I have a couple more weeks to look back at our Irish holidays before we can start taking you out on the boat once again.
This time around it was just Stacey and I heading over on our own. By 2017 we had a nice little routine for our holiday to Ireland. We would come in from the boats Sunday evening and drive across country to catch the overnight ferry from Milford haven. We could grab a few hours sleep on the crossing in a nice comfy berth before arriving at Rosslare early the next morning. From there we continued to Cobh to check in. the whole route is pretty straight forwards and good roads. After this many times the truck almost drove its self there!
After our usual play from the shore on the first afternoon we had our first day on the boat. It was quite breezy to be honest so we were fishing with the harbour for the first couple of days. We spent a fair bit of time targeting ballen wrasse on light gear in shallow water. Stacey had been a little dubious about fishing for them in case they were as fragile as the cuckoo wrasse. Once she discovered they are easily returned, look great and fight hard it was a struggle to keep her away from them. The first day ended up so breezy we went further inland past the marina at east ferry and fished behind great island for a while. We gave up in the end as sheets of rain blew sideways across the creek and after a thornback first cast we were only catching dogfish. so we headed in early to find a nice cozy restaurant for dinner.
The next day we were in the harbour again, this time we targeted blonde rays with no success. Apparently a commercial boat had seen fit to clear out what is a very localised population on a very small piece of ground (around the size of a football field. What ever that is). We had some bull huss, mackerel, whiting and tub gurnard through out the rest of the day.
Day three on the boat was good enough to venture a short distance from the harbour. There was a small area of reef close to the shoreline that we fancied trying. Mackerel were hard to come by but we scrapped enough for bait. We anchored and had several congers, coalfish and pollock all small fish but it was fun. We spent an hour fishing for wrasse on the way home and had great fun once again.
The next day we started with a good few mackerel first thing. We were a bit on the drag after getting pre-occupied with mullet, scad and sandsmelt in the marina. The weather meant we couldn’t get much outside of the harbour again. Fished for wrasse, drifted for plaice and finished the day at anchor catching thorn-backs, whiting and dabs.
Much as we enjoy the fishing on offer within the harbour it is nice to get further off and try for something different. By the Saturday we were lucky enough to get a small window in the weather so pushed off to a reef just outside the harbour. We had found a few mackerel for bait along with some launce and weaver fish but we didn’t have loads. We set up a drift across the reef and had some lovely varied fishing as expected. We caught grey gurnard, cuckoo wrasse, poor cod, pollock (in good sizes and numbers) and 4-5 cod. We had put a chum trail and shark baits down while we drifted and had attracted a load of joey mackerel. We topped up on bait with feathers until I saw a large dorsal fin break the surface next to one of our shark floats! It was clearly a porbeagle shark which had been attracted in by our chum and the large shoal of mackerel we were catching. We got the other baits in just before it took one of our shark rigs. The rod hooped over and the reel burst into life but the fish wasn’t hooked. We set the baits back out and agitated the chum in the hope the fish would hang around. Luckily it did just that and soon enough one of the baits screamed off again. However it still didn’t get hooked and the bait had only been mouthed lightly each time. We sent some fresh baits back out and once again we could see the dorsal fin as the fish worked its way up the slick of our chum trail. Unfortunately the fish was disturbed this time by another boat. It was a Saturday, the weather was reasonable and we weren’t far outside the harbour so there were plenty of other boats about. One of the local private boats came up to see how we were getting on and mistook our waving as an invitation to fish along side us, he wasn’t really looking where he was going and so nearly wound both of our rigs around his propeller. Thankfully he soon understood why our arms were flailing around all over the place, made his apologies and moved on. We thought our chances at this shark had been dashed but it re-appeared in the chum trail again. This time we had made our baits ever smaller which seemed to work as soon enough there was a shark attached to the end of Stacey’s line. after a short but powerful fight the fish was alongside the boat. It was just about small enough to get aboard for a quick picture without harming it. we measured it quickly and later checked these measurements against a weight chart which suggested the fish was 75-80lbs. by now time was getting on, we had drifted off of the reef and out of the leigh of the land so we took a slow ride back in.
The next day was calm enough to head further off. We started by trying to find those joey mackerel we had seen the day before. They were a bit more patchy today. We found a few shoals but each time we started catching them a pod of common dolphin would arrive and spook them. We weren’t too sad about seeing the dolphins though. We soon had enough bait and continued to set up a drift for sharks. First fish on the shark baits was a nice sized pollock. This was followed soon after by a small porbeagle shark. We then had a long wait before the tide turned and conditions came right for us to catch a couple of blue sharks. We had plenty of time to catch other fish on the bottom rigs though including grey gurnard, pollock and whiting.
The last few days were just short ones. I was feeling a bit out of sorts and the weather was iffy for a couple of days. We still managed some fun trips in and around the harbour. We had a nice variety of fish from mackerel and dabs to bullhuss and rays. We had a couple of rides out in the truck and took the boat into a couple of different ports within cork harbour. It was interesting entering places like Crosshaven from the water as we hadn’t been in there before.
We did manage a couple more short sessions for sharks. We had some more blues and I managed my first megrim on board the boat. The best weather was on the last day. there were plenty of dolphins about as we steamed out. Luckily we had prepared plenty of chum the day before and soon had enough hook bait for the day. I must admit I struggled a bit throughout the day. we had 6 blues but called it a day early in the afternoon. I felt so rough Stacey took the helm on the way in and drove us home too so I must have felt bad.
Despite this we had enjoyed another great trip here and caught lots of fish once again. Before we left we booked for the following year so we had something to look forwards to.
COVID-19 UPDATE
We have now had confirmation that the large deck area on Galloper we have some good news. we are able to accommodate up to 6 anglers plus the skipper as of 29/03/21. I will honour existing bookings as they are unless you wish to change them. If you are booked as an individual and would rather book on a trip with 6 @ £70pp then please get in touch.
I understand this could be due to change after 17th of May but I am not willing to take bookings for larger groups until the rules have actually been relaxed on this.
That means that until further notice I will taking bookings on the basis of groups of up to 6 people.
NEXT SPACES
I have plenty of midweek availability from 29/03 onwards. Please contact me to discuss midweek dates. Weekend spaces as follows
17/04/21-possible offshore trip 2 space @ £90pp max 6 anglers
24/04/21-3 spaces @ £70pp max 6 anglers
25/04/21-6 spaces @ £70pp or boat £400 max 6 anglers
03/05/21-6 spaces @ £70pp or boat £400 max 6 anglers
08/05-21-1 space @ £70pp max 6 anglers
22/05/21-poss offshore trip please call for info otherwise 6 spaces @ £70pp or boat £400 max 6 anglers
23-05/21-6 spaces @ £70pp or boat £400 max 6 anglers
30/05/21-6 spaces @ £70pp or boat £400 max 6 anglers
31/05/21-6 spaces @ £70pp or boat £400 max 6 anglers
Please call me for more information on 07956411528
Stacey is still operating the ‘lady grace’ on a bookings only basis both mid-week and weekends at the
Moment but and is likely to fall under the same restrictions as me. so please call her on 07791859624
Dad (Stuart) has availability on the ‘Razorbill 3’ please call him on 07850234077
