Took my daughter out with the aim to get her onto a fish or two with her bright pink Kmart Rod and 5g Temu Blade, went to como jetty for a few hours with nothing but blowies, so we popped into narrows bridge for a quick flick on the way home, it was a low tide, no run, people/boats/jetskies everywhere i thought we would be going home empty handed for sure...

She learnt to cast and work the blade pretty fast and we coverd the ground completelty, just as we are about to leave i hear her yelling daaaaaddd and look over and her rods bent like crazy head shakes snapping it back and forth, she managed to find herself onto a 51cm flatty! i couldnt beleive it... she reeled it it all by herself i only helped hold the rod and get it lifted onto the grass when she got it close to shore.

So proud of her, she now asks me to go fishing constantly haha got her a nice little light weight 6ft combo to replace the kmart gear now :)

 Few donkies from the Narrows the other day :)

Humble brag for a catch a few weeks ago, went to Narrows on a strong outgoing tide, easterly winds on my light gear flicking bream lures on 6lb/1k size reel and landed a 41 and 36cm tailor before work.
The next day the weather was the exact same! so brought my medium outfit down with a 95 Shiverstick and 3k/10lb 3-6kg setup, landed this absolute donkey 55cm tailor about 5 casts in! he flew out of the water on hookup was absolutly epic.
 

 just login on to share my experience at shark bay during the fishing comp. seems to distort the pics ?second day out

Hey team, 

Recently got back for a week in Exmouth booked 4 days on a charter got out for 3

brief summary day 1

northerly was up so decided to troll for marlin. The crew I took were kind of inexperienced fisher people but the skipper worked hard and got us all our first stick face going 5-4-4 was so fun

second day it was time to get some waters. Morning started of good for me landing a 14kg Mack (pb) followed by a 810mm trout which was also a pb. Ended the day with an awesome bag of reds trout spangoes and Mack's.

third day the forecast looked a bit iffy and the crew was a bit tired so we made it a landbased day. Awesome choice with me landing my pb queenie off the stones and my mate landing a stonker javelin from the creek

4th and final day was crazy. Went deep dropping for rubies and a nice steady action throughout the day landing 6 cod and 4 rubies. 
2 days of fillets bagging us out on demersals cleaned up and started the long trip home.

very successful trip for me the other team struggled a little I'll let the pictures do the talking

 just to ask on peoples oppinion is it deremental if motor is not  flushed every time /-  while away up north { how often should it be flushed ? }

 Just got back from our Gnaraloo trip so doing another write up..... Grab yourself a tin and have a read if your keen

This is the first ever fishing trip I have been on where I havnt used my car, my boat, my equipment. Sold the big girl a while back and still procrastinating on what I want to do for a new boat. So was lucky enough to get an invite on a good mates boat! Did 10 days in total this time up from the 7 from last year, thank god we did because the weather didnt play nice on a few days.

Day 0-1

Decided this year to head straight up from Perth all the way through to Gnaraloo in the day. Stayed at the skippes house the night, packed the boat, watched footy and ordered pizza with a couple of beers with a sensible bed time as we were setting the alarm for 2am. Up at sparrows, loaded the last of the bits and pieces in the boat and we were on our way.... Less than an hour out of town my guts was feeling horrible dutching up the car a few times, finally had to pull over for a road side bog.. Dodgey pizza I rekon. From there made it to Gero uneventfully and then through to Carnarvon also no dramas... The other boat that was coming with us caught up to us. Bit of a chat and a walk around their boat we noticed they had no tow hitch on their extension bar, bloody thing had fallen off somewhere on the way up.. This was the start of some bloody unlucky events for this boat, quick stop in Carnarvon hardware and got a new hitch. Quick stop at the king waves kill sign for a photo and let tyres down.... and OMFG the flies were hectic.

