It was time for a trip down to Albany. A friend from Sydney was over visiting and I'd promised him a tour of the south west with the gaurantee of his first ever Salmon.

We headed down Tuesday arvo after wasting our money spending a few hours in the pouring rain at the Royal Show. Wednesday was spent stocking up on fishing gear, new sleeping bags, shoes and rain jackets before a drive around Torndirrup area checking out the Gap, Blow holes, Salmon holes etc.. Cable beach was looking nice so we flicked a few lures around for 10 minutes but only a few herring were on the prowl.

The plan for thursday was to head over towards Walpole and fish one of the beaches for Salmon. After picking up a mate from Denmark we made the call to check out Blue Holes beach, hoping the beach wasn't too washed out to drive along and find a nice hole or gutter. I was keen to test out the new Pajero I'd recantly bought and before I knew it we had it swimming through some deep puddles (over the tyres) before making it down to the beach. Conditions weren't the best with a large swell and dirty water but the beach has some great looking gutters all the way along at the moment. We could only drive a few hundred meters down the beach (with the tyres at 8lb) before it was too washed away so we parked up high away from the waves and grabbed a rod each. The plan was to walk further along the beach throwing metal lures along the way into all the holes and gutters in search of some salmon. I made the call again that I gauranteed my mate Steve his first salmon before we left the car. It was 5 minutes before the first hook up, Adrian was walking ahead and was into a nice salmon in a great looking gutter. I ran towards the action and pinged a cast into the gutter hoping there was more, wind, wind, wind... nothing.... until my lure was right in the shorebreak and it stopped dead and launched into the air with a salmon attached. Hoots and Hollahs all round as we quickly landed our fish. Steve frantically casted around the same area but couldn't find any takers. "How do you guys do it?!"

A few minutes later and Adrian was on again but dropped it. It was another 1km of walking and casting before we found anymore Salmon. This time I was first into the action after watching several salmon fighting over the lure on the surface I was hooked up. "Cast straight out there Steve!" A good cast and seconds later he was hooked up on his first ever salmon! I quickly landed my fish and grabbed the camera.

He fought it well and had the fish in the shorebreak in quick time but it just wasn't meant to be and the salmon spat the lure back up the beach leaving Steve feeling like he'd just missed his chance. But the next cast he was on again, this time it was only a small one and didn't really put up a fight on the 20lb beach gear. His first salmon none the less! He was stoked.

Not being that content with such a small salmon Steve was straight back into on his next cast with a bigger one.

The salmon weren't huge but put up a great fight as always and kept us buzzing for that next hook up. I landed 1 more at the same spot before we headed on further up the beach. We should have just stopped there as we walked another 1.5km up the beach for only 1 more salmon. The 3km walk back picking up salmon we'd buried along the way wasn't half as exciting as the first walk, espeically once I had 3 salmon in the backpack and 2 in the hands and the sand was soft!

Overall it was a great session and worth the effort to find the fish!

The next day, Friday, we'd planned to fish the rocks for a kingie or sambo as the report was there are a few around and the winds were looking good. We were up early and on the hike to a favourite spot of Adrians with high hopes of a great rock session. An hour of hiking over hills and along the rocks....

and we arrived at our platform only to find the swell wasn't being as cooperative as we'd hoped. The spot looked fishable but the chances of landing anything hooked were slim to none. A few minutes of assessing the situation and watching a large set of waves come through and rightover the top of our fishing platform and we made the wise but dissapointing decision to give it a miss this time. Another hour hike back to the car and the shoulders and legs were crying for a rest. We headed to one of the local heavily fished rock spots with the idea to send out a few live herring in hope of a shark or possible sambo but those hopes were dashed when we couldn't even find 1 herring! Even after a whole bucket of burley we couldn't see or hook anything! Looks like the day wasn't meant to be so we relaxed on the rocks and had a rum :)

Saturday was booked in for a trip out with my old man in his boat to try some bottom bashing and conditions were looking.... ok... we headed out towards Torbay head to try and hide away from the winds but conditions were worse than forecasted and the seas weren't so comfortable. We put in a few drifts close to the rocks for 1 harlequin and a queen snapper.

Oh and many spikey blowies!

Atleast we brought home a feed!

Sunday was spent 4wding out west cape howe to dunskys beach for a looksey and to test out more of the Pajero. The track out there is pretty bad at the moment with lots of deep dug out holes and many challenging sections which made for a fun drive. Scratched up the car and dented the rear plastic bumper and bent up the tow plug bracket so the day was considered a success... by me, not my wife!

Overall we could have done better on the fishing side of things but it was still an enjoyable trip and the weather wasn't even THAT bad! Heading back down for a whole week next weekend so I'll hopefully have a better report when I return from that one as it should be a solid week of fishing!

Until then... I'll keep dreaming!