November 8, 2011 – Karen Get’s Her First Marlin!

Doug, Karen and her fiance James of Salem, Oregon, joined me for a full day of fishing on the Lepika.  We had some heavy showers during the night and some storm clouds still lingered on the horizon as we left the harbor.  There had been some striped marlin showing up in the deep so I headed out to the 1000 fathom line right out front of the harbor.  It wasn’t very long when a big dorsal appeared behind the long rigger bait.  Everyone watched as the stripey lunged after the lure and finally knocked it off the ourtigger clip.  It was on and then off!  The stripey tried the lure again and as we watched the fish try to eat the lure another stripey was all over the stinger bait as well…two stripeys up in the pattern!  I teased the stripey on the stinger but it kept missing the bait.  Finally the stripey on the long rigger got hooked up!  Karen was first up and buckled into the chair.  We got some great jumps out of this fish and some nice tail walks.  Karen did a great job fighting her first billfish to the boat in about 10 minutes.  James and Karen are getting married here in Kona on Friday so we decided to take the stripey for some sashimi for their guests.  Her striped marlin weighed an estimated 80lbs!