OK, we now know why there was no communication yesterday. One of the boats broke down and they waited FOREVER for the AA to turn up. Not quite true but read on for the full story.

There's another little problem. The way this is set up is that Roy emails me a story and pictures from Key West back here to the UK. I translate his disjointed ramblings into English and resize the pictures, then post it onto the blog. So when Roy sent last night's epic tale it occurred to me that he hasn't mentioned the names of some of the anglers in the party. I fired off an email asking if he'd actually said hello to the rest of the party and how about some names and photos. Here's his reply :

Hi Gus,

Sorry but I haven't seen them fishing.
Harry's mates are Terry and Stewart, nicknamed Terry and June.
I have only a picture of Terry, he is very funny.

Steve is another crew member who joins us every day but he is not stopping with us.

Clive is from Birmingham but he also has not been out with me.

I will send some more pictures.

Harry has asked that it be mentioned he caught a Bone Fish yesterday fishing for bottom fish. Actually very rare where he caught it.

Harry "The Scab"s mate Terry. Roy describes him as "very funny" but he looks reasonably normal to me. Maybe he has an extra nose growing from the back of his head ?? - Who knows ??

Harry's other mate, Stewart. Not only do we know absolutely nothing about him, but he's also out of focus !. Sorry Stewart, I can only work with what is supplied by the lanky one.

Anyhow, the confusion hasn't lifted. In Roy's story of the day there are two boats mentioned, holding a total of 6 anglers. Roy, Robin & Geoff are with Captain Birds Eye. Keith and his "shipmates" are on Damon's boat. We know from the story that Clive was battered on Damon's boat, so there was one other mystery angler on Damon's boat. Roy's email mentions that Harry The Rat caught a Bonefish bottom fishing. Was he the third mystery angler ?. It's like a game of Cluedo - Was it Captain Purple with the hammer in the study ?. Anyhow, a BIG CONGRATULATIONS  to Harry The Rat on the Bonefish. I've been out to Key West with that gang three times and I've NEVER even seen a Bonefish.

Whilst I'm in a congratulating mood, congratulations also to Steve on this fine Dolphin fish. In the three years that I joined those guys we NEVER had a Dolphin caught on my boat.

A fine Dolphin fish for Steve. The picture only arrived last night but looking at the flat calm sea I'd guess it was caught on Day 3.

Right, back to the story. Over to Roy :

Welcome to day 4 of our Big Adventure.

It was a 6 am start as we had planned to go way out into the Gulf  to fish for blackfin tuna, in fact our destination was 48 miles from Key West where we knew some shrimp boats were located. The weather forecast was light and variable winds so everything was looking good.

We loaded our two boats, Keith’s shipmates on Captain Damons boat and Robin and Geoff were with me with Captain Birds Eye Bill.  We left the harbour on time and headed into the Gulf guided by moonlight. That all sounds very nice and well organised, if you were not exhausted it would be.

A couple of miles out and I commented that the weathermen tell lies. We were ploughing our way through a heavy swell and were getting battered by the waves.

20 miles out we met a shrimp boat heading for Key West, we did a deal and loaded both boats with fresh chum. It was just getting light and a you can see from the picture it was a magnificent sunrise.

Another 28 miles and we could see 4 shrimp boats anchored and cleaning their catch. We were looking good except that we already had two wounded crew mates, knockeded into submission by the pounding of the boat on the relentless waves. Clive on Damon's boat and Geoff on our boat had both been severely battered, we now had walking wounded.

Our two boats split up and after checking out our first shrimp boat with no fish around it we moved on to boat two. A scoop of chum next to the boat erupted with the splashing of both Bonito and  Tunas...Bingo !!.

I reckon the mix of Bonito vs Tuna was about 50/50 which is a brilliant result, you often find just a few Tuna mixed in with the Bonito which are really a nuisance fish. The trick is to draw the fish away from the shrimp boat by steady feeding, this worked a treat and by employing one of my old Indian tricks that I cannot tell you about, we soon had mainly tuna boiling along side our boat.

Roy with a "tiddler" Tuna

After that is just became brutal, we quickly landed 9 Tuna and several big bonitos breaking two rods and spilling  more blood from my crewmen. These fish really can pull, it is not a place for the faint hearted, even Captain Bill joined us in the excitement, we had a ball.

Captain Birds Eye attached to an angry Tuna

A brilliant Blackfin Tuna safely aboard after a long battle

We only needed 8 tuna so we released several after that.

Robin with another Tuna. Sushi for dinner ?

We were about to move to a wreck for a bit of bottom fishing when bad news came over the radio; Captain Damon had lost a prop. With no spares on board and only one working engine it was going to be a long journey back at 10 miles an hour.  Like good crewmen we offloaded most of the crew of Damon's boat leaving Keith and Damon to limp back to Key West.

We were now like a band of pirates and headed to our wreck where we were soon catching an assortment of fish in 90ft of water. Lemon Geoff had a snapper grabbed by a Jew Fish and thought he could land it on his relatively light tackle. The Jew fish had other ideas and promptly smashed his rod at the butt. I think this could be Geoff’s 3rd rod of the trip.

We caught some big Grey Snappers and then got plagued by small sharks. One of our new crewmates (I'm sure that Roy doesn't know their names !) was playing a 4ft Lemon shark when below it appeared a monster Hammerhead Shark and  I mean a MONSTER. This was the biggest hammerhead I had ever seen and I have seen some big ones.

Captain Bill also commented that this was a true beast in fact he too had not seen one bigger. Like a proper angler I was ready with the ultimate heavy gear, like lightning out went a bait fit for a monster, as you can see from the picture the bait was a whole 14lb Bonito.

Roy is ready to do battle with the monster shark, how's this for a bait ?

What I did not tell my shipmates was that I was a little concerned that either we would need a bigger boat or an ambulance for me if this was going to be a long fight. The drag was set at 30lbs on a rod that will easily pull you overboard without a fighting chair. I wanted to make sure that the fish could run without dragging me overboard.

We estimated Harry the Hammerhead at 12ft long and it looked like a small submarine with evil eyes. The good news was it did not come back for the bait so we made it back to Key West on time for one of Keith’s banquets.

Everyone was "feeling badly" having travelled over 100 miles on a not too calm sea. The moral of the story is never trust the weatherman.

That is also the reason for the delay with this report, I fell sleep writing it !!.