Ocean Isle Report

[Nauti Natured]

Ocean Isle

So after my fishing day in AB I headed down to Ocean Isle for our family week with my wife's side of the family. I was completely unfamiliar with the area but, again, with the help of all of you I had some good numbers and advice to try out. Once again, I had some guys that hadn't fished much so I just wanted to see them pull on something. The plan was to go out and look for Mahi for the beginning of the day and then head to a wreck to see if I could find some AJ's for the to pull on.

Went out on Tuesday morning with just my brother in-law to do some "scoping out" for our Wednesday trip and ran to some numbers about 35 miles from shore that happened to be the wrong numbers for the wreck that we were trying to find but the right numbers for schools and schools of Mahi! We bailed some nice size Mahi for a couple of hours and then had to head in for a family lunch. They were all excited to find out that we had enough Mahi to feed all 19 of us on the trip! Gotta love it when a plan comes together

The next day we left early and made bait in the ICW and headed back to the same spot. I could tell from the very beginning that this was just one of those days we should have stayed at the dock. To start, my wife's step father was with us and he is the most fidgety guy on the planet. He is a wonderful man but patient, he is not. He had lost his patience before we even made it to the inlet and it was stressing me and everyone else out on the boat. As we left the inlet we ran into some shallow water and it took me a while to get my motors into enough water to keep from bouncing So .... we finally cleared the inlet and headed out into a very choppy 3-4 footers. We ran into some beautiful blue water with plenty of flyers and weed so I decided to stop short of our spot and put lines in the water. I also thought it would give the guys a break from the spray and pounding were taking on the way out. Well, after a while with no love we picked the lines up and ran out to the original spot where we found them yesterday.... no such luck.
Finally we ran to the Raritan wreck. We threw some live baits out and quickly a school of 7 or 8 of the BIGGEST DAMN COBIA I have EVER seen in my life attached themselves to our transom. I swear that the back of one of these beasts was as wide as my motor cover. I wish I had a picture of this but I was running around like a chicken with my head cut off trying to get them to eat. We quickly hooked a big one and my brother in law cranked the drag down on him and broke him off That was the last bite we could get from them before the damn stinkies came in and bit everything we had in the water.

After a few hookups on AJ's that just kept breaking off in the wreck and an adventure with someone (will remain nameless) throwing my motors in reverse and running over two lines in two motors, we decided that my miserable father in law had enough torture so we headed in at about 1:30 pm.

All in all OI was a great trip with some great people. The people on the town and especially at OI marina were great (except when they almost dropped my boat off the fork lift)and really helped make the trip a success.

Unfortunately we did not get many fishing pictures on this trip other than a few that were snapped on the way out from my iphone because my wife commandeered the camera for the little ones at the beach. I threw in some of the fam on the trip.

[netman9]

Great looking pile of kids you have in the family. Thanks for sharing. Netman

[Nauti Natured]

Great looking pile of kids you have in the family. Thanks for sharing. Netman

Thanks! The three little men in the rocking chair are mine.

[Capt. Lyndon]

Sounds like you guys had a great week. The donkey's at the Raritan are full grown. We've hooked a few lately that we couldn't do anything with either.

[Nauti Natured]

Sounds like you guys had a great week. The donkey's at the Raritan are full grown. We've hooked a few lately that we couldn't do anything with either.

Hey Lyndon,

Sorry we didnt catch up. Stuff got busy with family.

As far as the AJ's at the Raritan ... I had my drag cranked almost completely on a Spheros 14000 (which I think is like 20 something lbs of drag) and these fish would spin it like there was nothing there until they got into the wreck and broke me off. I have never experienced anything like it.

Have you seen those Cobia there??? I am telling you they are freaking whales!

[Capt. Lyndon]

I'm running fin-nor 20-l with 35 lbs, and have had a few that would do the same thing. I've had the cobia come up once, following jack up, but had everything hooked up already and couldn't get a bait to them before they disappeard.

[SeaBiscuit]

Good looking boys Chris!
thanks for the report and glad you had a nice time in the lower Cape Fear.
SeaBiscuit

[BTH284]

Thanks for sharing the report Chris. Looks like everyone had a good time and you got some well deserved time on the water!

[Robja]

Nice report Nauti

[netman9]

As far as the AJ's at the Raritan ... I had my drag cranked almost completely on a Spheros 14000 (which I think is like 20 something lbs of drag) and these fish would spin it like there was nothing there until they got into the wreck and broke me off. I have never experienced anything like it.

Had 18# of drag on a fish spinning like its cool and ended up boating a 22# AJ. They are just bred to pull!