Best big fish fishing in the world?

[spill]

I am looking to plan a fishing trip of a lifetime with my father and brother some time in 2008. I could do with some suggestions on destinations and time of year to fish them.
We have done some big freshwater fish trips in the past and had a great time, but we fancy something different.
I am thinking boat fishing - perhaps big Shark, Tuna or Marlin, lots of action and most importantly - massive fish!
I'm not asking much, am I?

[PanamaJack]

Hi Spill
In answer to your question - not at all. But obviously everything comes at a cost.

If that's no object and you want to catch a really big Marlin, with the possibilty of one over the magical 1000lbs in weight - a 'grander', then I'd go to northern Queensland's Great Barrier Reef in October/November. They're Black Marlin.

In terms of Blues that's much more difficult. But places like Ascension Island, Northern Brazil, Bermuda, La Gomera and Ghana regularly produce big fish. And both Madeira and Faial in the Azores can, on their day, produce 'granders'.

If though it was a trip of a lifetime I'd perhaps consider something like the Ultimate Lady's operation. That runs out of the Bay of Islands (New Zealand). Here the main target species would be big Striped Marlin - and a lot they catch are in the 3 to 400lb range. But they also catch very big Mako Sharks and Broadbill Swordfish whilst drifting at night. But to put that into perspective the daily charter rate for this 90 footer is around £1500 a day and one of the remote set of banks they fish is 36 hours steaming out.

Sticking with Marlin for the moment, and somewhat closer to home and if 'numbers and excitement' where key I'd probably target Sao Vicente in the Cape Verde Islands. Here they're Blue Marlin but you'd anticipate multiple strikes a day, mainly from fish in the 2 to 300lb range. And each year one or two 'granders' are encountered. Yellowfin Tuna, fish up to 250lbs, also show up. And a 40 mile trip to Sao Nicolau would offer the chance of Tiger Sharks at night.

If though Tiger Sharks were of more interest I'd suggest places like Kenya or Brisbane (Queensland).

And if you just want to catch a BIG Shark well I'd try Ascension Island for the Six Gills. You'd be bottom fishing in around 600' of water for 1000lb fish. And the bottom at night can be carpeted with them. The quickest bite I've every heard of being recorded happened 38 seconds after the bait touching bottom. But fighting characteristics, um.... they're often described as 'Cement Fish'! However that would give you a big fish. Then they're the Marlin and masses and masses of Yellowfin Tuna - fish up to 250lbs or so.

Moving on then BIG Tuna are much more problematic.

For BIG Yellowfin then places like Ghana or the Pacific coast of Central America are worth targeting. The long range boats that operate out of places like San Diego regularly get 300 pounders with some within a whisker of 400.

Then there's the west coast of New Zealand's South Island that's producing monsterous Southern Bluefin - 700 pounders upwards. But that can be extreme fishing with, due to adverse weather, opportunities limited.

The big Bluefin Tuna that used to be caught in the North Sea though have been over exploited throughout their range. And possibly the only place I'd suggest you have a realistic crack at them would be east coast USA - the canyons off New York, Cape Cod through to Maine. With strict conservation of juveniles though some big fish are now starting to show up in their traditional grounds off Nova Scotia and PEI.

The other option for Bluefin, although very few would be 'Giants', would be off North Carolina during the winter months - places like Cape Hatteras or Morehead City.

I realise that much of what I've written has focused on BIG fish. I'd suppose though I'd if it was going to be a one-off trip of a lifetime would probably look for variety - offshore and inshore. I would opt for the Pacific coast of Central America, Panama or Costa Rica, with perhaps some Tarpon fishing in the Florida Keys thrown in on the way down. There you would expect species like Sailfish (mainly), Marlin and Tuna offshore and Roosterfish and Cubera Snapper inshore. (And both countries have lakes stocked with Peacock Bass if you were interested.) That would fit in with your 'lots of action'.

As well as individual guides down there there some excellent lodges which would help to make it feel like a 'trip of a lifetime'. Off hand places worth considering are http://www.tropicstar.com, http://www.crocodilebay.com and there's a place I've never visited, but thought about, on the Perlas Islands in Panama. (You could find it through one of the search engines.

Then somewhere else, albeit without Marlin, perhaps worth considering is Guinea Bisseau (West Africa). There, as well as the excellent inshore fishing, the BIG fish would be Sharks and Tarpon.

Anyway hope that's given you a starting point.
Dave

[PanamaJack]

Well, another venue for 1000lb plus Marlin? This is the first I've heard of coming from this tiny island in the Indian Ocean - a protectorate of Mauritius. A German aquaintance, literally today, has landed a 1250 pounder on 80lb stand-up tackle.

There's a cyclone coming though and in the morning they're 'retreating' to Mauritius.

[johnwahoo]

Why not give us a try in the Andaman Islands good marlin fishing yellowfin tuna plenty of sharks all the bottom fish you need plus jigging for dogtooth tuna and popping for GT's.Check out www.wahoo.ws andaman photos you will see what it is like.The food Thai food cooked aboard is second to none.

[spill]

Thank you Dave (and John) for your ideas. I will have to look into them all.

I particularly like the idea of catching huge Six-Gills off Ascension. Cape Verde Islands also look tempting.

Money will be a factor - if I could afford it, I would fish all the places mentioned! A combination of money and time may rule out Australia and New Zealand, but I will have to see.

