SPORTFISHING BOAT TINKNOCKER MAKES 3 OFFSHORE OUTINGS

Sept. 28, 2005, Stan Vath, Tinknocker, Puerto Vallarta, Mexico Fishing Trip Report:

Here is the latest on Tinkocker's fishing at Puerto Vallarta. We will report after each trip outside.

09/25/2005: We left Punta Mita and headed to Roca Corbetena at 0530 hours. We arrived at 0730 hours and were the only boat at the rock. We looked around for Skipjack but none showed until about 0900 hours and we made 7 quickly.

We trolled around and at 1005 hours “Big Daddy” Don Burnside gets a knockdown on the port rigger, lets it run and pulls the 12/0 39950 BL Mustad Demon circle hook into place. This hook has a ringed 2/0 Mutu trailer. This ringed concept was devised on TINKNOCKER in 2004 and perfected by Jim Kastorff for the 2005 season.

The fish doesn’t do much for a while and is just kinda out there. When Don puts some heavy drag to it, the fish makes a good run. At this time we see a tail beat and know it’s a tuna. The fish is real stubborn but so is Don. The drag is past strike but the fish is still pulling line so Don moves the drag up a bit and starts gaining line. After that he puts it to full and we have 3 gaffs in it in 30 minutes. Larry puts a fourth gaff in its nose and we drag it through the transom door and everyone is stoked! I took the measurements several times and it taped 307 pounds conservatively, 73 inches x 58 inches. Later it went 313 pounds on our certified scale. The rod was a Calstar 655TSS. The reel a Penn 80ST, with 200 pound Hollow Jerry Brown Spectra with a BHP 25 foot 200 pound FC Topshot. The water temperature was 88 degrees.

Jason Thompson also caught 2 huge Pargo with skipjack trolled on the downrigger, 55.2 pounds and 30.6 pounds.

We trolled Skipjack until 1600 hours but only had a couple knockdowns which were a Marlin and a Pargo but neither stuck.

We headed into Punta Mita for dinner but a rain storm came up, as well as the wind and swell, so we stayed on the boat. Don had brought a bottle of 1993 Dom Perignon for such an occasion. So we toasted the first Cow of 2005 and the first yellowfin tuna over 300 pounds on TINKNOCKER.

09/26/2005: We went in to Punta Mita for breakfast at El Dorado. It was excellent as usual. Hector's new restaurant is not open for breakfast so we did not see him. We took a walk around town with our panga taxi Captain Cacho and then back to the boat. Weather still is sucking but coming down tomorrow so we did odd jobs on TINKNOCKER and rested a bit.

09/27/2005: We headed out to the Rock at 0500 hours. The weather had changed around to the prevailing stuff out of the northwest. We trolled a bit for Wahoo but with no results.

Puerto Vallarta fishing water is cleaning up and the other exotics should be here in force soon. The Skippy’s usually don’t bite until 0900 hours or so and we made 5 at 0915 hours.

We started trolling and only had one taker that rocked me after a solid hookup. We trolled Skippy’s until about 1400 hours, then put up the kite. It worked awesome but no takers. We had a couple of fly lined baits out on the kite drift and 2 minutes before we were heading back one got bit and Jason Thompson had his first yellowfin tuna, a 50 pounder, and we avoided the "Skunk."

Fishing at Puerto Vallarta has been really tough with even the best boats and skippers blanking some days. Today only 5 yellowfin tuna were caught in the fleet, with two cows on boats we did not know. Josh got one in the high hundreds. Danny on the Marla II had an 80 pounder, and our 50 pounder. There are some really great charter operations down here that target Cows. The Marla II, Yolaray and Prime Time are all in the hunt daily.

(See "Mexico Fishing News" online for current fishing reports, photos, weather, and water temperatures from Puerto Vallarta and other major Mexican sportfishing areas. Vacation travel articles, fishing maps and seasonal calendars, and fishing related information for Puerto Vallarta may be found at Mexfish.com's main Puerto Vallarta page.