80 plus and still reeling them in

They might have a combined age of 164 but that couldn't stop fishing buddies Merv Strongman and Bob Brown landing a whopper 256.3kg marlin.
The Tauranga pair, who have been making regular outings in search of hapuka, bluenose and bass for 16 years, accidentally happened upon one of the biggest hauls of their lives while zig-zagging their way back to shore near Mayor Island.
Mr Strongman had just finished gutting a feed of blue nose when a 37kg nylon line rigged from his 50ft launch suddenly tugged last Tuesday.
When the huge marlin on the other end of the line made a dozen "spectacular" jumps out of the water, they knew they'd caught something big.
"That's when the fun started. I'm 81 and Browny's 83, and there was no way in hell that we were going to be able to haul it up.
"It was hard to tell how big the thing was but we couldn't stop him, so we just had to go back with him on the boat."
Mr Strongman said they followed the giant fish about 800m before it plunged 250m down into the sea. Gradually, the pair wound the line in before connecting a rope to the marlin's bill when they could get close enough to it.
With the rope strung over the launch's front skylight, Mr Strongman and Mr Brown spent the next hour-and-a-half slowly pulling the marlin out of the water and into the boat.
"There was a lot of sweat, that's for sure and it was a hot day. At first we were wondering whether we'd be able to get it into the boat."
They decided against releasing the marlin after discovering they had hooked it through the eye socket. "There's no way it could have lived if we'd thrown it back," Mr Strongman said.
Back at the Tauranga Game Fishing Club's Sulphur Point weigh station, there was enough debate over whether the fish was a black marlin or a blue marlin that a piece of it was eventually sent away to get sampled. The rest of the prize catch was donated to a lucky fisherman.
Asked whether others at the club were amazed at how the elderly pair had managed to bring in such a heavy fish, Mr Strongman answered with a chuckle: "I don't know - I probably don't look that old."
But Mr Brown recalled one comment: "Trust you two old buggers to catch one like that."
In his years as a commercial fisherman, Mr Strongman has hooked some monster catches - including great white sharks - but he admitted last week's haul was something special.
"It's certainly the biggest marlin I've ever caught."