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Hatteras 6/14 - 6/16

Offshore 
2K views 4 replies 5 participants last post by  Meakle 
#1 ·
The wife and I took a trip to Hatteras last week with one goal in mind: Successfully boat our first Dolphin. Our first stop was the Pelican's Roost to buy bait and ballyhoo rigs, since I had none. The owner was very friendly and had some good tips about Clark Spoons versus another brand that he stocks (can't remember the name). He said that Clark Spoons are now made in China and have cheap hooks that easily rust and break, which I've seen happen with several of my spoons. He gave me a free spoon for spending a small fortune there and I bought a couple more, then we headed out for Spanish Mackerel since it was too late and rough to run offshore. The first fish was a surprise - a baby cobia. Not exactly what I expected for my first cobia, but whatever. We finally got on some mackerel and boated 20 along with plenty of small blues.

Wednesday ended up being a bit rougher than the forecast was calling for, but we pounded our way out 20 miles in our 21' Wellcraft anyway. After 2 hours of absolutely nothing, I remarked, "I sure would like to hear a screaming drag right now." 5 seconds later it happened and we had our first dolphin on the line and going airborne. I'd like to say everything went according to plan after that, but being beginners at the offshore trolling game I'm just happy we got the fish. We went until just before noon without any more action and then had a flurry of activity to end the day 4 for 5 on gaffer dolphin plus a bonus blackfin.

Thursday brought calmer seas, but nastier weather. Fished through a pretty good thunderstorm and when things settled down we picked up two small dolphin. We didn't get anything else for several more hours, got one more gaffer and proceeded to tangle all three lines around the prop. OK, I'm new at trolling in the ocean, but I've fished the Great Lakes my whole life, so this was more than a little embarrassing. Fortunately the water was a balmy 81 degrees, so I threw on a life jacket, tied off to the boat, and proceeded to cut everything loose. Much to my surprise, the wife didn't cut ME loose, so we resumed fishing but caught nothing else other than another Spanish mackerel and some blues on the return trip.

Well, we ended up our first 7 dolphin and a freezer full of meat so I'd say mission accomplished! Unfortunately I think I am seriously addicted now... does anyone have a 24-27' twin engine boat they'd like to sell? By the way, our best bait was a Bluewater Candy ballyhoo rig in blue/white. Not cheap, but super easy to use for a novice like me.

I'm joking about the boat... kinda.
 

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