Bluefin Tuna Are Being Caught At The Beach! Aki's Catch of a Lifetime

Story courtesy of @oceanseastobx and thank you to @strategicangler

Photos by Ed Tupper (@breakfast1)

Aki’s story in his words:

"On Friday I saw the picture of Stefan with his kayak caught bluefin. I decided it was the sort of opportunity I could not pass up. I would regret it if I did not try. Once I got home from work I started packing the yak and gear.

I got to Jennettes pier in Nags Head at 615am on Saturday. The ocean was slick, with small 1.5 foot waves breaking at the water’s edge. Birds working. Dolphins rolling. Several boats trolling already.

I got my yak set up and launched about 645. Put my phone in the dry bag so the rest of the timeline is my best estimate.

I was looking for menhaden as my plan was to snag one and rig up a live bait. But there were not any schools visible on the surface and I don’t have a fish finder on my kayak so I settled for trolling a 6” white swimbait (bass pro brand) on a 2oz NLBN jig head.

About 2-3 hours went by and I hadn’t had a bite. Saw 3 other kayaks, one of them got what appeared to be a nice drum.

At around 930, maybe 10am, I am trolling that swimbait about 200 yards off the end of Jennettes pier. I’m headed south when suddenly tuna start busting ~100 yards away at my 2o’clock.

I turn the rudder hard and start peddling as fast as I can go. This is on my hobie adventure island, which is great for sailing but a beast to peddle. My legs are burning but I’m trying to get there before they’re gone. Before I can make it there my reel starts SCREAMING.

Im using a TLD25 on a star boat rod. This is a setup I typically use for kingfishing off the pier. I’ll also use it for kings from the kayak but it’s overkill for that. I’ve caught 30 pound kings before on that reel and thought they made the reel sing. This was something else entirely. I thought the reel was going to explode it sounded violent the way that thing started dumping.

Reel was 90% with 65# braid (estimate 850 yards worth), topshot of 60# mono (~50 yards), and 125# leader. Drag at bite was probably 10 pounds.

I furled the sail, turned the rudder, and reached back to grab the rod. The reel was 1/4 empty already. I bumped the drag to strike (~15 pounds) and that just upset him even more. Reel is like half empty 45 seconds into the fight by the time I get to max drag. Fish finally starts to slow down. Well, he slowed down and I sped up. I’m getting pulled along at about 5mph at this point and he is still steady rolling line off the reel.

I slowly began gaining line on him. I think it was more like I was pulling me to him, rather than the other way around. He ran offshore, then spun south and headed down the beach a bit, then turned back offshore. Id estimate about 30 mins before I finally got back to the topshot.

Next 30 mins was a dog fight with him directly below the boat doing huge circles. I had to drop the drag to freespool, give it the old thumb drag, and up the drag preset knob as far as I could get it to go. That finally allowed me to get enough drag to begin moving him. I’d bring him up 10 feet and he’d go straight back down. I’d work hard to gain line and he’d take away minutes of progress in a couple seconds.

Kept telling myself to be patient. I had time on my side - the forecast looked good through early afternoon. Just don’t rush and break the rod.

He didn’t slow down gradually. It was like a switch was flipped. He did some huge head shakes, quickly ran out and up near the surface, then dove down one more time. After that he was beaten and I finally started seeing color. 1-2 more short runs and I had him up top.

Jacked his head up out the water for about a minute, then gaffed him in the throat while he was penciled upwards. Stuck him good and it was game over. Bled him and then lifted him into the kayak.

He had towed me ~3 miles out to sea. In a kayak you’re pretty low to the water, and I could barely see the houses. Took a half hour to sail back in.

I took a spill coming back through the surf. Fortunately the kayak didn’t flip. I just had to bail out then jump back in. First time for everything, I’ll chalk it up to the extra weight on board.

I got on the sand and was greeted with the nicest people. One guy asked me if it was a dolphin lol. But everyone was so happy and I really enjoyed celebrating together. They were all so helpful too. One guy brought his jeep over and we strapped the tuna to the front. He drove it up to my vehicle, as 4 others helped me carry the kayak to the parking lot. Sharing that moment with everyone there was the cherry on the cake.

Fish weighed 154# on Oceans East’s scales. Cut the tail + a foot of the fish off the back end and still couldn’t close the fish bag. Drove home with the bag splayed open, bags of ice thrown on top of the fish.

It will be hard to top this one. Let’s all hope the fish stick around for a while and some more people can get one. And maybe, just maybe they’ll be back in future years too."