Coorong - November 2009

Less than a month after landing my first legal mully, I was all set to repeat the feat and this time get my name on the gashes as well (frankly, I should be on there in massive bold letters and retain the trophy until some one beats it in my opinion!)

Andre, Kym, and I headed off at the leisurely time of 9am on Friday, all having the day off work. Winding our way through chain of ponds, we realised we'd left the eggs and sauce at home, but there was no turning back now. A quick stop off at Meningie fixed that problem, and then on to Salt Creek. We went across Tea Tree Crossing at a snail pace as there was an inch or two of water in it, turned left at the beach (no choice due to closure) and headed south looking for a nice gutter. There was a nice gutter running close to Tea Tree, but no campsites within walking distance.. we plowed on until we found a likely looking spot about half way between 42 mile and Tea Tree. The gutter was not as evident, but still there.

There was a bit of rain threatening, so we set up the big tarp first thing, and it looked magnificent!

Lines were cast out and cookers fired up for the first camping burger of the trip. Before the bacon was crispy, my rod started ducking over with a sure fish on. I bolted down the beach and wound it in. A bit of Kym's line was tangled up with mine but a nice flathead was still pulled up the sand. Upon closer inspection, Andre points out "Aren't they Kym's hooks?"

"....." "...DAMNIT!"

Kym had hooked the flathead on his line and it had swam around mine. Fish 1 to Kym, even if I did wind it in.

After finishing Lunch, Kym landed another Flathead, slightly smaller than the first, and was feeling a bit better about actually getting to wind this one in.

Matt and Will were due to rock up around 9pm Friday night, but after 10pm weren't sighted. We had fished all day without success, and a bit of weed was floating around at night, so we gave it in. We were starting to think they may have given up finding us in the dark and settled for a camp further up the beach, but then we saw a huge light beam coming over the horizon. Will's spotlight collection lighting up the sky.

Those guys set up their swags, and soon after we all hit the sack for some sleep. Unknown to me at the time, Kym actually slipped away to have a vomit before bed. His first camping vomit.. nice work Kym!

The next morning Matt told us that he had woken up at about 3am to take a piss, and saw Will out on the beach fishing. This is why Will always wins The Gashes! He was seen to pull in a big pile of sea weed and Matt returned to sleep. Will didn't get a fish for his efforts.

That day saw plenty of fishing, and even more beer drinking. The first were cracked soon after breakfast. Andre firstly devastated that he wasn't first to crack one (those were my honours), then Matt and Kym both get one, so Andre grabs one too.. but still not opening it. Will returned from down the beach and immediately reached into his Esky, sending Andre in to a paniced rush to open his beer and not be last. His priorities when fishing may be considered different to others. Probably why he never wins The Gashes :)

There was a fair bit of seaweed around on the Saturday, so not a whole lot of fishing was done. Will stuck it out and along the way managed a small undersized mulloway, a dog shark, and a little elephant shark. Kym was still considered leading with his two flatties, but Will making more inroads than the rest of us. The elephant shark had sea lice all over it.. Will pulled them off (they hold on pretty hard though) and released him. The fish was probably happy it had been caught, it was better off for it.

Will donned his bogan wig to cook up a huge steak amongst a sea of draught cans.

When time came to hit the tent for sleep, I considered rain an unlikely scenario.. and didn't bother to peg out the front canopy to stop water running down through the zips (a bit of a problem on my tent). Waking up the next morning, there was a pool of probably 10 litres of water at the bottom of the tent.. luckily I was at the high ground side :)

Outside was worse though - our once magnificent tarp shelter had caught about 50 litres of water in the middle and pulled everything down around it. Tables were pushed over and cooking equipment now laid buried in the sand.

A struggling eyelet on the tarp gave way in front of me at the pole pushed up straight through it and water gushed out everywhere. The tarp was pulled out the way and all that remained was a few poles standing, and a lot of sandy equipment.

It was blowing a gale and looking decidedly unfishy, so Matt & Will packed up and headed back home early. The remaining fishers cleaned up a bit and by mid morning the wind had died a little bit and conditions were good for fishing again, except for the lack of fish.

