It seems that I owe Cruncher and Daiwa an apology. I thought that the rod that Cruncher was using was made of clear glass, like some of the Ugly Stik rods. I was mistaken, it's a light grey blank that is very sea coloured, giving the impression that it was clear. I hear that the rod is in a range of new models that are top-sellers in South Africa. They are virtually unbreakable, described as awesome by Mr Marlow and they are priced at over £300 each, so well out of Argos range. There, if he'd told me this in the first place instead of just sending the picture then we'd have avoided the mistake.

The shipmates were rested and ready for another Big Adventure, tactics and meticulous planning was the order of the day.

Off shore fishing had been slow and with slow tides and low tides around midday a decision to go shark fishing on the flats was made.

Captain Mike aboard the Coolcast was going to take us to a secret location that few white men knew. It seems that I was one of them because I had been there before.

Captain Mike

The A team today was Cruncher Robin, Chris the Wrasse and Robber Marlow it was hot and humid but the shipmates were now hardened and were pacing themselves.

The secret location was a long winding channel with flats both sides, the problem was it was between flats with only a couple of feet of water available to gain access.

Captain Mike skilfully got us into position and our fresh Barracuda and Bonito were hung over the side to attract our target species.

After about 30 minutes the chum slick was about ½ mile long snaking its way over the flats, which were at high tide averaging 4 ft of water. Visibility was excellent and soon our first customer arrived, it was a Lemon shark and we decided that only one of us at a time would target a fish until we hopefully had several to go at.

To cut to the chase sport became hectic and we were soon into double figures with several fish approaching 100lbs being skilfully released.

Chris the Wrasse plays a shark to the boat

Robbers arm was playing up so it was down to Chris to keep the count going up.

Chris's 20th Shark of the day

In case anybody is feeling sorry for Robber Marlow and his "bad arm", DON'T. The bad arm only comes into play when he's hooked an average size fish and can't be bothered to play it. The arm is particularly bad when he hooks an amberjack and he was most upset when I was sharing a boat with him a few years back. He attempted to pass the rod over only for me to refuse....the reel handle was on the wrong side...I'm left handed !.  I also remember him going out with Dave Burr tuna fishing around the shrimp boats. That day there were a lot of bonito around (they're like little tuna and fight like hell). Poor Dave had to land so many bonito that he was proper poorly for the next three days.

Robin also had some great fish including a couple of black tip that really smoked our 12 and 20lb outfits.

Come Back Please - Robin's fish heads for Cuba

Chris was awarded a special prize by landing a shark with his hook through the eye of a hook that had previously broken off, an amazing rare picture.

You have more chance of winning the lottery than being able to perform this trick

The Tide turned and we moved up the channel a few hundred yards to a better location.

It wasn’t long before we had several more sharks around the boat but way out on the flats were two real monsters.

One was a Lemon the other was a big Bull shark that looked like a mini black submarine.

These big fish aren’t stupid and are always out of range.

Robber caught a nice Jack and quickly had it out on the edge of the flat under a balloon.

This should have done the trick but despite some major chasing the big bull shark did not catch the Jack and it gave up.

We needed a new Indian trick.

Robin soon had the answer he hooked and landed a Barracuda and a fresh fillet was soon out there.

This Barracuda provided the bait for the big sharks

The big Lemon picked up Crunchers bait and the reel smoked as about 200yds of line disappeared off the spool, then disaster, the hook broke in half and it was gone.

Robber had been studying the big Bull shark and noticed that now and again it left the flat and disappeared into the channel, a new tactic was employed.

A sizable piece of Barracuda was cast way down the channel and it wasn't long before the beast was sizing it up.

These big sharks aren’t stupid and over the years we have found that the wire puts them off, so we use short pieces of around 20” and strike quickly.

The beast picked up the bait and Robber set the hook, the first run was over 200yds and it was looking like Robber would be spooled out.

The Bull Shark is now 200 yards away

The beast stopped for a few seconds, but then raced off with another 100yds, the situation was now critical as the bottom of the spool was showing and there was no time to pull the anchor to follow it.

Robber used another Indian trick and did the opposite to what most anglers would do, he reduced the drag rather than increasing it and it did the trick the Beast stopped.

This time there was no bad arm and slowly the beast was pulled back to wards the boat, it was a major effort with some very serious drag on the reel and sweat from Robbers nose dripping on the spool to cool it down.

200 lbs of Bull Shark nears the boat

Eventually after 45 minutes it was along side, a magnificent Bull shark estimated at 200lbs plus.

The photographs do not do it justice regarding its size. Another Personal Best for Robber.

The bull shark is released to fight another day

We finished the day with 26 sharks of various species, 1 Barracuda and several smaller fish, a fantastic day for the crewmates.

The B team were out with Captain Jack, Keith and Lemon Geoff was the crew.

They also went shark fishing in Jew Fish Basin, it was a slow start but eventually the customers turned up and they also had some great sport landing 14 sharks of various species.

A lemon shark for Lemon Geoff

Everyone was tired out so we dined at the Raw Bar eating some of our fish from the previous day, it was awesome and the perfect end to another great day in paradise.