Most of the time, Mouna Ghossoub is underwater along with her husband Deron Verbeck, who took the above photo of Mouna. Yesterday though, they both had an exciting day on the water fishing and Mouna shared it via e-mail last night:
Dear friends,
Today I went fishing with Deron and we caught 4 rats (what small ahi or tuna are called), the biggest being 7 lbs. (3 Kg). We saw lots of people using the palu bag (a bag filled with pieces of fish that are used as bait to catch bigger fish). The bag is dropped deep and opened, releasing the bait and a hook. So Deron, who made his own, decided to drop the bag, the first time ever. Immediately, we caught an 11 pound ahi (5kg).
Today I went fishing with Deron and we caught 4 rats (what small ahi or tuna are called), the biggest being 7 lbs. (3 Kg). We saw lots of people using the palu bag (a bag filled with pieces of fish that are used as bait to catch bigger fish). The bag is dropped deep and opened, releasing the bait and a hook. So Deron, who made his own, decided to drop the bag, the first time ever. Immediately, we caught an 11 pound ahi (5kg).
Hey.. so much fun..the biggest tuna Deron ever caught. We decided to troll (drive the boat with the fishing lines in the water dragging behind us) on our way home. We saw a pod of spotted dolphins and we decided to troll slowly through them. We know that big Tunas (ahi) often swim with them.
Lo and behold! We get an amazing strike (fish biting and hooking on the fishing line) that pulled so strong and far and took almost all our fishing spool. We knew the fish was big. Ok, calm down and let's reel in the other lines that are still in the water and might get tangled up with line on which the fish is caught.
Then another strike. We have 6 fishing lines in the water at the same time. "Holy cow"... we were yelling. The fish was able to get off the hook and we lost it but we still had the one that bit first. We bring all our lines in and Deron takes on reeling the fish. Oh my God. It took him almost an hour. The fish wouldn't tire.
We brought it all the way to the boat and tried to gaff it (a gaff is a pole with a big hook at the end that we use to hook on the fish and bring it inside the boat) but then it suddenly went crazy and ran and took out all the line Deron spent almost an hour reeling in. The fishing line cut through the gloves and tore some skin off Deron's hand. The whole thing had to be started all over again. It is amazing how big fish can test your strength, character, and determination.
Finally, Deron brought the fish to the boat again and grabbed the line in one hand and the gaff in the other and "Voila". He gets the beautiful Ahi into the boat. We took it to a local restaurant to sell it. It weighed 86.5 lbs (40 Kg).
What a day...
Go in to Jackie Rey's Ohana Grill today and ask for the ahi that Deron and Mouna caught on their boat, The Odd-i-Sea. It should taste sooo good. And if you do, would you take a picture of your meal and send it me? I'll post it as a follow-up along with your comments. E-mail "barbara at guava bee dot com".
Note: Jackie Rey's is not a sponsor of Guava Bee. This is all for the...Halibut? (Crowd boos).