We spent a great deal of the day sitting in the car, out of the wind and odd shower that went past. At some point we got hungry enough to cook up the Flathead. Andre had all but given up hope on catching a fish, and tied on some big minnow lure and left it floating around in the water. It got hopelessly tangled.

We were listening to tunes for hours when we decided to perhaps drive the car forward a bit to be closer to the rods. But the car battery was flat. I hooked the two batteries together to give it more juice, but still no go. Then Kym tries and the car turns over, just. His lucky weekend I guess. We left the car idling for a good 1.5 hours or so, and had a reasonably early night.

We had a fishing session in the morning, but with still no bites since Friday between us, confidence was low. We packed it up and headed home mid morning - Kym taking his second Gashes win in just 4 trips.

Got him.

Since 2005, I have made 12 trips to the coorong in chase of the elusive Silver Ghost. On my 13th trip, a quick overnighter on 31st October 2009, I landed it.

The Facts: Caught around 8pm, Brined Pilchard for bait, 2 x 8/0 Gamakatsu's on a running sinker rig. It was between tides - low was a few hours before and high wasnt until 1am. The moon was almost full (there goes that theory).

It measured 91cm long and around 6kg gutted. About 13-14 pounds. I didn't have any good scales so I just stood on the bathroom scales holding it.. not the most accurate but it gives a bit of an indication.

Woohoo!

Sheringa - October 2009

8 months between Gashes trips. This is unheard of. We've all been going off on fishing trips here and there, but never lined up our leave. Finally we're back on.

Harry, Sani and myself headed over to Sheringa on Friday morning, cutting our way through the dirt roads along the way. The scenic route. Arriving at the roadhouse, I asked the owner how the fishing was, and he replied "crap". Not a good sign, but he also told Harry his bottle of port was $100 before charging $9, so we weren't sure if he was serious or not.

We set up our camp at the "GUN SPOT" Matt had directed us to claim if possible. That was no problem, because no one else was camping down the Salmon beach end. After cooking up lunch, we set up our rigs and headed over the dune to the Salmon Beach. The only problem was when we got there, there was no beach left. From my last visit about 3 years ago, there seemed to be about 2 metres less sand on the beach.. where small rocky bits barely made it to the surface before, they were now sticking up above my head. This wasn't a good sign, but we trekked further west to a small patch of beach which still had some sand on it.

Before long I had hooked on and got a small salmon in the esky. The fishing was slow however, with a lot of weed in the water, and Harry endured a bust off or two.

With the sun getting low, and lacking any lights, we made our way back to camp to get the fire going.

The following morning, I was up before the others, so decided to go for a quick drive to see if I could see the cap of my fishing tube anywhere on the track. It had rattled off somewhere along the way on our trip. No luck in that department, but I did spot a better looking beach. After breakfast we headed back to this beach and on my first cast I had a nice 1kg Salmon on.

We continued fishing here until lunch time when Matt & Saza, and Will & Dana both rocked up within 10mins of each other, and headed back to camp. I had caught about half a dozen salmon, although all of them quite small. My day head start hadn't given me the biggest lead in fish caught.

The fishing that afternoon again was at the beach I had spotted with a decent gutter. It was the only real fishable spot along the coast, not counting the first beach when you head in. We noticed a Rav4 further down the beach getting itself very bogged, and after awhile they called us over to help. Me and Harry drove around planning to snatch em straight out but my bolts wouldn't fit onto their cars tie down point. So plan B, which should have been plan A, was to push them out. With 4 guys pushing, it easily reversed out of the bog and was on its way again. Good deed done! Now for the good karma...

Back at the beach where the other guys were, Matt had somehow stolen my good karma and landed a massive salmon in my absence. All I got to see was a huge tail fin sticking out the sand.

No matter, as Will landed one pretty much the same size not long after, but with already one huge fish ready for dinner, he popped it back in the water. After the photo of course.

