I hope everyone enjoyed the “It’s not the Queen’s birthday” Queen’s birthday long weekend. It sounds like there were a few who enjoyed it on the water.

The Gold Coast season never ends and the good weather conditions on the weekend certainly helping.  Greg Bailey ticked off a solo blue marlin in his 18foot Sea Bird with a 2-2-1 blue marlin around 160kg on 37kg stand up.  Greg says it was about an hour fight on the stubborn fish but good fun and a great effort. He’s ticked off the solo black and the solo blue now. Next up the stripe!

Nearby Darren Malaquin’s new boat on its maiden voyage (the ex OB26 now renamed to Adios) accounted for the stripe with a 1-1-1 to angler Tim Reid (and bonus dolly too) while Jugs also had a blue and a stripe up but couldn’t convert.

Meanwhile on the NSW Central Coast a few late season stripes recorded.  Myles Weston’s Bertram Elempi headed out Saturday for a look around, as the charts still show water at 22.5c and a current pattern that would normally hold a few marlin.  In the calm conditions and nice looking water, a big upside down tree produced a nice mahimahi for angler Geoff (photo at top).

A few hours later, mid sandwich and beer (as they always are), a striped marlin broke the band on the short rigger lure but missed the hooks. They were able to tease him back for a solid bite and 15 minutes later released a healthy “standard” sized stripie with Geoff doing the angling again.

Sounds like there were a few more encounters out of Port with the Lee’s Gunrunner teasing two they couldn’t convert while Scott says that Born Free went 2 from 4 nearby.