b'HALF DAY CHARTERS Close to the reef where the deep Most of the charter boats prefer to takewater starts, wahoo and GTs lurk.people out on half day trips, leaving fromPhoto: Cook Islands Tourismthe wharf between 7am8am and back by 1pm.With afternoon-early evening trips also available for those wanting a sleep in.It gets hot out on the water and so is a good way to break up the day.Our first trip was on board Marlin Queens 650 Senator, a top Kiwi made trailer boat and one of three different boats available for hire.Our skipper was a local lad with good experience and the plan was to troll out past a FAD (fish attraction device) and the water was amazing, over 24 degrees and a deep blue/purple colour, it was a welcome sight from the wintery conditions back in Godzone.After a couple of hours trolling, we spotted many birds in the distance, upon closer inspection a pod of pilot whales were feeding actively and the area screamed fish.We circled the area trolling for some time but unfortunatelyThe team from Akura with a nothing came in to check out ourstunning 54kg yellowfin.lure spread.Another boat called on the VHF and told of a good action around some drifting structure further east, so we pulled in the gear and the skipper gunned it.After a good 45-minute haul, we had found the other charter boat which had landed a few yellowfin and we could see the large floating debris in the water.It was a breakaway FAD from a Chinese commercial trawler that had used to attract fish before netting them, it was now acting as a FAD for local charter boats.YELLOWFIN AT FADSWe trolled the lures around the FAD, but it wasnt getting any action, I suggested to the skipper to use a popper and set up my Daiwa stickbait set.We used a small popper and trolled it way out the back and I held the rod and popped it as we went past the drifting FAD, it wasnt long before I got a strike and then hooked up on the second hit.The fish powered off a few metres of line, it wasnt big however and I had the drag up high on the 24kg braid combo.The skipper put the boat in neutral while I played a fat, yellowfin tuna up to the side.We tried it again and had a second tuna on when it unfortunately fell off the hooks during the fight. /FISHINGINGODZONE45'