Finished the trip into Gnaraloo, the track wasnt too bad really. let tyres down and drive to conditions and its not too bad. Rolled in, checked in and unloaded the boat and car. Next day which was Sunday was looking great for weather so we were all excited to get up early and launch. Dinner, beers and rigging up rods, lines etc. Headed to bed to get up early.

Ooohhh And we got to watch the mighty Eagles flog the Shockers!! We had starlink on this trip and bought a TV up to watch the games! 3 out of the guys on the trip were Dockers supporters and 3 others were Eagles so it was great to see the Eagles win the Derby and rub it in!! haha

Day 2

Got up reasonably early around 5:30am. Breaky, coffee and headed off to the beach as the sun came up. Launching boats was very easy. No real dramas at all. Headed out to troll to try get fresh bait. Areas that produced well for trolling last year we got nothing. Trolled for around 2 hours and didnt get a hit. Headed out to bottom bounce before bite time - Up here found that he bite times play a massive part in getting your fish. Fish literally bite in those times, could get 10 Reds in the hour and a half then it goes dead. First fish on board was a Red around 7kgs, brilliant start to the trip. In the next hour 10 reds, rankin, cobia getting a decent bad. We got the biggest red for the trip on the first day that went 9.3kgs. We were catching red throat as bait as we couldnt get anything on the troll. Ended up with a pretty decent bag for the first day.

Back to the beach to see how our first retrieve goes - We opt to retrieve as for us its easier. If we had a ute or something similar we would moore. Just the issues of getting equipment, fuel, eskies back to and from the beach every day we just find it easier to retrieve every day. Anyway first retrieve was pretty easy for our boat.... The unlucky boat had a bit of an unlucky misshap... As the boat was coming onto the trailer the hitch lock on the tow ball wasnt in place causing the trailer to come off the car... No damage done luckilym we were able to push the boat off, hitch the car on and re-set. Second time went alot smoother... We use a second car and snatch strap to help the car out. Pretty easy.

Back to the fillet station and spent a few hours filleting. On the first day we got just over 20kgs in demersal fillets which was a blessing in disguise as the fishing and weather for the next couple of days was pretty poor.

Day 3

Day 3 was a rite off. Pretty windy this day so called it a lay day.... We went hunting for spaghetti.. One of the meals we pre-cooked and froze was spaghetti bolognase however one of the deckies left the spaghetti at home. So we went sight seeing to 3 mile and Red bluff and an unsuccessful spaghetti mission. Good to see the place seems as well last time we didnt get to have a drive around. Pretty nice place and might bring the missis and daughter up here in the Van at some point.

Cleaned the house, fixed up leaders and rigs getting ready for the next day.

Day 4 

Wind was down and swell was up for the next couple of day but were fine to get out. This day we decided to go to an area that produced alot of Reds for us last year. This time the bite was very very slow. Although we managed to pick up a huge coronation trout, the biggest I had ever seen... Up to that point haha. Fished alot of places, trolled everywhere we went. I did manage to pull in a 8kg mackie on a floater which was good going. Even though i say it was slow we still managed the mackie, 7 reds, the big coronation and a big bald chin. No miss haps launching and retrieving, pretty straight forward pretty simple. 

Day 5 and 6

These days should have been write off days.... Wind did totally different than what was predicted on weather apps, still got out but did not get many fish at all. Think we got a couple of Reds, Pearl Perch and Baldies for the 2 days... Once again trolled everywhere and did not get a single hook up. Still happy to be out on the water but was alot rougher than predicted. 

These days allowed us to have dinner at a reasonable time as we werent spending hours at the fillet station, filled up the boat, cooked a few great dinners so all in all not too bad 

Day 7

Looked to be one of the best days on the trip weather wise..... The weather did not dissapoint and neither did the fish...... Got to the beach and the unlucky boat had another unlucky incidents... Pulled up to the beach and one of they tyres had completely shredded itself to pieced... No dramas... Jacked it up and fitted a new tyre. When we were about to lower the jack I wiggled they tyre (Im a mechanic) the bloody bearing was dead loose I dont think the bearing cup was seated correctly on assembly because there didnt seem to be any damage just really loose... Ahh well all good tightened it up and it was sweet for the rest of the trip.... Not a good start but it was going to get better.

