Well hell, the time came again for the moon to full up and a winter front came through. We thought for sure we were f'kd. I had NOAA wind warnings coming in for work. 30 - 40 knots sustained Thursday and Friday, gusts to 60 knots in the squall line. It blew like mad and only just slowed down on Saturday. The waves were spraying across all 4 lanes of the Blvd. on the south side of the island. The water was milk as far out as you can see.
Sunday showed a drop in the wind for just a few hours. We had reports of terrible vis all the way out to 200'. Once again my buddy Trae pushes it to the fucking limit trying to get hoo's. I cancelled everyone on my boat for the Sunday plan. I have 2 brother/sister in law in town with 3 kids next door. Getting everything ready for my son for Christmas. The excuses piled up. Trae had his boat at my house. Late Saturday night his 3rd diver cancelled. Him and his buddy Chip would be a 2 man boat, diving 1 at a time. Chip had drove down 8 hours for this shot. I pulled my man pants on told my wife, count me out in the morn, I'm joining Trae on his boat.
We load up at 6am and push off the dock. Get 5 houses down the canal and the motor shuts off. Trae has a 23 Formula with a single 300 Suzuki. One of the baddest smaller center consoles I've ever been on. We check all the fuses and breakers. Chip paddles us back to my house with the cleaning brush

.
We hit my dock. I tell Trae before we launch my boat off the lift to just tighten everything. The battery terminals were tight. There was a single post bus that connected all the negatives. He put the socket on it and it was loose. He tightened it down and boom, ignition. Everything back on.
We ran out west to the wahoo grounds. It's about a 23 mile run from my house. One of my good buddy's was there before us. Looking down we could tell the water sucked. He had his guy dressed and jumped in. Told us the vis was 25' maybe. Not good. I decided we run back east. After checking the sub wreck in 220' and the vis being no better we took off. I stopped at 3 different spots about 5 or 6 miles of jumps and the vis got no better. After we are basically back off of Key West the vis starts turning blue out of nowhere. We hit the end of the outside reef where I have seen wahoo before.
I jump in with Trae. No one wanted to get in. It was 65* air and that with the wind is damn near arctic for us. But I was dressed because if I was gonna be there I was gonna kill something. We jump in to a particle free crystal 70' of vis.
I tell these guys all the time. If we are targeting wahoo, stop diving all the time. About 5 minutes in and Trae already gets bored. Does a dive down to about 70'. Thats fine if you see snapper or grouper in the chum, or big kings. He was just bored. I'm looking down at him looking down at the bottom. I look up and here come 8 wahoo. hahaha. I remember thinking, this is so great. They would have came in right on his side but he was down. He was fucked. I dive down and let them come into me. The smallest is the closest so I look right past him. The next fish is pretty nice, the rest broke the other way. I waited to long now they're going away. Trae looks up and spooks them so they turn back. Perfect angle but long shot, right through the high back, doesn't go all the way through. I'm on.
This things take a few really big runs. I didn't hurt him and knew I needed to be smart so I let him go. After about 10 minutes I have him in my hands. The success was mine and it was about 8:15. I was ready for a beer. I was freezing.
Trae and Chip get in and I take over driving. After the next 1 or 2 hours (I can't remember) they don't see any more wahoo but keep saying there are big kings. King Mackerel are awesome fish to shoot, just not as good to eat. But much harder to find a big fish. I finally convince Trae if they are big to shoot. So he does, and brings in a 44# king which is a freaking awesome fish to shoot.
After he lands his fish I get excited for a king and jump in. I'm hovering over another big fish as it eats chum. This time though his fish brought in about 5 big bull sharks that have us surrounded. So I thought this is NOT a good idea, and I pulled the trigger. LOL. The funny stops there. The fish dove but I was making ground no problem. But I started to get some line around my leg and that was enough for me. I let the fish go to get immediately unwrapped. The fish dove into the depths and got sharked instantly. My favorite Sea Sniper slip-tip did not make it back up. That was a $100 shot. Oh well, I made the choice.
After that the wind started to howl a few hours earlier than expected. We decided we were ready to head home and just be happy the plan worked out. Sorry for the long story but these two fish don't make it seem to great unless you know how it went down. Wahoo went 38# and King Fish at 44#.



Trae with my fish, haha