I thought this was a good sign for some big fishing session about to commence, but unfortunately not. The next morning, divided on where to fish, Harry, Sani and I travelled up to Lock's Well. Matt and Will persisted with the spot we'd been fishing previously.

There were no good gutters at Locks, but we decided to walk down and have a go anyway. Harry managed to catch one small salmon but it wasn't looking very fishy, so we soon headed back up the stairs and made our way back to Sheringa. Once there, I decided to give the first beach a go, having heard it produces some big King George Whiting. The only problem was, it was very very long and I had no idea where to fish from. After a quick go at the very beginning, and losing a rig amongst all the weed floating around, we drove down the beach and I casted the big rod out into some nice clear water.

Once I finally got my whiting rig back out, I managed a small Mullet and Salmon trout, but no KGW :( Think I'll need to get some more information on where they reside next time.

Back at camp, the others were sitting around drinking beers and cooking lunch - obviously a quiet morning session for them too.

The afternoon / night time fish was back at now 'ol faithful. The only place producing decent fish. Another quiet night despite a few fresh salmon fillets going out as bait. Will pulled another decent salmon and put himself out in to a clear lead for the gashes. Surprise!

Back around the campfire, will declared the Gashes will be over on his departure, thus declaring him the winner - how ever we argued its not our fault he's leaving a day early, and it was still on. He went to bed early to get up and have a fish before he left.

Will's morning fish proved productive and he had another half dozen landed. He was well out in front now.. but soon to depart and Matt not all that far behind. I was lagging further back, and Harry was probably asleep some where.

I wish the gashes was about who saw the most sleepy lizards, because I saw millions of them. Including one that walked right through the middle of our camp.

Here is a picture of our final day fishing efforts. As you can see it was action packed

So, with that, Will takes home another Gashes win. It was unfortunate the beaches were so eroded as it would have given us a few more options to fish from. The fishing was slow, but Matt and Will were both happy to pull in some 3kg+ salmon. I sure would've been!

More pictures here

Ryan & Kym Hit Salt Creek

Kymbo and I decided to brave the rain and head down to Salt Creek over the long weekend. On the way we were trying to spot patches of blue sky amongst all the rain clouds. Any tiny speck of blue was considered a sign of incoming great weather.

Arriving on the beach we travelled down about 3kms to find that the beach was completely washed out and some beach closed signs were set up. We turned around and settled on a free spot about 2kms from the crossing entrance.

Although the weather was surpringly nice.. we decided on setting up some shelter first thing.



This was cool.. we could see our rods from the comfort of camp. The only problem was the first cast saw some seaweed brought in and it was there to stay. We were able to sit under the tarp and keep an eye on our rods which was good.. apart from the fact the only action happening was sea weed tuggin on the line. At least we stayed dry when these storms rolled past



I kept persisting with the fishing into the night, but a massive tangle bought that to a halt. The next morning I woke up and spent a good hour untangling the mess - determined not to lose much (or any if possible) of my new Shimano Technium line

I finally managed to untangle the whole thing, and loaded up a pillie and casted in. I hooked onto a mammoth pile of seaweed and the line snapped.. fantastic!

Kym arose and wandered off deep into the dunes for a nature visit, and then proceeded to get rained on. I sat under the tarp - laughing as he made the big run back to camp with shovel and toilet roll in hand.

Sunday was pretty much a non event for fishing as the seaweed was a worse problem than the day before. We barely casted a line all day, until it cleared up a little around sun set. We put on some glow sticks, baited up and cast out, then sat around the bonfire sinking a few beers.

I never saw my glow stick move, but on a routine bait check, I wound in my line to find I had landed a nice little elephant fish!



Kym, in a great show of foresight, had printed out some "how to prepare elephant fish" instructions, so we set about gutting, bleeding and finning it before popping it in the fridge. A late birthday present for Mum.

Kym then keened up to get his line back in the water, and was rewarded with some spikey looking puffer fish.. a fine effort!

