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The Arizona Tuna Hunters
In a blur of work and business travel the weeks have passed since trip 9 with the
Arizona Tuna Hunters.
This great group of individuals has been out with JES in the past and has great fishing and I really wanted them to have another successful trip in 2003.
After months of preparation and organization including printing of their own Relentless/JES Sportfishing tee-shirt the big day was upon us…
Arriving at Fisherman's Landing I saw Bob Singleton and a few of the other anglers had already arrived and were attempting to relax… pretty tough when you're pumped up with adrenaline for a Sept 2-day tuna trip!
As the rest of the anglers checked in I got them over to the Rod rental desk and organized for the pre-boarding seminar… Just a short 
preview of what our Skipper, Joel
Ralston, was going to give us in the galley as we loaded bait at the receiver.
This was going to be a good trip I could tell because this group was all about the fun and experience… The fish would come later.
As we woke in the morning of the first day we knew that Joel wanted to get to the 100 + mile zone… Chowder was making breakfast as we past a line of sport fisher's stopped @ the 90 mile mark… The group was in frenzy and wanted to fish, but we knew our skipper had the numbers for the spot so we waited in anticipation for the call of the first round of trollers.
As the Relentless crossed a small 4/10th temperature break the water became clean and blue. Joel pulled
back the throttles and slowed the 65 foot vessel while calling out for the 1st rotation of anglers to head to the stern. We were off 
and it was all good. As we headed south, south west to the zone we were interrupted by skip jack. Yep, with the warmer waters pushing up the line those
skippies were like rats in an alley. Joel was not going to stop on a Skippy mark…So the trollers had to grind them to the boat to clear their feathers.
About 20 minutes passed and then Wham! The corner jig was hit and it wasn't a Skip Jack! As the Detroit's slowed on the slide the 14 other anglers pinned bait and tossed off the stern to get the first bait fish of the outing. Wow! These guys wanted it bad and it wasn't long before we
had a few hook sets on the starboard rail. Some nice fish started came over the rail and hit the deck in the ever so exciting thump as 
anglers glowed with smiles of their catch. I hooked one and handed it off to young angler Stephen Darling, unfortunately it turned out to be
Skippy and the demise of this stop.
As the morning progressed we moved to the west a bit and found some good meter marks… Circle the mark and chumming the jigs were inhaled and the bite was on again… This time it was the real McCoy, Albacore and big 30-35 pounders. I think this was the stop where Bob lost some hair under his arm as one big longfin drug him up the rail to the bow faster than his feet could get him there.
The fish really never charged the boat this
morning, but we did have several stops where we had 3-4 fish going at a time.
On one stop I saw Robert, Doug and Brock were all hooked up so I grabbed my camera and started shooting the photo essay. As I shot pictures from over the rail I could see TunaQ shooting video in the background. This was awesome because it was the demo of the new mini camera and a test for future graphics for the trip reports.
As Chowder prepared his incredible Chicken Caesar Salad for lunch we got another blind stop for a few bait fish… Chuck, Dave and Larry landed a few nice albacore before the bite shut down as fast as it started and we celebrated
with a 
toast in the galley over lunch.
As the afternoon progressed, every one was having a great time and learning how the tuna shuffle worked.
I was exhausted and slightly off my mark due to a quick visit to the emergency room a week before and still trying to get back my stamina after being bed ridden for the past several days. Thankfully 
TunaQ was there to pick up my slack… I just fished and tried to assist with some verbal assistance while I caught him giving instruction and education to the novice anglers wanting more.
The first day's fishing concluded with 64 Albacore for the 18 on board and as usual, a great steak dinner with all the fixings. We motored to the west for our morning fishing…we were going to be in search of Yellowfin Tuna and another vessel to bring us some fresh bait for our
attempt at bagging a second species of tuna.
The second day started early and by the time the pancakes were on the grill we had a Skippy stop… Hmmm that's nice. At least I knew that the Yellow fin weren't to far off.
I soaked a bigger dine and got it through the purple fish to the Yellowfin below and was on… Just as I turned the corner I saw Chuck land a huge Albacore that turned out to be the big fish of the day.
We had several stops with the same out come… a few Skip Jack and then a few 15-18pound yellowfin…We were 75 miles from the dock as we passed a huge kelp paddy… If this wasn't holding we were done for the trip…As we all threw bait on the floating hotel several fish charged the boat and in a quick flash we had 3 more fish and our trip was completely out of time…
We ended our outing with the J.E.S. Raffles as we passed between the Coronado's. Jigs from Kicker were awarded to Joe and Dave Chesley, Matt Nicholas and Jon darling…The Tuna day belt was picked up by trip organizer Doug
Moore. J.E.S. outer wear went home in style with Chuck Yechout, Larry Hale, Stephen Darling, Tim 
Chambers, Brock Starkweather.
The Diawa SLV30 was won by buddy, Bob Singleton and the Seeker blanks were awarded to Mr. Skinny, Jim Widney, Rob Freund and Monte Lebo… Congratulations all.
In closing I must say that I had a great trip with this group… They were fun and relaxed and just out to have good time. Special mention goes out to Tim Chambers, Brian Starkweather, and Dave Chesley and last but not ever the least TunaQ, thanks again. I couldn't have run this trip without your help.
Jack pot winner was the 1st days big fish, a 40 lb Albacore caught by Gary Tanner who will gladly display the big fish trophy to Other Arizona Tuna Hunters on his wall at work for years to come…
Until next report…your charter master,
Jamie Spencer
J.E.S. Sportfishing
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