With late notice, it left just Kym and I, driving through hours of rain to hit the beach, and after travelling 20kms up the beach, we finally settled on a spot we could set up camp and got out the car - for the rain to dry up and barely bother us for the rest of the weekend.
I sent a message to Ben to let him know our location and he informed me he was on his way back from Brisbane - that's dedication to a fishing trip! He was to arrive later that day, and then leave the following evening.
I had the first soapy on the board which was clearly undersized and quickly returned. Kym, having never caught a mulloway of any size, was excited even by undersized fish being in our gutter. Regardless of that, we set up a pretty cool shelter just in case the rain came back:
Ben and his father-in-law, Francis rolled up around 5pm, and before long we had a nice selection of baits in the water. Everyone was able to pull in a soapy, including Kym who looked pretty happy with his:
Whilst my mulloways got consistently smaller, Kym got a couple more that had us racing for the measuring tape - but fell short at just under 70cm.
It was a nice calm night and as the sunset, we chucked on some glow sticks and fished right up until midnight, but not a single bite was had.
The following day the winds picked up a bit, but nothing bad enough to stop the fishing. Ben and Francis were due to head home around dinner time and were desperate to get something in the esky before leaving. But with only undersized mulloway about, it didn't seem likely.... until Ben wound a stocky little bronzy up onto the beach! He was de-finned and prepared for the esky and they were soon on their way. Fresh flake for dinner.
Kym & I chose to forgo the night fish with the wind being too much of a pain. We instead rose early (for us at least) and threw some baits out. Without any hits, we quickly decided this spot wasn't going to provide, and packed up with the intention of fishing another gutter before heading home.
With no gutters really standing out as saying "fish here!" we were very indecisive and ended up back towards 42 mile crossing before finally settling on a spot. A few enquiries were had on our baits which resulted in no fish, but raised hopes. I landed a couple more tiny fish, before Kym had a definite hookup on one of his lines. He ran over, struck hard, and was on. We saw the shape of a mulloway cruise through the shallows and I knew it would be close. I grabbed out the brag mat and raced over to pull the mulloway up onto the beach. It came in at 76cm (or 76.5cm as Kym tells the story).
Not much better feeling than your first legal mulloway.