After the last remaining beer was drunk, we headed off to sleep. I was awoken in the night by the sound of our shelter flapping around madly, and when a recently dropped fart seeped up through my sleeping bag I had no choice but to open up my swag for some air. My fears were confirmed when I saw the tarp flailing around in the wind, but I figured it'd be fine and closed up the swag again. Then I felt water dripping on my head and some large puddles forming.. doh! Given that I setup the swag under the safety of our shelter, I didn't bother to peg it in or put the poles up that may (I'm not convinced after my second in-swag soaking) have prevented the water pooling up and dripping through the canvas.

I decided to go sleep in the car, which first required closing up the rear window and securing the tarp by closing it in the car door as I got in. All this running around in the freezing rain in my jocks! And then the tarp whipped around in the wind and slapped me right in the face.. it hurt! Once inside, all was well again, and I went back to sleep ready for the morning fishing session.

We woke up to extremely strong winds and decided to call it a trip and head back to Adelaide. The guy at the Salt Creek servo told us fishing crews further north (passed the closed section of beach) had no problem with weed and a few sharks and mulloway were landed. Doh!

Will & Matt hit Salt Creek

Will & Matt picked the worst possible weekend ever to do an overnighter at Salt Creek / Coorong. The weather forecast was so bad I bailed on the trip - not a normal occurrence for me!

Heres the report from Will:

I think we all knew the weather was crappy :) When we got there it wasnt too bad. Found a wicked gutter that produced a 4.6kg snapper (78cm) on my first cast. Fished for about half an hour longer and the wind changed direction gaining about 100 knots. The grapple sinkers were getting washed up on the beach about 2 mins after casting. We slept the whole afternoon till about 6:30pm hoping the storm will calm down for a night fish, but it got even worse. We bailed at about 7 and headed to my house. The track on the way back was completely washed out and the waves were pushing up to the dunes. Hilux cruised over it all though and we made it out sweetly. Was heaps good fun still. Loving the snapper. Half of it fed 4 adults and a kid tonight for tea. Definitely very tasty, i take back what i said about salmon tasting better.

So, Will confirms himself as the luckiest, and most visible, fisherman alive...

Hillocks Drive - April 2009

This wasn't actually a "gashes trip" but still worthy of a post. With all the regulars busy with other events or just plain soft *cough*Andre*cough, It was left up to me and Harry to rid the sea of fish this weekend. Not enough participants to award the illustrious prize.

Harry, and two of his mates, Kadge, and Adam (Whom were later renamed Vadge and Adam Internet) went down to Hillocks on Thursday night in order to secure a decent camping spot before the Easter rush. Apparantly everyone else had the same idea though and they were forced to squeeze in between two main camps. Still a decent enough spot though.



I, along with Sani and her cousin Alisha on her first trip made our way over Friday morning. Sitting in the same car as Sani and Alisha for three hours was a worrying prospect, but armed with my new Garmin Nuvi 760, loaded up with Mastodon's new album amongst my other awesome tunes, I was content for the journey.

We arove around 10am to a somewhat quiet group of 3 guys, hungover from the previous nights drinking. I set up the tent and cracked a beer, which was enough for Harry to consider it time to start up again. Reliable Harry!

After a cookup, we headed down to Salmon Beach, and the "good spot" was taken, so we headed further down the beach and set up. Our other spot on the rocks was also taken.

It didn't take long to land a fat mullet. I just wanted one for bait, but this one was too huge, so I kept it to eat later. I managed to get a just legal Salmon Trout, and immediately set up my wire trace and sent him back out. This would be my Shark trip (or not, as it turned out).

The others lost interest in the later afternoon and headed back to camp. Me and Harry stuck it out until we ran out of beer. I managed a few more mullet and a bigger salmon on the surf rod. I'm sure we could have caught a bag of mullet if we tried, but sitting back sipping beers, and waiting for the big rods to go is more appealing.

Back at camp with many more beers drunk, I decided to try out my artistic skills with the camera. It didnt really work too well, but the effort was there :). Side note: do not drink a Dr Tims immediately after a Sparkling Ale - it is a BIG step down.