We decided to head out into the 80s- 100s today. First time going into the hundreds. I was given some great advise by Seakem off here. Went out do around the area he advised and found a decent showing of fish while trolling in the 70s. Came around and sounded a bit more and found alot of fish on this spot. Decided to have a quick drop.... Worth it!!! First fish came on board was an even bigger coronation trout than a couple of days before, we were stoked hi fiving and cracking our first beer (First fish first beer rule) by 7:30am..... Literally as we were celebrating bang one of the other blokes on the boat was on.... After a great fight an even bigger coronation was landed!! This was later weighed at the fillet station and was just over 5kgs!! Was massive! We were absolutely rapped!! Went back over the spot and the red throat had moved in.... Wasnt a bad thing as we needed bait... Got a heap of bait and kept trolling out to the 100s.... Before we even got to our destination again a very likely spot showed on the sounder. Pulled in the lures and sounded around. We were in just over 100m and found this spot that was absolutely on fire. The fish arches were amazing to see and I was frothing to drop a big bait down... Came around on the drift, dropped down and bang I was on!! A very very good fight and a few minutes later this thing started to "Swim" out.... I called it for a Cobia as that is what they do.... Then this thing breached the surface like a submarine.... It was the biggest Goldban i have ever seen, it was massive. My PB weighing at 6.9kgs... I was stoked to say the least. We also got a couple of reds off the same drift.

Next drift came around.... Bang on again!! not as big this time but same deal another very very big Goldban. A friendly shark had also moved in and ate a big goldban at the boat which one of the others boys on the boat pulled in... We got my goldie and another red up off that drift until we had to circle around.... 3rd drift..... We thought the other 2 drift had been good..... Well this one was better haha!! All 4 of us hooked up, we were scared we were all going to get smoked by the shark so we were literally winching these fish up!! I got in another Red and so did one of the other boys, both fish were around the 6kg mark, decent fish. The other deckie got bitten off and the skipper was still fighting his fish. It was big whatever it was. We thought a small shark must have taken his bait.... Until... Another massive Goldban breached the surface right near the other boat that was fishing with us.... It was a monster. This one weighed in at 7.3kgs when back at the fillet station... It was a thumper!!

We tried another drift but got sharked on 2 rods so decided to give up on the spot. We made the call to troll for the rest of the arvo as we pretty much should have had our demersal limit but no pelagics at all. We trolled for a few hours on the way in and nothing... I have never seen it so dead for pelagic action.

Back at the fillet station a few of the other boats around were stoked with the size of the goldies and coronation we were able to get. Weighed a few of them, filleted and same nightly ritual of cryovac, rums and dinner.

Day 8

Looked to be a half decent day. Our boat decided to troll where as the other boat decided to go out and bottom bash. They ended up with a bloody ripper of a Red as well as a few other reds - Cant remember what they got just know their red was a thumper!! They yelled over to us on the two way as they had hooked a 20kg plus mackie on their bottom rig and it snapped the line off near the hooks just as they were about to gaff it. We trolled over and once again had zero luck... We trolled for pretty much 90 percent of the day trying to get pelagics... Absolutely nothing... Had a few drops on a couple of great flare ups and kept a couple of decent reds and Pearl perch..

We didnt know what we were going to do with pelagics this year... Talked to alot of the other boats that were around and not many had gotten onto the pelagics apart from a few cobia.

Pretty low key at the fillet station thisarvo, stoked with the other boat and their red, they had a great day fishing!

