La Filette, Trinidad, 11/6/09

[James80]

Yesterday was a public holiday (we get fourteen official and two unofficial per year) so a last minute morning fishing trip to La Filette was planed during the late hours of Wednesday night by Darryl and myself. La Filette is about twenty miles down the north coast of Trinidad and usually has good fishing for kings. All the reports for the last few days had been good with the fleet from the village holding fish on live bait and people were doing well with small plastics. Stampede hit the water at 6:30am and after taking fuel we were heading out of the First Boca and onto the North Coast by 7. We were met by beautifully calm seas and made it to La Filette in record time.

Our last trip to La Filette during what was supposed to be amazing fishing amounted to nothing, fish were caught on live bait but we didn’t get a strike, so expectations were high. This is added to some dismal trips in recent times and me saying things like “if we salt again I’m selling the trolling tackle”.

Back to yesterday, we set out a spread of plastics and worked very carefully between the boats from the village that were anchored and fishing live bait. They don’t really appreciate people passing too close. After releasing a gar fish and a small Bonito we stopped briefly and attempted to jig but weren’t to sure where to anchor and didn’t really have proper gear so at 10:30 back to trolling we went.

We weren’t feeling the plastics so I rigged a hoo behind a white witch and a small white umbrella (pictures to follow) and set it out (after losing the bomber at boat side, it just disappeared, the wire leader was intact but no lure). I bumped the speed up to 6-6.5 knots and bam fish on. Darryl took the rod and we landed our first king at 10:50, one for one. Right, hoos it is. Reset the flat line with the same white set up, second pass in the same area and yes fish on. I grabbed the rod and started to fight, half way to the boat the line went dead, one for two. Re baited the white and pulled up the down rigger to change to ballyhoo. The ball made it to the surface and as I was pulling the line from the release clip the ball dropped, the line popped and off it went to the bottom, opps, not to sure what happened. Changed that line to a pink and white witch with a pink and white umbrella and ran two flat lines (I can only run two flats and a down rigger). Same place an hour later and the white witch did it again, Darryl grabs the rod and decides to fight it in the holder as we forgot a belt. Then the fun started, I don’t know what happened but the fish wasn’t happy and I kept missing. So about ten gaff shots later the second king came into the boat, two for three. We turned around and were resetting the line that had been pulled in during the fight and bam, fish on. The TLD lost large amounts of line but after easing the reel to strike I brought it in, three for four. We made a few more passes but were already late and had to get back. Coming back was not as pleasant as going out as we started to sputter badly, seems to be contamination in the fuel system, going to sort that out now.

All in all a successfully morning. Not fantastic by some standards but after the amount of bad fishing recently pretty good for a half day.

Finally tally:

Three kings came from the ocean and one black bomber, one release clip and one downrigger ball went in and the white witch mysteriously disappeared from the boat.

The fish:



The umbrella

[WAHOONBOX]

HEY JAMES....3 KINGS HAVE MADE MY DAY BEFORE AS WELL!


GREAT STORY AND THANKS FOR BRINGING TRINIDAD TO US!!! BRING US MORE OF YOUR WORLD BRO!