There has been a lot of rumors running around about our whereabouts over the past few months and whether or not we have been taken by Somalian Pirates, arrested for dynamite fishing or breaking some other law of some sort. The fact of the matter is the most recent trip is not one to be repeated for so many reason. It was rough as hell every day, the diving was deep and 100-120 ft dives were the rule if you even wanted to glimpse our quarry the Dogtooth Tuna, we had to keep moving and always have someone on constant look out for Pirates because 4 other boats had been taken and the passengers and crew were still being held captive for ransom in sunny Somalia, when you got sick it was 2 days to the "doctor" and even then there was a good chance chicken blood and a handful of bones shaken in a small Baboon skin pouch would be part of the "cure".
We all lost between 8 and 15 lbs in two weeks, a testament of how much work we put in to make our dreams come true and we put in our best effort each day.
We landed some fantastic fish and within the first three days we were passing up on the constant stream of wahoo coming through on each drift and we even let the billfish sneak past holding out for something incredible.
We landed 4 world records, two with the pole spears and learned more about gear in that time than most would in a lifetime of diving. I'm proud to say that as a member of Team Riffe there is nothing that rivals the overall quality and reliability of their equipment. In three weeks of hard diving, only once did I have to re-rig a shaft and that was after shooting 4 fish in the 100lb range with the same 5/16 shaft with a flopper. The last thing you want to do at night after 8 hours in the water is try to re-rig all your wishbones and shafts or figure out why every flopper from your $85 "specialty" spearfishing company shaft has sheered off and left you with no fish.
Brad Thornbrough dove like a man possessed and we worked together throughout this trip to dive safely and bring the fish up to a manageable depth. He and Craig were hanging at the bottom of their 120 ft float lines every dive. It was insane.
Having him watching as I shot my 243lb Dogtooth and being able to film him shooting his 240lb one will go down as the best pair of fish I have seen come on the boat in one day and an epic end to a strange and scary voyage on the coast of Africa.
The pics from the adventure will leak out slowly but here are some to keep everyone interested.
Pending World Record Dogtooth Tuna | SpearBlog
photos by Brad Thornbrough of Headhunterspearfishing.com and Brian Head
We all lost between 8 and 15 lbs in two weeks, a testament of how much work we put in to make our dreams come true and we put in our best effort each day.
We landed some fantastic fish and within the first three days we were passing up on the constant stream of wahoo coming through on each drift and we even let the billfish sneak past holding out for something incredible.
We landed 4 world records, two with the pole spears and learned more about gear in that time than most would in a lifetime of diving. I'm proud to say that as a member of Team Riffe there is nothing that rivals the overall quality and reliability of their equipment. In three weeks of hard diving, only once did I have to re-rig a shaft and that was after shooting 4 fish in the 100lb range with the same 5/16 shaft with a flopper. The last thing you want to do at night after 8 hours in the water is try to re-rig all your wishbones and shafts or figure out why every flopper from your $85 "specialty" spearfishing company shaft has sheered off and left you with no fish.
Brad Thornbrough dove like a man possessed and we worked together throughout this trip to dive safely and bring the fish up to a manageable depth. He and Craig were hanging at the bottom of their 120 ft float lines every dive. It was insane.
Having him watching as I shot my 243lb Dogtooth and being able to film him shooting his 240lb one will go down as the best pair of fish I have seen come on the boat in one day and an epic end to a strange and scary voyage on the coast of Africa.
The pics from the adventure will leak out slowly but here are some to keep everyone interested.
Pending World Record Dogtooth Tuna | SpearBlog
photos by Brad Thornbrough of Headhunterspearfishing.com and Brian Head