Back to the accommodation and some deep discussions were had...... We had some really really good red ground a fair way north we use to fish when we were in Coral Bay and used to get mackies and the odd Wahoo out there. Big gamble but we were thinking should give that a go... Running low on fuel we were tossing up what to do. The skipper in his most serious voice says while eating dinner "Right we need a group decision what do we all want to do"...... Fuck it we dont need demersals lets do it!! Do the miles get the smiles.

Day 9

Decision was made to head to our Coral bay spot... Got up early and headed out..... A pretty decent drive and we were there.... No joke its some of the best ground you would see up there. Marked a heap of fish on the bottom and a heap sitting about 30m up... Surely that has to be something... Started trolling... teaser out... then ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ..... Were on!!! we were so bloody excited that we were on while trolling....... And then...... Snap!! hahahahahah..... The frigging wire leader broke hahahhahaha Lost the fish and the lure!!! Just our bloody luck trolling this year..... Stuff it, put some deeper divers on and try get these deeper fish to play the game.... Started trolling again up to the mark where we marked the fish and then.... ZZZZZZZZ....ZZZZZZ....ZZZZZZZ.......ZZZZZZZ........ 4 WAY HOOK UP!!! hahahahaha it was going ballistic.... Rods and people going everywhere... Thank god one of them got off so we had Andrew (Gaff) to help get the fish on board.... 3 mackies all around the 15kg mark came on board and into the catch bag... We were all pumped and stoked!! High fiving, fist pumping, bloody stoked with the decision. Again set up, lures out, teaser in, beer out of the esky..... Went to crack the beer and a huuugggeeee Run...ZZZZZZZZZZZZ THAT IS BIG!! The bloke that picked up the rod says "I dont even want to reel this in Im too screwed from the last one" hahahhaha after a bit of groning and about a 20 minute fight this fish surfaced with amazing electric blue stripes on it!! It was a bloody WAHOOOO!!!! We were bloody excited until it jumped and a hook popped out.... Fuck get it it... Get it in hahaha we were yelling, got it to the site of the boat and Andrew (Gaff) managed to nail it in the worst spot haha right in the back part of the fillet.. But just as he did the second hook came out so all in all was pretty lucky!! We were pumped!!! For the next hour and a half we trolled over this 1 spot where the fish were showing and got 11 Mackies and a Wahoo off it in one of the best ever pelagic sessions I have ever seen. We got our bag limit by 9:30am........ We were on the biggest high, better than any drug could ever give you! It was insane!!

We stopped when we had our fish and decided to have a drop on the spot as this is one of our best Red spots....... Huge fish hooked but couldnt get them to the boat, had 1 pass and lost 4 fish to either sharks or mackies, gave up on that idea. Headed in towards Cape Farqua where we had a few spots we have done very well on before. Wanted a red for dinner.... First drop... Bang red around 8kgs and a pretty big Pearl Perch.... Dinner sorted.... If you havnt had Peal Perch for Sushimi you should try it, one of the best fish for sushi

Came in and got in the bay pretty early, had a swim, cleaned up and headed to the fillet station.... Everyone couldnt believe our catch, neither could we. Few nice blokes up there gave us some Pasta to go with our bolognese sauce and garlic bread so we were more than happy to give them a heap of fillets for helping us out. The comradarie with everyone up there is one of the best things about going up there!!

Day 10

Yesterday was our last hurrah sp we cleaned, packed and headed back into carnarvon to stay the night then drive back through to Perth the following day..... Not much else to report, everyone got home safe!

Thought I would mention a few thing

- We took a deep freezer and Generator this year as we learnt from last year..... Wayyyyyyy better

- If your fishing and not catching try something different

- Sharks were insane.... Like hugely insane.... We lost over 100 rigs.... Luckily we bought spare hooks and spare sinkers and that Eugene from Mackdog tackle was there... The underdog jig he makes is awesome!

- We stayed in the cabins, they are alot cleaner than most of the accommodation around and amazing views

- Take 6 max tracks for retrieving you will need them

Cheers hope you enjoy the write up!!

