With Roy Rose at the helm we departed fathers day June 21st on the annual family 5 day aboard the Royal Polaris. There were many familiar faces from previous years with the kids all a year older. This is a great group to fish with many of the anglers from the longer trips with some families 3 generations deep. This trip is all about the kids and everyone was excited and ready to go. After picking up a nice load of bait we are underway and headed south looking for some Albacore and Blue fin.
We arrive at the fishing grounds in the evening and troll up a few albacore. We idle down swell for the night and start again in the morning. The morning brings some nice Blue fin and a few Albacore; we spot a nice body of fish and we able to land some nicer grade Blue fin with 1 going 80 pounds and another in the 45 pound class. The rest were in the 25-pound range and the Albacore were up to 25 pounds. After a solid morning of tuna fishing we continue south to Cedros Island for some Yellowtail.
We started the morning fishing the Yellows on the drift with the Yo-Yo iron. With a long cast you could pick them off with the surface iron so I had a great time picking them off on the long rod and handing fish off to any kid up for the task of wielding the Ulua. We had some very productive drifts ending the day with a few hundred Yellowtails in the 15 to 25-pound range, The Kids had a ball and are all tired from pulling on fish all day. With the offshore fishing slow we will stay here 1 more day and head to the lee of the island and look for the bigger models.
Fishing with the kids is a blast; some adults should probably take note. The kids don’t care when they lose a fish, they pull as hard as they can and they just keep turning the handle and are always smiling, it is a real kick to watch.
After a calm night on the anchor we started looking again, around 8:00am we find a spot of big ones and get the anchor down. It didn’t take long and we are hooking a nice grade of yellowtail on the bait and the surface plug. I just stood amid ship and picked them off on the long rod, it was truly great fishing. Every time I went to hand one of to my son he was bent on his own on the bait, he is really getting it down and was neat to watch him pick a bait get it is the water and then hook another. He had 3 over 30 all on his own. I also had my nephew onboard and he is quite a fisherman and even handed off a few. At noon we had limits and headed offshore to finish the trip with some more tuna.
We scratched a few albacore in the morning and we had a slow period in the early afternoon, With the kids having nothing to pull on for a few hours they decided to take on the crew with a few water balloons, they got some of the crew pretty good but with the wash down hose and the 5 gallon buckets at the crews disposal and a well timed “hook up” bringing all the kids out of the galley the crew prevailed!
We ended the trip with 24 or so more albacore in the 15-pound range, at 6:30 we called it a trip and headed for home.
In closing, if you ever wanted to take your kids fishing: Do it! As far as ages go we had kids from 7 years old and up. This type of trip and longer length is the way to go. The crew bends over backwards for the kids, as do the parents. It is very low key and low stress, there is nothing like watching your son or daughter pull on these fish and the smiles when they see the fish is something you will never forget.
Photos courtesy of Dharyl Shelbounre
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