While neither Steve “Pilchard” Jones nor myself tend to have much trouble filling a tub with coral trout, red throat emperor or nannygai on a regular trip to the reef, we figured we’d have a crack at something a bit outside our comfort zone. With a good weather forecast and the third nine-day coral reef fin-fish closure in full swing on the GBR we figured we’d dabble in the Cape Bowling Green Billfishing caper, about which we’d heard so much hoopla in recent months.

Accordingly, on Sat 26th November we ventured out in Steve’s recently acquired custom-built Sailfisher plate alloy boat, “Bluebella”. This 6 metre vessel built by Goldstar boats in WA, complete with 115hp Yamaha 4-stroke, is a craft that represents unsurpassed luxury and comfort in comparison to my 2-stroke driven 5.25 metre pressed aluminum ¼ cab Savage!

We made the half hour drive south of Townsville and put in at the Haughton River on a high tide around 6.30am. Notwithstanding the excellent 10 knot forecast we were both dumbfounded when we reached the mouth, only to find the open ocean was the same as the creek – completely flat. What a day it shaping up to be!!

A course to one of the closest Cape Bowling Green marks was quickly plugged into the Navman 5500 GPS plotter. How The Pilchard managed to lever these spots out of his work mates remains a mystery (they tell me he can be quite a blackmail merchant, but that’s for another story) Anyway, we thought it was considerably reassuring that as complete novices we were completely in the know on this, our maiden Sailfishing expedition!

Realistically though, as we’d pretty much missed the boat (in a manner of speaking) with the sailies passing through the area a month or two earlier, we were not overly confident of an encounter. Rather we were out there to experiment a bit with my new cache of Multi-Strike skirted lures, and if we got a hook-up well and good. With $380 worth of Marlin Chugger, Marlin Barrel and Tuna Barrel lures on 24kg, 24kg and 15kg outfits respectively you’d rightly say we were well over-gunned for Sailfish (this tackle was geared for a trip to Cairns in October which sadly didn’t eventuate). Besides, if Jonesy’s winch failed back at the ramp I could always use my Shimano Tiagra 50WLRS to pull his boat up onto the trailer….

The oily looking flat water off Cape Bowling Green revealed anything and everything on the surface, and we must have spotted over 25 sea snakes for the day as well as numerous dolphins. At one stage early we saw a dolphin, or was it a shark – hang on a minute, no - that’s a sailfish!! The sickle tail protruded about 20cms out of the water behind what looked like a glistening (waterproof) black sheet of A4 paper (landscape not portrait). One swift flick of that evil looking tail and our first confirmed sailfish vanished into the 30 metre deep water.

A little bit later the Tuna Barrel lure in shotgun position got a nudge and we both “Ooohed” and “Ahhhhed” as we spotted a long black snout poking up out the green water 30 metres or so behind the boat. I swiped the TLD30 rig from the rod holder and the fish proceed to climb all over the lure. It took 5 or 10 metres of line before dropping the lure. “Bummer! Goodness me!!” exclaimed I at this point (editor’s note: this is the censored version of actual events so that it is suitable for family viewing). Sailies 1, Newbie Sailie Hunters zilch.

After defaming Paul Wells of Wellsey’s Tackle for 5 or 10 minutes over his hopeless lures that “clearly don’t work” I settled down and rewarded my missed opportunity with a consolatory beer. It was, after all, quite thirsty work with virtually no breeze to do the cooling (hence internal liquid cooling was required…)

A short while later I expertly skippering Bluebella to an area which I expertly announced to The Pilchard would be “absolutely chocka-block with sailfish”. (I was driving because Jonesy was relieving himself yet again: 2 beers – 5 leaks. I suggested he visit the bladder doctor but that’s another story…) Of course you can imagine my astonishment when we straight away saw another sail and sickle tail quite close to the boat, portside. I (expertly of course) swung the boat gently around to the left (portside that is) with designs on presenting the lure spread to this foraging beast for his morning-tea selection. Right on que the 15kg rig again went berserk and Pilcho started hollerin’ “Hodgey, Hodgey, do you want it?!!” Thankfully he’d just relieved himself otherwise there might have been a pants wetting episode. “No mate, you’re closest, you grab it!!” I screamed.

Almost immediately, and like a possessed fiend I cleared the other lines while the Jones boy Yippeed and Yeehaaed above the beautiful din of the screaming TLD 2-speed’s ratchet.

Just as I jumped back behind the wheel to turn the boat into a more favourable fighting position I looked back and like a ballistic missile the sailfish took to the air and tail-walked for a good 3-4 seconds. Words certainly cannot describe how cool that was!

I reflected at that moment that perhaps Paul Wells and his bloody expensive lures weren’t so bad after all….?

Being a damn fine angler in the first place, Pilchy probably didn’t really need my Expert “back seat fishing” advice vis-à-vis when to pump and when to wind, but I administered the said advice regardless, and at +100 high decibels for that matter. Here we were: Our first attempt – after the season for that matter – and we had a 6-7 foot fish in the air! “HOW GOOD IT THIS,” we both thought and shouted as Steve made good progress and forgot to level-wind the line correctly onto my TLD reel (sorry mate – you deserved that!)

And Like Torville & Dean we gracefully guided this mighty fish towards the transom (ok, I promise to go easy on the ridiculous analogies from here on in…)

Having done several blistering runs it was all over, and we soon realized that the fight had made this fish more limp than Donald Trump during industrial action at the Viagra factory. Anyway, after a brief attempt at revival it was not on the cards, and we made the decision to get some photos and make the most of the considerable fillets within those brilliantly lit-up flanks.

To be sure it was a sad moment to see such an awesome creature die, but as this was our first sailfish we certainly weren’t about to waste the meat. After a couple of photos the remaining 4X Gold was removed from the 65ltr Evakool, and put to it’s intended use to make way for the thick pink fillets. The sailfish meat looked surprising like pork, which was, well, I guess quite surprising….

A short while later the big man upstairs must have realized his error in giving the Townsville area near prefer weather, as he gently wound the wind gauge up a couple of knots and gave us a nice cooling afternoon sea-breeze and following sea for the ride home.

Back on terra firma we sorted out the sailfish fillets, which have since been divided up and distributed to friends and family in 300-400 gram portions in snap-lock bags. Without endorsing the deliberate taking of these mighty pelagics, I can highly recommend the following technique to make a delicious meal of what many people (wrongly in my opinion) call a rubbery, in-edible flesh.

Diagonally slice the sailfish fillets into 1 ½ -2cm discs, cutting across the grain;

Marinate for ½ hour in a mixture of extra virgin olive oil, fresh lemon, a generous amount of Red Ochre brand Wild Lime & Chilli dipping sauce and a good splash of Nando’s Extra Hot Peri-Peri sauce (Tabasco Smoked Pepper Chipotle Sauce is also terrific and can be added if you’ve got some handy);

Next drizzle Crisco peanut oil over a med-hot BBQ plate and sizzle the fish for 2 minutes or so each side – IMPORTANT: DO NOT OVER-COOK!!!

Accompany with a pre-prepared side of Mash Potato (secret mash recipe: add ¼ cup of cream, 1 teaspoon of pesto paste,1 teaspoon of wholegrain mustard and cracked pepper to taste).

Best with a brace of icy cold Cascade Premium Lager stubbies or a classy +$20 Adelaide Hills Sauvignon Blanc. Enjoy!