The following day, we considered going for a fish off the rocks, as the water was dead calm on Friday and would have been ideal for rock fishing. Arriving at the beach, the good spot in front of the reef was free, and since it was 1km less walking, we set up there. We had spoke to a guy the night before who said he'd been hooked on to monster for over an hour before snapping off at the rocks. He thought it was a large kingfish, he was rather devastated. This did have me keen to go down and have a go, but the swell was a lot bigger on this day - not the best for a relaxing fish off the rocks.



Once again, I showed off my amazing photography skills.



I pulled in a Salmon which had a big chunk taken out of it and teeth marks all down its side. I felt he'd had a rough go, so let him back in. Now, rather excited about the prospect of sharks in the area, me and Harry both had live baits out and sat back, waiting. The girls had a quick go with the small rod and Sani managed a nice Mullet, which was kept for later. Harry also pulled in a small Salmon and added that to the pile.



Back around camp at night, the Nuvi really made me thankful of its purchase. The FM transmitter works from around the "fire" (a gas lantern in this case). Sitting back, drinking Coopers, and flipping through my MP3 library from the comfort of my chair, gold!

Came back home on Sunday to avoid the Monday traffic, and cooked up a few mullet that we brought home with us. Harry took a few Salmon home for his mum to cook, awww :)



More photos can be found over at flickr

Gashes Stats & Facts

I whipped up some stats for our "gashes" trips. There were trips before the gashes were created, but since then...

• 19 trips in total
• 9 of those trips have been to Salt Creek/Coorong
• Will has won the most trips (9)
• I surely have the worst winning % (2 wins from 18 starts) excluding those who've never won anything (Andre)
• Will has the best winning % at 75% of trips he attended
• I have attended all but 1 trip - the most of anyone
• Matt has only missed 2 trips
  
• Andre has now been on 10 trips, with no wins
• I am currently on 8 successive trips without a win, so could be approaching that record!
• Will won his first 7 trips in a row before being defeated by Matt's Coorong Snapper
• Will and Matt are the only members of "The Snapper Club"
• No one has ever caught a legal Mulloway
• 4 non regulars have claimed the prize (Dan W, Dan M, Kym, Andy)
• The most actual successive trip wins has been 3, by Will
• Anyone who wins 3 in a row, gets their beer shouted next trip.
• Money spent chasing the silver ghost: too much
• Amount of powerades drunk to cure hangovers: 89
• Did I make that last stat up? Yes.
• Number of participants required to make a Gashes trip: 3
• Number of nights away required to make a Gashes trip: 2
• Would these rules be thrown out the window if someone caught a Mulloway: Yes
• Most amount of hours spent sleeping whilst away: Harry (this is despite only attending 5 trips)
• Most amount of people in our group on one trip: 11 (Hillocks, October 2006)
• Most amount of guys (and therefore true contestants) in one trip: 8 (Coorong, November 2006)

My turn to lose a fish

Would've been good to at least see what it was!

Far West Coast - January 2009 (part 3)

See part 1 here and part 2 here.

We arose early with the aim to pack up before the flies came out in force, but they had similar ideas too. I found that the fridge had shut itself off due to running the battery too low. It was battling to get things cool until it ran out of power. Good thing I had the dual battery isolator installed before this trip of we'd be stuck out there.

After reinflating the tyres by the highway, we were back on our way to Fowlers, with a quick stop off at Nundroo to pick up some more supplies (read: 4 30 packs of beer). Unfortunately for us, Nundroo's cool room was out of order, so they only had warm beer. We stocked up the bait esky as much as we could with ice and beer and were on our way.

Back in Fowler's, we set up in the caravan park and enjoyed comforts such as a plumbed toilet and well needed showers. After a couple of now cold beers, we set out to Scotts again, and kept driving past to the ledge once more. The ledge once again provided a little bit of entertainment, with Matt's rod having 3 big tugs on the line before he got hold of it, and the fish wasn't hooked. He rebaited and 10 mins later, his line was off again, this time he hooked into it and set about battling the fish. Much the same as the fish I'd hooked a few days earlier, it took off to the left before turning around and going right. It was ripping line off Matt's reel and definitely must have been something big. In an attempt to stop it running into the reef (and with the rest of us yelling and screaming) Matt tried to pull the fish up and it snapped off. Ledge 2, us 0.

