The Herbie Paul International Festival was fished last weekend with eleven boats, including three teams from Germany and anglers from Britain, Mozambique and up country Kenya matching their skills against the difficult sailfish and tuna, but it was Alleycat, fished by Peter Suddaby from UK with friends Oggy and Beefy  who won the tournament, coming from behind with a late black marlin on the second day to pip runner-up Seahorse which had looked to be safely home with seven sailfish.

There were plenty of sailfish around the traditional Malindi/Mambrui areas, but they were feeding on the huge shoals of tiny whitebait at their leisure, easy pickings and finding so much feed, they were ignoring the bait offerings of the anglers, a frustrating experience, as one sees packs of sails a couple of dozen strong finning slowly around the surface and feeding at leisure but totally uninterested in the baits behind the boats!

The first day, Neptune with anglers Russell and Peter Brumby, Richie Moller and skipper Angus Paul were leading with two sail tagged and 146 kgs of tuna while Alleycat trailed them with a good score of big tuna. Clueless were lying third with two sailfish, and several boats close behind them, so it was fairly open at the beginning of the second day.

On Sunday, Seahorse which had caught no sail on the first day nor in the light line competition the previous day, really turned on and became irresistible to the shoals of sail, and by lunch had tagged five, and then added two more in the afternoon to be in the lead. With an experienced team of anglers, Bruce Buckland, former manager at the Driftwood Club, Nick Taylor, Simon Christie and skipper Peter Ready, their total of seven sail seemed invincible till the radio announced that Alleycat, on which skipper Pete Darnborough had decided to try for marlin and repeat his victory several years ago and had run down to Watamu to live bait with a yellowfin tuna, had hooked a good black marlin which had to be boated after a hard fight as it was deeply hooked and bleeding. It weighed 147 kgs on the scales and proved enough to clinch the first place ahead of Seahorse with Neptune, which had added two sail to their first day score, taking third place in an exciting finish.

Tarka, fished by Paul Worthington, Phil Revett, skipper Callum Looman and Mangi came in fourth and fifth place went to the team on Tina, Messrs Josch, Krey and Abudi. The first thee teams were rewarded with prizes of Shimano reels and bronze picture frames, from the sponsors M H Joinery Products of UK and support from the Driftwood Club, to whom very many thanks, and a good party at the fishing club in the evening after the prize giving rounded off a very successful and fun weekend,

The Friday had seen the Churchill Cup, a light line formula tournament in which only lines of 10 kg breaking strain or less are used, going to same team that won the trophy last year, Paul Worthington, Callum Looman and Mangi on Tarka. They tagged two sail on 6 kg line and a dorado, and it was this latter fish which proved crucial as second boat Albatross, with Manfred Haase, Ralf and Marcel also had two sail on 6 kg line, but the dorado put Tarka ahead! Neptune with the same team as the Festival were third with a sail on 4 kg line, but the sail were hard to find, although Eclare, not in the tournament, had three with Mick and James Barrett on board.