Travel Blog #125 – Bottom Fishing Maui with the Mendo Boys

My girlfriends sister and her boyfriend were on the island for a few weeks and we thought it might be fun to let the girls go do a spa day while the boys go out for an afternoon bottom fishing trip. We opted to go on a boat called the Hokua that is operated by Aloha Blue Charters, and the girls opted for an aromatherapy massage at the Maui Spa Retreat in the upcountry town of Olinda.

We got to the harbor a bit early and decided that it might help our luck to go and grab a beer at the bar thats located across from the harbor on the bottom floor of the aquarium center. We enjoyed ourselves there for about half an hour before it was time to meet the boat. We made our way to the slip just in time. Our Captain was there waiting for us. He introduced himself as Captain Matt and invited us on board his boat.

Within a few minutes everyone else was on board. Captain Matt fired up the engines and the boat began creep forward out of the slip. As soon as we were clear of the harbor Matt punched the throttle and we started to pick up spreed until we reached our trolling speed. The first mate of the boat (who was also named Matt) began to set out a pattern of lures behind the boat. Once they were all in the water he assigned let everyone on the boat choose a straw that had a number on the bottom. The lines were all numbered and the number on the straw corresponded to the line that we were assigned. When our line got hit, we were the one that was supposed to reel it in. We continued trolling until we reached our first bottom fishing spot. Our first mate brought in the pattern and Captain Matt eased off of the throttle until we came to a complete standstill exactly where his fish finder indicated a large outcropping of reef coming up off the bottom about 150 feet down.

The first mate went over the operation of the rods and reels before he passed them out to us. He also gave us dixie cups filled with squid that we were to use as our bait. We baited our hooks, crossed our fingers and dropped our lines to the bottom. My fishing partner, Justin caught a Kumu on his first drop. On the first mates suggestion he swapped out his smaller squid hook for a larger circle hook that he used to make a live bait rig for the Kumu. He dropped the little red fish back into the water and we watched it erratically drop towards the bottom.
We continued the process of baiting and dropping a few times before the bite really turned on. The little Kumu managed to get torn to pieces by another fish, but it did not swallow the hook