Rockfish Fuerteventura! - Part three

On Saturday I kinda thought it maybe wise to get some medical attention for my dome so we fished locally in the morning in a spot where you ain't supposed to, but it was early and there was no one about so who cares.

I get really bored of dropshotting at times, actually most of the time, so I decided to fish metals again. Nick was punching out some larger stuff for Barracuda and the like and Scott was hitting the Dropshot. We did see a lazy Barracuda but unfortunately Nick did not connect, Scott was bagging up while things remained slow for me. 

I cannot deny that Dropshotting is an insanely effective technique and especially with gulp, I just find its annoying and if I'm to be a bit snobby - not very skilful. 

Anyhow I did manage to catch some fish, albeit small stuff still.

Greater Weeverfish on an Ecogear vibe bait

Look at those gnashers!

You can see above why fishing larger soft-lures is a bit futile and brutally expensive, these Puffers are everywhere and make short work of most lures.

After a trip to the Pharmacy and the shop to get me a Buff type thing we headed back to the digs for a chill. Nick had decided to take the afternoon off whilst myself and Scott headed down to Tarajalejo and fished a small pier for a bit. 

Actually it was well funny there as the resident chipmunks kept trying to raid our bags in the hope of some lunch, cheeky little critters!

The fishing was a bit sub-par, but we had spotted a sheltered rocky outcrop over the bay and decided to try there, it was pretty good actually and just a good laugh. File fish seemed to be present in quite numbers which I really liked. Filefish do fight well and the occasional one game me something of a run around.

Well all in all it was a chilled but pretty kool day. That night wasn't exactly epic all the same as the wind seemed to get up some and we had a bit of rain, it reminded me far too much of Wales and the fishing was crap too. Ah well, always tomorrow right?

Stay tuned for more and tight lines.

Rockfish Fuerteventura! - Part two

Friday 26th Feb and I woke up feeling a bit worse for wear, seriously burned and my head was wet with weeping sores. I had never been burned so much in my life and its a stark lesson to not be so stupid in the future. Anyhow the show had to go on!

At first light we fished the salt museum area in Caleta de Fuste which became known as "the Salty Gaff". Our hopes were for Bonito, Bluefish and Barracuda yet all I caught were Lizard fish which took my 40g jigs in the swell. I quite like this type of fishing nonetheless, I really like blasting big and heavy stuff and I know full well that in this part of the world decent fish don't come easy so I wasn't overly bothered with the missed target. 

I don't think Scott enjoys it so much though and after some time I did agree that it seemed a bit futile and we headed west, dropping to light game styles again.

Puertito De Los Molinos and Ajuy were out ports of call before heading south to Gran Tarajal. We were trying to find areas that lent themselves to light line angling but the swells had effected most of the Island and the wind speed was increasing. Nevertheless we found some fish.

A Small Derbio I caught on a Shout Dangan mame 5g

An Azores Damsel Fish and a new species for me.

Common Two Banded Sea Bream 

I loves the File Fish

A Common Comber

Macronesian Sharpnose puffer and another new species.

Puffers are a bit of a pain in the ass, they wreck your soft lures like nothing else yet on the other hand they are quite amusing to catch. I had two varieties though only photo's of the one above, the second was the Guinean Puffer. I also didn't photograph any of the hundreds of Ornate Wrasse and Painted comber I seemed to catch, they just get boring after one or two.

After heading back to the digs I pretty much hit the sack right away that night, Sun Stoke had gotten me and we all thought I may need medical attention by this time so we stayed local again for the first part on Saturday.

I think we were all suffering a bit though, I just seemed to get the worst of it being quite blistered.

Stay tuned for more small fish :D

Tight lines!

Rockfish Fuerteventura - Part One

Well I had been looking forward to this trip for some time, initially I had thoughts and dreams of Bonito and Bluefish but as the winter dragged on I found myself just looking forward to sunshine and the great outdoors. Catching anything other than Pollock would now be a huge bonus.

As time got closer I also knew that the chances of encountering a Bonito were slim as the shipping forecasts were looking less than ideal, strong and pervasive North Easterly winds were set to batter the coast for the duration. 

Well I was never going to put all my eggs in one basket anyway and the light game kit was already  prepared and packed.

I met Scott and Nick at Manchester airport on the 24th Feb and we flew out full of anticipation and excitement.

After checking in and finding the digs we were pretty much up for a fish and headed down to some marks surrounding Caleta De Fuste Harbour and Scott and Nick were pretty much straight into fish but it took me a while to start catching, well hooking anyway as I lost 5 decent Salema that evening and only landed a bloody Cardinal fish.
I did help land Scotts Salema though, after slipping about on some precarious rocks!

The next morning after finding a new room mate in my bed

and breakfast

We headed out to Las Playitas and caught absolutely tons of fish, the methods of the day were vibe baits, drop shot and jigs.

Canary Damsel taken on dropshotted Gulp Alive! 1" Fish Fry

Planehead File Fish

Common Two Banded Sea Bream 

Planehead Filefish on an Aquawave Ami

Madeira Rockfish taken on a Dropshot Aquawave Ami rig

Diamond Lizardfish taken on a Shout Dangan mame 5g

Painted Comber on an Ecogear vx40 vibe

Scott with another nice Pandora which has obviously had a hard life.

We caught literally hundreds of fish that day and a lot more species than pictured too, you will likely find a more detailed report on Scotts blog.

We also made a big time rookie mistake this day, in not wearing any suntan lotion! My hat also blew into the sea and I sustained second degree burns to my head and neck which left me quite ill for two days.
I had already made some other mistakes; not charging my Camera and not packing the needed attachments for my action cam! For this reason all the photo's were taken on phones and Scotts old Pentax Optio.
Nonetheless we were still on to a good start with some fun being had, I was real pleased to get my first Filefish as this was a new species for me, I also got my PB Painted comber and its always a pleasure to catch the iconic Scorpionfish.
Scott is always a jammy bugger though and always turns a good Pandora with his funky dropshotting, he did the same in Madeira.

More to come so stay tuned peeps.

Tight lines!