We were treated to a bit of a show by a massive pod of dolphins swimming not far from the shore, and then we headed back to Scotts to try our luck in one of the deep gutters again. As usual for this trip, not much was happening, and we went back to camp to cook up some dinner and prepare for some jetty fishing on sunset.

Back at the caravan park, a bus load of tourists from europe had arrived and we had a chat to them about all sorts of stuff. Its interesting to hear our different countries see things compared to us - the Swiss doctor explained the reason for getting hiccups (because I had them) but I can't even remember what it was :)

We had many many beers by time we got out on the jetty, and other than a couple of small tommies which Matt landed, nothing was caught.

The following day we did the Scotts/Ledge cruise again, and again the ledge provided the entertainment. We threw some berley in and a school of small salmon came in right next to the rocks. It was just a matter of dipping your lure over the edge and you'd hook up. Unfortunately they didn't stay hungry for very long and we only landed 5-6 fish before they went off the bite. We used 1 or 2 for big baits, and kept the rest to cook for dinner. We were down to eating tinned stews now so some fresh fish would be welcome!

Andre finally showed off his cooking skills that he'd talked up before the trip and made up a nice batter for the fillets and fried them up. Everyone agreed, job well done :) Or it could have just been that we were starving.

We decided to head home the following morning, so hit the jetty for one final fishing session. Kym and I were slower getting down there and Andre said he'd hooked a massive cuttlefish or squid but it'd dropped off as it came to the surface. Would anything go right this trip!? We had a chat to a german guy and a couple of french guys for a little bit and then decided to call it an early night - all the cold beer had ran out.

It was good to get home after the 10-11 hour drive. Another Far West Coaster done and dusted - disappointed in the fishing, but had we pulled in those big hookups we had, it could be a completely different story. Matt has declared he is never to return to the FWC. I am already thinking about the next trip there :).

I must have put the camera away for this part of the trip, so heres a picture of some seals just so this post has one

Far West Coast - January 2009 (part 2)

See part one here

On day 3, we arose early and packed up the camp. We decided to head up and down Scotts and Mexican Hat, on the off chance there was a school in close, as we badly needed more bait for what was sure to be a bumper mulloway session at Yalata.

No schools were had and we returned to camp to have a quick breakfast and then head off. I discovered my Penn 9500ssm was missing the little screw thing which goes on the opposite side of the reel to the handle. I assumed this screw made sure the handle didn't fall off, and it was panic stations. I had had my rod and reel sitting on top of the car as we searched for schools, so assumed it vibrated loose and fell off somewhere on the track to Mexican Hat. We drove back to the highway via Mexican Hat beach, hoping to see the gold screw glinting in the sun, but no such luck. As it turns out, the handle stayed on fine. The screw is more to stop dirt getting inside, which I remedied by way of some sticky tape over the large hole now in my reel.

We were on our way to Yalata, and of course, stopped at the sign for a photo first

It was HOT in Yalata, very hot. But it was nothing compared to what was coming at us later. Upon walking up the sand hill at Geues, we were treated to the sight of one of the fishiest looking bits of beach we've ever seen. The photo doesn't do it justice.

Yet still, we contained our excitement to put up the much needed shade, and cook up an Aussie day BBQ.

The chops were still a bit frozen, so required a bit of cooking to pry all the pieces loose :)

We finally got out to the water and casted in half expecting the baits to be taken instantly. But nothing happened. So we waited, and waited. Soon the chairs came out and we all sat down, rods now in holders.

The first day at Yalata ended without a single bite.

The next day was hotter than the previous. The highest I saw the thermometer was 56.6 in the sun, which I then relocated to a shadey spot, and it hovered around 48 all day. In the morning we were greeted by thousands of little flies.. they were everywhere. They must have smelt us or something because they hadn't been any where near as bad up until that point. They hung around for the rest of the trip. Andre and Kym came prepared though...