One thing I will have to look into is the likelyhood of bad weather spoiling things. I know that this can happen almost anywhere, but it would be a real shame to invest a lot of time and money into a trip to get no time fishing due to bad conditions. Maybe the idea of some inshore fishing too would make beating the weather more likely.

Time to start saving and weight-training!

[Kingfish81]

Spill, I can't really add much more than Dave has already said - the chap is a walking piscatorial encyclopedia!! One quick thing on the Cairns black marlin fishery regarding prices though. I fished a day out there in September (before the big girls turned up) back in 2004 whilst on holiday and spoke to the skipper for ages. I remember he said that a four day, three night liveaboard charter cost AU$7500 in October, which at the current rate is about £3000... Is expensive, but it would give you a chance at some HUGE fish...

The baja in Mexico in June-August or Cabo San Lucas in Jan-Feb would give you shot at lots of striped marlin, yellowfin tuna etc. Although these aren't huge fish - the stripies average around 100-150lb and the YFT are typically under 50lb... But the fishing is very cheap so you could potentially afford to go for longer...

[marktheshark]

I agree with Kingfish. Of all the places I've been, Baja offers the most consistent offshore big game fishing, some half-decent shore action, and a growing fly-fishing scene. It's completely geared up to anglers, the boat-fishing is good value for money, and IMHO you've a better chance of catching marlin there than comparable places such as Tobago, Mauritius or Thailand. The bread-and-butter fish are 100-150lb stripies, but one of those, on 30lb gear, caught from a skiff, will provide backache to last a fortnight and memories to last a lifetime.

[Spitfire66]

Nice post Panama Jack - very well informed.

[PanamaJack]

Thank you Dave (and John) for your ideas. I will have to look into them all.

I particularly like the idea of catching huge Six-Gills off Ascension. Cape Verde Islands also look tempting.

Money will be a factor - if I could afford it, I would fish all the places mentioned! A combination of money and time may rule out Australia and New Zealand, but I will have to see.

One thing I will have to look into is the likelyhood of bad weather spoiling things. I know that this can happen almost anywhere, but it would be a real shame to invest a lot of time and money into a trip to get no time fishing due to bad conditions. Maybe the idea of some inshore fishing too would make beating the weather more likely.

Time to start saving and weight-training!

Hi Spill
Yes the Six Gills are BIG fish! The two boats – Shy 3 and Harmattan – have just started their post Christmas season and after a day’s Marlin fishing Shy’s charter wanted to anchor up on the drop off, chunking for the Yellowfin Tuna and bottom fishing for the sharks. That first night I understand they released an estimated 1800 pounder. There should be a report of it soon on Olaf’s - the skipper – personal web site - http://mitglied.lycos.de/grimmel23/.

If bottom fishing for them proves too much like ‘hard work’ they also catch Makos and Threshers and occasional Tiger Sharks. But most frequently, and they even catch these from the shore, something called Galapagos Sharks – these run up to over 300lbs in weight. That said they can be a menace! (Well that’s my view.) Troll a livebait or lure too close to the shore and you’ll get it hit and I’ve even caught them at night whilst fishing for Swordfish.

As well as Olaf’s site it’s also, if you’re thinking of going there, worth viewing Matthias’ site - http://www.atlanticfishingcharter.com/index.html. And although you’ll see that the skippers prefer Marlin fishing here’s another link that shows anglers deepwater jigging and surface popping - http://www.caranx.net/forums/index.php?showtopic=1222. And some more pictures of the same trip - http://www.caranx.net/ascension_report.htm.

There’s a reasonable amount written about getting to Ascension on other threads in the International forums. It’s remote and literally the only way down there is by RAF transport – it’s a refuelling stop on the way down to the Falklands. And because of its remoteness and the logistics of getting spares and crews there charter rates are high at 1100 Euros a day. But the fishing can be spectacular, especially fishing Bait ‘n’ Switch for the Blue Marlin.

You also mentioned Cape Verde. This is definitely the place for lots of Blue Marlin, mainly small but big fish are always turning up. From memory a renown American big game angler, Stewart Campbell, holds the ‘record’ (globally) having released 22 Blue Marlin in one day! Read through Olaf’s reports though. That should give you a more realistic view of numbers.

Here boats are somewhat more reasonable in price. Berno’s boats are, from memory, 700 to 750 Euros a day - http://www.capeverde-fishing.com/english/index.html -
and Zak Conde’s (an Azorean I’ve fished with) new boat a 38’ Hatteras is 900 Euros a day. (Let me know if you want Zak’s e-mail address.) There are a couple of other boats there and I can similarly get contact details for you. Again just let me know.

Finally just to get you in the ‘swing’ of things there’re some excellent fishing photographs of Cape Verde and Ascension on this link - http://www.worldseafishing.com/forum...ad.php?t=33426.
Dave
PS Definitely the final point. I've done a reasonable amount of overseas fishing and could count I suspect the number of days that have been cancelled through bad weather on the fingers of one hand. And that's been when either hurricanes or cyclones are passing near by. Winds can be at a level where anchoring is impractical but most of the time you're trolling and fishing in deep oceanic waters - you get big swells rather than breaking waves.

[spill]

Thanks again PanamaJack. I think I will be spending the next few days fully looking into the links you have provided and the next few weeks discussing the options with my brother and father.
Its looking more and more like Ascension for me. I can't wait.