ANZAC WEEKEND IN THE ESTUARY

Just back from fishing, weather was fabulous, fishing was even better, though there were a few hiccups, like wrapping a line around the prop, and a bit of trailer maintenance.   I won't talk about wrapping the line around the prop, (I just lost concentration talking to Amanda), but the trailer repairs were interesting, thank goodness Crusty was there because I think Roger was about to roll the trailer back into the water and leave it there with me out in the boat.   He was trying to change the rollers, but they were a swollen with rust and the pins could not be driven out, so luckily Crusty forced them to slip out of the pin holes on one side and get them out, thank goodness and thanks again Crusty.

Should not have that trouble again because the new pins are all stainless steel and the boat goes on nice and easy now.

On Saturday we ran around everywhere to try and find the good fishing spots, found some and then headed back to locate Amanda, Darren, Mick and Kiera. They were enjoying themselves on Knife Island, and the fish were starting to come up around them, but Roggie had seen heaps of fish on one of the reefs and told them to follow us, because it was a 'fish a cast'   He really shouldn't say that, because when we got back up there, there were no fish.  Oh well that's fishing!

Luckily everyone had a chance on the flats and there were heaps of smaller barra around there.  On one flat, Crusty and Wayne found not only barra, but a school of big golden trevally tailing on the edges.  What a sight that would've been !

There were a heap of smaller barra around, all just under legal, but they were a bit flighty on the outgoing tide.  On the incoming tide however the salmon were going crazy for about ten minutes then it all went quite.

Wolf Herring

There were also schools of these small wolf herring breaking up around Indian Island.  Very messy.

Sunday was the day though and poor Crusty, Amanda and Darren missed out.  Wayne fished by himself and killed a pig. Big barra, but also got into a group of big tarpon and managed to land a 72cm on the 8wt.  Now that would of been fun!

Wayne cruising the flats

Alex was fishing with Lenny and he too lost his fly line, only his wasn't to the prop, he hooked a metre plus GT that went so fast and shot off through the mangroves.  The line went around one of the trees and broke.

Alex and Lenny waiting for the tide to get a bit lower for the flats.

The tides on Sunday went from around 7m down to 2.4m so on the outgoing, the fish were even flightier than Saturday, we managed a couple of barra though then fished the creeks that we don't often fish.  We found some big barra, just laying on the sand at smaller creek mouths, most were flightier because the tide was streaming out, but one, around 80cm was crazy, it came out to the boat which was still moving from the electric and  followed right beside us, Roger tried to get it but it was too close and would just nudge the fly, it stayed with us a for a few goes then got bored and swam off.

On low tide we went up to Hutt Point for the start of the run it and it was amazing, queenies to 60cm, trevally to 48cm and a couple of golden snapper the same size.  Then the big macs came in and started to cut them in half before they got to the boat.  Tried for the macs but they just cut us off.  No wire.

Typical golden snapper from Hutt Point

About half way into the filling tide, we decided to re rig all our gear after being mauled by the macs, and pulled in on a small flat that usually only fishes on the outgoing tide.  We got a few barra there initially but it was so low, we had beached the boat, just before a mud/sand bar that cut the flat in two.

The tide eventually covered the bar and we floated over it, but because the tide was so strong the water was all muddy, thinking we would wait a bit longer and leave, we noticed what appeared to be a heap of seaweed along the edges of the mangroves.  No seaweed, barra tailing.  They were all small, but there were hundreds of them and they hit anything that you put near them.  They would reform into a group as you pulled one out and we just kept on fishing.  It must have been over half and hour or even more, the time just went so quick, but we got 36 barra along the edges before the tide got too high and they just disappeared.   Normally for us it would be in the fresh (Corroboree Billabong) where you got these numbers so this was a great session even if they were all rats.

Typical of the barra that were tailing