Have you ever had one of those days when you should have just stayed in bed? We Jay did this morning,  he actually did.  He was supposed to be at my house at 0430 so that we could give ourselves half a chance of beating the forecast blustery SW winds on route to Dixon Island in Nicol Bay in the Pilbara.  He arrived at 0630 with all the excuses you can imagine.  I didn't mind so much i was liking to the idea of using jays poor punctuality as an excuse to stay in bed myself.  The forecast was not looking good, we decided to push on however.  As i said the plan was to head out to one of the islands in the area more as a bit of a reconnaissance mission.  Have a look around and see if we could get some crays.  It was neap tides so we were hoping for good Vis but Mr 20 kontt SW wind decided against that idea.

Dixon Island

After a slow trip over to the island we opted for a quick fish first.  We had a bag of prawns and thought it might be a bit of fun to try our luck on some bluebone.  We haven't really had much luck with bluebone on the neaps in the past so expectations were really not that high.  We did get a few juvenile fish on the creek rods, it was enough to keep us entertained for a while.

Nice mouth ey!

Jays tiny little bluebone, yes its a fish rutar!

Anyway before too long the sun was overhead and although the Vis wasn't too flash we decided to hop in for a bit of a swim. Saw a lot of very small crays around but no hoocha mammas.  Was good to get in and have a swim however.

After a swim we decided to move back toward home into that bloody SW wind at around 12 knotts.  I swear my kidneys are still bleeding.  We stopped at an old trusty spot and anchored the boat so that we could get some crays.  It wasn't long and i had three good sized crays in the esky.  I was talking to jay(in the water) and we both looked at the boat to see it floating away.  It has slipped anchor and was roaring up the coast pretty fast.  We managed to swim it down and decided to dive in and check the anchor a bit more thoroughly the next time.

Me diving for crays

A couple for the Missus.

While we were swimming for crays i say a nice coral trout of around 75cm, i went to spear it and missed, actually nothing happened.  Later i realised that i had my safety on, that was after i missed another nice trout, idiot!

Anyway the wind was really picking up probably around the 20 plus kotts at this stage.  We decided to head into one of the creeks for a shot at some jacks, and maybe a Barra.  I had packed the cast net just in case.  We got in without too much trouble, and after a few casts had a few really nice sized mullet "turbos".  Jay also scored a bonus muddie for his mum while i was busy collecting bait.

Can i smell a bazza?

We ventured right deep into the veins of the system and anchored up in a nice hole around 4.5m deep. We got our turbo's in and it wouldn't have been ten seconds before my rod was screamin.  The fish swam straight toward then back under the boat.  I didn't have a hope in hell of stopping it, both thumbs were trying to slow the spool down, then it dropped it.  Now it was definitely a barra, and a bloody big one at that.  The mullet i was using was about20cm lond and very fat.  We estimate the fish to be very big, but the exact size we will never know.

We both had another run while we were fishing with the livies but didn't hook up.  The baits were coming back completely scaled, typical symptoms of a barra attack.  Anyway, we decided to move and have a crack at some jack before going home.

It wasn't long and we got a few, we tagged and released them.

Jay tagging a Jack

Another jack tagged and released

We were getting smashed every cast in this little spot.  So many species too.  Flatties, many species of cod, catties, Jacks and bream.

Jays Bream

This one i kept, yum!

I landed another nice sized jack and then it was time to call it a day.  We headed out the mouth to be greeted with 25kontt winds right in the face.  Lucky it was only a quick trip back to the ramp.  I was glad to get home at the end of it all.  Thanks for another great day Jay.  Next time we will have to give the barra a bit more of a nudge at that place

Cheers  PB