We took a drive down to Bob's Kitchen and when we got down to the camp, had to let our tyres down to get back up the hill. A guy camping there came over for a chat, and told us he'd been camping along the dog fence, and in Yalata for a total of 55 days, and so far he had one barely legal mulloway to show for it. Not sure how he kept up the keenness! He was bronzed up and with skin made of leather. The 55+ heat in the sun not seeming to faze him. My feet were burning on the sand through the soles of my wet suit boots, and after some time chatting, this guy said "gee, the sands a bit hot" and I looked down and he was bare foot! We named him Leatherman after that. Leatherman had an amazing set up with his troopy. He was sitting there watching the tennis via his foxtel satellite dish. He told us how he fishes for bait at Fowlers - sits on top of a cliff watching the cricket, waiting for a school. When he sees one he runs down and chucks out the lure until he has a dozen or so fresh fish. Thats how its done!

Hot weather is good for mulloway fishing they say.. it should have been on! But instead, all we (by we, I mean Matt and I) caught was two very small mulloway which were instantly returned before the camera's came out.

The next day, on Leathermans advice, we woke up early and hit the shallows at geues with some berley and small rods in order to catch some mullet for fresh bait. All we could muster was a few undersize salmon trout though. This day was heating up more than the last, it must have been 40 by 9am. We spent most of the entire day back at camp in the shade, where the temperature was over 50 in the shade for the most part. An attempt to cook saw the hose on the gas bottle somehow burst a small hole in itself, rendering the gas cooker unusable. Luckily Kym brought his butane cooker along, and slowly but surely, some snags were cooked.

Strong northerly winds which were hot as hell were blowing all day, and our once mighty shelter was now falling down all around us. We had to tie one side of the tarp down low, but that just caused the tent to take a pounding too.

Although we had plenty of water, it was all hot enough to be drunk as a cup of tea. The fridge after powering for a few days in the heat must have drained the battery a fair bit, and was now constantly on trying to get stuff inside cool. It struggled to get anywhere below 15 degrees, so our cold cans of drink were now not so cold at all. We took quick trips out to the beach to just lay in the shallows and try cool off, which worked well, but we couldn't stay out in the sun for too long or we'd be burnt to a crisp. Matt chose to stay out there longer, digging himself a little "kiddie pool" in the sand which filled out with water with each large wave. Quite the sight to behold, him sitting in a hole splashing himself in water. Pity we didn't take a camera over to the beach :P. Back at camp, we plowed through all of our hot water, either drinking it warm or spraying it on ourselves to try keep cool.

We decided it was best that we exit Yalata the following morning, as now our meat supply would need to be chucked as well. We sat up into the night as it was still 40+ and impossible to sleep in the sauna of the tent. We didn't realise until afterwards, but everything was extremely quiet, until we heard the roaring of the ocean start up like someone flicked a switch. Ten seconds later the wind shifted to the south and a cool breeze blew through, dropping the temperature 10 degrees instantly. It was the best thing ever at that point.

The final installment can be found here

Matt Loses Fish - Blames Others

You never know whats gonna happen at Fowlers Bay :)

Far West Coast - January 2009 (part 1)

Well, we finally got over there again and I'll start out by saying we didn't get the big fish we were after. We loaded the car up and stayed at Kym's on Friday night, before departing for Fowlers Bay at 3:45 on Saturday morning.

We arrived at Fowler's Bay around 2pm and after a quick drive through the town, we made our way to Scott's Beach by way of an excellent short cut I took (the others were dubious).



We set up our tent and cooked up a bit of food before heading out onto the beach itself, where we half expected to be greeted by massive schools of salmon swimming up and down the beach after the reports we'd read. Not quite the case though, and we headed to a likely looking gutter mid way down. Around 5 O'Clock Matt caught the first fish of the trip, a reasonably large Salmon going 62cm. Without much action, we decided to head back to camp to have a feed, before giving it another go at Sunset.



Back at camp, there we now had some neighbours in the way of an aussie bloke showing a Swiss girl around Australia in a van. He asked us for some "Herb" - I don't think we had the kind he was after.

