Lepika Sportfishing, Kailua Kona, HI 96740 • 808-960-0068

Dusty and Denise are celebrating their 6th wedding anniversary here in Kona.  Dusty is a charter boat captain from Charleston, South Carolina and really wanted to catch some big ahi.  Dusty is also good friends of Keith who was crewing for me today.  We left the harbor before the sun came up and found a big pod of porpoise just as the sun came up.  I didn’t see any marks of fish in the pod so we headed father into the ledge.  There we found another pile of porpoise, but again no signs of tuna in them.  I decided to head back offshore into the deep and retrace our path from earlier in the morning hoping another pod was father back.  As we crossed the 1000 fathom line a big hole opened up behind the short corner bait just 15 yards behind the boat!  The line snapped off the rigger and peeled off the reel as the big blue headed for the horizon.  It didn’t jump until it was about 300 yards away so none of us knew how big she was, but we knew she was over 500lbs.  Line was disappearing at an alarming rate so we turned and chased the fish going forward.  Denise was already buckled into the fighting chair and cranking as hard as she could to keep tension on the line.  The fish was now about 700 yards out and still going!  We had less than 200 yards of line on the reel before the fish settled down and we were only 5 minutes into the fight!  Denise settled into her fight trying to gain a few feet at a time on the marlin.  She fought the fish hard for about 2 hours before her body started to hurt.  Keith and Dusty helped her as she continued the rest of the fight.  The fish went deep and the battle got even harder as she had to deal with a lot of lifting and cranking.  For the last hour (yes, a 3 hour fight time) Keith turned the crank and Dusty held Denise in the chair.  Finally, the fish was at the boat!  The marlin had died during the fight and we had been battling dead weight for about 15 minutes.  The fight had taken us just over 3 hours and we landed her more than 2 miles from where we hooked up!  Denise was exhausted and sore but she hung in there like a champ!  Her 1st ever blue marlin would hit the scales at 673lbs!  That’s a big anniversary present!

The last few days have had some action for smaller game!  Good friends Joe Bruno along with his wife’s family joined me for a full day.  We caught a nice spearfish and a mahimahi which they took home for grilling!  A few days later, Norman brought his two sons Trevor and Jacob out for a full day.  We went far south of the harbor looking for some action but most of it was back off of town so we headed back north.  As soon as we got back in the “zone” we caught two really nice mahimahi for each of the boys!  Steve and Rod, along with their wives Patty and Kathy fished with me the next day and caught a nice spearfish as well!  They took some nice fillets home to grill that night too!  There is definitely some action and the fishing is picking up.  Rumors of big fish being missed have been spreading around the harbor and the big blues should be showing soon!

Today, Jim and Nancy of Kansas joined me for a full day on the Lepika.  The weather was a little unstable and we had some wind out of the north but since the bite has been near the airport we headed into the wind.  We took a few waves over the bow and we were definitely “not in Kansas” anymore!  Jim and Nancy did great and they hung in there threw the rough weather.  We fished a nice pod of porpoise without a bite for most of the day.  It was a lot of rocking and rolling and they were getting tired so we started back.  The water had calmed as we passed just south of the airport on the 500 fathom line.  My good friend Keith was deckhanding for me.  He was sitting on the flybridge next to me when a big blue marlin exploded from outside the wake on the long corner bait!  The big blue came up jumping inside the spread going straight away and dumping a lot of line in a hurry.  The marlin headed straight away as Jim got harnessed into the fighting chair.  I started backing down hard on the fish trying to make it easy for Jim to gain line.  He was shaking in the chair, fulll of excitement and awe.  He had half a spool to bring in still…over 500 yards.  Slowly but surely we gained on the fish.  We put the Fin Nor 130 in low gear and he steadily gained line.  After 35 minutes we finally got the fish to leader!  Unfortunately, she was hooked in the eye and we decided to take her instead of feed the sharks.  Jim’s first blue marlin would scale out at 456lbs!

Keith is back in Kona and enjoying the warm air but more importantly the fishing.  He visits here every year for about a month and a half and fishes several days with me.  Today we decided to look for porpoise and hopefully find the big ahi that follow them.  For the past two months the ahi haven’t been with the porpoise so our expectations weren’t very high.  Since the spearfish and marlin bite has been pretty good so we had a chance of at least catching something.  We headed straight out of the harbor and then north out in the deep.  About midday a friend of mine had found some porpoise just a little south of the harbor so we headed his way.  The porpoise were pretty spread out and I didn’t see any fish right away with them.  We put up the greenstick and decided to stay with them until they came a little tighter and maybe then we would start seeing the fish.  About an hour later the pod came together tight and I marked a fish on the sounder at 40 fathoms.  It didn’t bite but on our next pass the water beneath the third squid exploded as a nice ahi piled on the bait!  Keith got in the chair and quickly landed our first ahi of the day of about 80lbs!  We set back up and by this time several boats had joined us.  We worked the school with about 4 other boats when out of no where another ahi came blasting about 6 feet out of the water swallowing the squid.  We were on again!  Keith again made quick work of our second ahi which weighed 91lbs!  After packing the fish in ice we again ran back up and deployed the greenstick.  It took a long time to mark more fish in the pod.  By now there were about seven boats fishing with us and none of them had a bite.  We came back into the pod and put a small bullet lure out as we trolled the greenstick.  Sometimes the ahi like a slow lure trolled close to the boat.  As I came into the school the lazy bullet took a strike and line peeled from the Fin Nor 130.  We both thought it was an ahi but a small shortnose spearfish came up jumping behind the boat!  Keith quickly brought the fish close and we took it for the grill.  His shortnose spearfish would weigh 23lbs!  As I made a pass on the front part of the pod I marked an ahi at 40 fathoms but it didn’t bite.  I swung back around that part of the pod when a nice ahi came skyrocketing out of the water and missed the squid!  I continued to jig the squids as it again came blasting out of the water only to again miss the squid!  I continued jigging and on the third try the ahi blew up on the squid and we were on!  Keith would fight our third ahi to the boat in about 15 minutes!  We were happy with three and a spearfish so we decided to call it a day!  We ran home and were back at the dock by 2pm!  The big ahi are here and fishing is picking up!