Sunday, April 19, 2009

Eastside Ulua

Winds finally backed off after what seems like months of strong trades and with the small surf you know what that means!  Go-DIVE!  We packed the Red Sea boat, woke up early and decided to go east and check my favorite spots.  The reef action was fun but the highlight was finding an ulua house which seemed like a hotel.  The occupancy rate was full with 40 white uluas packed in this huge cave.  I wish I had my video camera with me to document the action but only had a small still camera rated for 30 ft.  Kris Tyler from Westside Dive and Tackle was with me and he went down first while I guarded the rear door of the cave.  He surfaced without pulling his trigger so I went down on the back door and crept over the ledge.  About a dozen smaller whites came up to me than swam back down, so I followed them down to spot the big boys in the 50-80 lb. range deep in the cave about 80 ft down.  I only had my 90 euro riffe with no tag line so I had to try and get a good shot.  The larger fish were out of range but one came in and I was ready to go for the ride, bend my shaft, and lose my gun.  I pulled the trigger and bam!  The fish rolled over stone cold!  Yeah! It weighed in about 45 lbs.
After a few pictures I tested the fish for ciguatera and it passed so my dad started cleaning the fish for dinner.  And guess what we found inside the stomach?  A decomposed "Uhu" looking about 4 lbs.  I heard they eat tako, moanas, eels, but uhus? I don't think we will be eating that uhu tonight.