Went for a quick drive to Mexican Hat to see if we could spot any schools, but none were visible, so we headed back to Scotts and as we pulled onto the beach we saw our new neighbour pulling in a Salmon. We stopped nearby and he said there was a few about, but he was only after one, so was heading back to cook it up. We promptly took his spot.

We managed another 4 Salmon here - I can't remember who got what, but Kym also got a nice sized King George Whiting, and Andre pulled in a small, but legal Flathead. We kept those to cook up for breakfast. All the Salmon were filleted and put in the fridge to be used as bait later.



As it was getting dark, Andre's reel started screaming.. line peeling off fast - and Andre made a quick dash over only to grab his rod and have his line break instantly. He wound it in to find that his red surf popper had snapped off - leaving us guessing at what it could have been. We headed back to camp and made a large dent in our beer supply.

On Day 2, we started off with a quick drive down Scotts in search of visible schools, and then headed over to Fowlers Point, in search of a place known as just the ledge. After winding through various tracks, we finally found the spot we were after. Greeted with a solid platform 2 metres above the waters surface, and dropping into deep clear water, it was a great spot. We pulled a lot of small fishies here, including sweep, trevally and rockcod - but nothing worth of keeping.



I had my Mully rod out just incase, and line starting peeling away off the reel. I picked it up and was hooked on. Whatever it was went on a big run straight out from the rocks, and then turned left and headed out further. I was able to turn it around and bring it back in close before it went off on another big run this time out to the right, and unable to stop it, it got itself hooked into the reef. Defeated, I pulled on the line until it snapped off. I'm still not sure what it was, I suspect a ray as I didnt feel much in the way of headshakes, but the fact it darted off in changing directions makes me think it might have been something else. I'll never know now!

With no more excitement on the ledge, we headed back down to Scotts and spotted a small school of Salmon out at the back of the breakers. Another 2 guys had also spotted them and were making their way out to cast too. We quickly threw on some lures, and started wading out. I got to waist deep and one of the other guys said to me "Theres a bronzy out there" - and I turned around and walked to knee deep water. Having not actually seen the bronzy, I didnt have the same amount of fear as I suspected I would, and Matt and I waded out further again. We were having swell roll past at chest high, and were soaked head to toe, but we just couldn't reach the Salmon as they kept moving further out. One of the other guys was really keen and was just about swimming before he casted. He hooked on and made the long journey back only to lose the fish right on the shore. Spewing! They gave up after that, and we got back in the car and followed the school down the beach hoping it would get closer, but it didn't.

We had a fish at sunset on Scotts again, and disappointingly, there was still no action. Tomorrow we would need to head out to Yalata, and the bait supply was not looking good.



Part 2, where we head to Yalata, starts here

Montage

Ahhh, the memories



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Big Salmon Photo

I was just flicking through some old photos and saw this one. How fat is that Salmon! Will landed this, the only fish of the entire weekend back in February 2005

St Kilda Quicky

Sani and I went down to St Kilda for a quick fishing session off the breakwater last night. We got there around 7pm, grabbed some live tube worms and made our way down the 1.2km walk to the end of the breakwater.

Didn't take long before I landed a small King George Whiting, which was quickly released. I thought we were supposed to catch Yellowfin here. Sani also managed to get an undersized KGW, and then we both caught a couple of trumpeters. Pity I didnt bring my mully rod down, or that little prick would've been seen straight back out as a livie! :)

Shortly after, we both managed to get snagged at the same time, and lost both rigs. Since I don't have any small swivels (well prepared) I just tied some new hooks and a sinker onto the main line. Then I snapped one of those hooks off too. The tide was rising and if we didn't want to get our feet wet, we had to move further up the breakwater, which is what we did. Without much action going on, we decided to take some photo's before getting annihilated by mosquito's and racing back to the car.



That thin bit was quite wide when we got there.

A Coorong Moment

3 Regulars at the Coorong. They were all down there on New Years Eve - no remarkable captures, but a few undersized mulloway (keep that tally going) and a stingray.

Not Long Now!