The season has started and seas have calmed down considerably around the island of San Cristobal. Water temperature close to the island on the SW side still remains a chilling 67/68 F. Offshore around Rosa Blanca water has held 71/72 F. 88 bank 68 miles Northeast of the port of San Cristobal is a bit warmer with 74 F. Water has been dark blue everywhere we fished and the presence of bait and life was very encouraging. Tunas were a pest everyday just about.
This time we had the pleasure of fishing with Andy Helms and his wife Jillian Kus. They chose Galapagos as their honeymoon destination.
On their first day in Galapagos they took a tour to snorkel with sea lions, sharks and turtles around Kicker Rock and Lobos's island. The next day Dec 17, 2012 the fishing began. Onboard the Jhonamar 2 the newly weds headed for Rosa Blanca to try their luck at marlin. The seas were a calm 3 foot. Bait, dolphins and tuna were seen working around the honey hole. A jumping striped marlin put on a show but the marlin remained absent from the spread for the day. Conditions were wonderful but the marlin did not want to play. Several big eye tuna were caught around 30# and when the couple had enough it was time to focus on marlin. The day went without any marlin raises but the tuna made for a wonderful dinner
Day 2 took Andy and his lovely wife Northeast to 88 Bank. As soon as lines went into the water bites from pesky tunas were frequent and not long into the troll did a stripey come up to chase a bait but did not eat. Tunas were a nuisance and again they caught multiple tunas from double and triple hook ups on the circle hooks. Eventually they had to troll all teaser until the tunas would go away. 5 stripeys were raised with 2 bites and 2 releases of on fish around 170# and a second fish around 130#. They were very vivid fish showing lots of flash on the tease and bite. Plenty of bait and several surface feeding stripeys were seen during the day. A large dorado around 50# plus came to chase a teaser as well.Dec 19 and final day of the Helm's trip took the on the Jhonamar 2 all the way to 88 Bank again. Seas were a bit choppier as the wind had picked up but it was not bad at all. The crew was not done putting lines out when a triple header of tunas hooked up. As soon as baits went back in tuna would hook up. This pretty much went all day and over a dozen tunas were caught and many more released. It was almost impossible to keep baits in the water. The fish averaged 15 to 25#. Only one marlin which looked like a blue came into the spread. A group of 5 tailing stripeys was seen late in the day but they had no interest in coming into the spread. We knew there were more marlin that we weren't seeing but they would not play today. Lots of bait on the bank
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