My report is a bit late, as I have been a bit busy at work of late.
Due to work and family commitments, fishing trips with the boys have been rather rare in the last few years. This year we decided it was time to start an annual boys trip, and the first one would be held on the 7-10 Aug at my cottgae int he kei.
We had 12 guys for the trip, incl 3 young lads of 12-15yrs old who were joining us with their dads.
Thursday am most of us drove down from El with one vehicle coming down after school on thursday eve.
The forcast had looked very poor from early in the week but improved as we got closer to the weekend.
After arriving and getting unpacked around 1pm, 3 of the guys headed off to the rocks to see if they could catch some shad (that have been non existent most of the year). I was going to join later to test my new rod, but soon found I had packed the wrong one, the old broken 1. Good effort.
I spent the afternoon doing maintenance ont he house.
The guys arrived back around 5.30 having had a ball with lesser sandsharks on dropshot tackle. They recon they caught about a dozen decent sized ones between the 3 of them. One other guy pulled about a 5kg kob between them.
Thursday evening was the typical FNB (first night blow out) with too much
.
[size=78%]Friday am we woke to perfect conditions but rather sore heads. We were on the sea at 6.30 and started looking for bait. Nothing. we spent around an hr looking before we moved to 40 odd m to look there incase the mackrel were deeper. I put a bait down whilst 2 others used mackrel flies. Imediatly the decent bites were there and I got a decent dagarad, but bait was scarce. We all started fishing properly as it seemd the fish were biting. It wasnt wild and we were not fishing our "hot spots" but were were regularly getting a decent sized red or rockcod. I ended up getting a decent 12kg black steenbras and a mate a decent 5kg dagarad. I dropped a very dgood fish after about 5 min just under the boat (probably a decent black) and got another matching 12kg black shortly after. [/size][/size][size=78%]We moved a bit deeper still lookign for decent reds and my brother got a 12kg copper on a tiny squid bait, it was duly tagged and released. A few min later he was in again and another similar sized copper came up, this one was already tagged, bu the tag was in poor condition (looked like it had been bitten/cut off short). we took the nrs we could get guessing the last nr, but retagged it with a new tag and duly released it. I then got a +_8kg copper a bit shallower, also released sporting a tag. It was strange to be getting them in shallow water (for copeprs that is) and also wierd that there seemed to be so many small ones (all eating squid) the blacks were also on squid [/size][size=78%][/size]strangely[size=78%][/size][size=78%]. [/size][size=78%][/size][size=78%]We called it a day with a decent bag of fish around 2pm. a good day although nothing spectacular. It was awsome seeing the amout of whales around, with some breaching fairly close to us. The sea was around 21deg, crystal clear and glassed over all day. We had spent quite while chasing yellowfin that were busting, but they were tiny 2-3kg guys eating tiny sprats. no luck though.[/size][size=78%][/size][size=78%]The rest of the guys had spent the day diving and surfing and going on the river fishing. No fish, but a few coolboxes of [/size][size=78%] meant they had had a great day.
3 of us went for a dive as we got back from sea, but the surge meant we couldnt get on the crayfish areas. We saw schools of big spotted grunter and plenty of the big lesser sandies.
Friday night was
and
again. We woke to perfect conditions on sat am, but a few sore heads and broken bodies meant we skipped the early deep sea. The boys did some surfing and a big brunch to sort out the babalas.
Sat pm the guys hit the other river for a bit of fishing, armed with decently stocked cool boxes. My younger brother and I headed depesea with a mate and his keen 11yr old son. He had never been deep sea,a nd the dad hasnt been for about 10 yrs.
We decided to try for geelbeak due to it being a late afternoon trip. I gave Sam tmy new slammer on a jigging rod as i didnt think he would manage a KP. 1st geelbek spot, good showings, but not a touch. me moved to another spot and ist drop dad and sam VAS. dave got one bek that was just on legal size, and sam doyubled up with 2 just legal bek as well. He was so chuffed with himself. the 2 biggest fish of his life in 1 drop.
Next drop he was in again with a proper bek, but unfortunately tired arms and inexperience he gave it slack and it was gone. As per usual it took the shoal with it. Whilst trying for more sam hooked a bus, but we soon realized it wasnt a fish and he was fighting out of his league so my brother (who had been helping sam akll afternnon) took over. Geez im impressed with that penn slammer. My boet took about 30min before getting about a 120kg raggie up. which we cut off.
We moved to the 1st spot again and we were immediatly into the bek, better sized ones, BUT it was definatly tax season. We got smashed by the sharks. Every decent fish we hooked got eaten from 10m off the bottom to right under the boat. We landed only 1 4kg bek, And Sam landed a 6kg black steenbras the rest were eaten. The black worked him over properly, but the smile he had was priceless. My brother, whilst trying to hook fish for sam hooked what we think was a yellow tail as it screamed off about 150m of line and then the hook pulled, no chafe and not bitten off so unlikely it was a shark. the slammer was smoking though.
We called it quits with a full moon rising behind us and hit the shote around 5.45. Sam told his dad on the way home that " THIS WAS THE MOST FUN EVER"
That evening was a quieter party but still fun was had. Sunday the guys went for an awsome surf in perfect conditions before we packed up int he rain and headed home.
A great 1st annual boys trip, some decent fish, too many laughs and more than enough beers. I cant wait for next year for hole in the wall.
Highlight of the trip was taking a youngster fishing and seeing him get hooked properly. I think we may have a convert.
Not many pics, just this one of a very chuffed Sam.
