------



## skindeep (May 31, 2009)

One in the same.


----------