 Well what a first month of being able to fish have had an amazing momth couldn't tell you how many snaps have been caught but this weekend was able to equal my pb of 90cm. Let him go as already had our limit well and truly sorted. 

 300 m off Exmouth 

 hi spending 3 weeks in shark bay starting from 16 may ,would like to target amongst other things, crabs & poss. {large whitings } just wondering if someone can help in that regard just general area as a starting point  would be appreciated , can message me  

 seems 475k was spent on upgrading a jetty  in his own electorate and after a few years its now  closed down , his incompitance and failure to listen is stagering , did not acknowlege what others were saying ,IMO  if ever there was a troglodite then he would fit the bill !!

 So after Rona did its best to mess up Easter, i decided to book Friday off and with the young bloke recently adding a trip to the fads to his bucket list, we checked the forecast and decided to have a go. 

Problem was that I made this mistake of trusting a northerly wouldnt mess things up too much.....
So after launching at ~0830, we headed over to the dog beach and picked up a couple of squid before heading out to the channel to catch some bait. The northerly had created a bit of slop so we moved to the lee side of Mewstone and quickly got some herring before heading towards Rotto via Hugall Passage.

In the lee of Rotto, it was fairly decent so we hugged the beach having a bit of an explore of some spots we hadnt seen before hitting West End at around 1030 and agreeing to head out. Well it was shit. THere seemed to be more SW swell than planned (was .6), there was a bit of north westerly swell as well as a chop from the north east with the occasional three way wave combining to something that was steap and higher than the boat. Surely this was just at the cape, so we kept pushing out to the waypoint I had for the Club Marine fad. We got about 1.5 miles off the cape before the sounder decided to be a knob and lose bottom so we turned around so it could re-callibrate itself before going back again....
After 45 or so minutes doing anywhere from 10-15 knots including throwing a couple of lures out the back for the last 1.5 miles, we got to where it should be to find nothing.....no mark...no signs of a mark and no other boats. 
On the horizion, I could see another boat so we headed towards them thinking they were on it and I had just stuffed up but it turns out they were looking for it two.

With the daughter feeling less than average, the wife in a similar spot, we turned back to rotto and spent the next 50 minutes going as slow as 13 knots towards the island. The boat would surf only to slam into a nw/ne wave so it was a case of having to slow the boat down.

In that time, the breeze had died to nearly nothing but it was just misrable so we headed into Salmon Bay at Rotto for some michilin 5 star two minute noodles.....

After lunch, we headed over to Parker Point for a swim and chill out because dad (me) was starting to lose his shit at the number of complaints coming from the small people. 

After a swim kayak and more of a feed, we headed back out south west of PP looking at some of our waypoints. Out on the 40m line, we found a bit of a showing on the sounder on relatively flat ground so we dropped baits. 

As soon as the baits hit the bottom, both rods bent over. I grabbed one and Blake (little man) grabbed the other. I ripped mine up which turned out to be a small snapper while Blake was fighting with somehting else which, after a few minutes and a couple of runs, turned into a 550mm mulloway. He was super chuffed.

Over the next 10 or so drifts, we managed 3 snapper, a decent sea sweep which we kept, a bonito (from the bottom) which my daughter wound up after a hell of a fight. 

We spent 45 minutes on that spot and had a hit each drift with one bust off and a couple of dropped fish on the way up. 

With the sun getting lower, we pointed to Garden Island and with the conditions being fairly decent, we sat on 25 knots most of the way in, pulling up a mooring at GI to have tea before getting back to the ramp at about 1820. 

Still yet to get a sized Pinky but we are clearly on the right ground and very happy to see my kids getting fish up that I have never seen. 

Mulloway and Sea Sweep were delicious

With the weather being so windy over the xmas break I didn't get a chance to go for a proper deep sea fish anytime the wind was down I had something else on, before I knew it open season was shut. So now that we are allowed to fish again I've made sure to get out and have a fish while the weather and my life let me. Actually let myself sleep in abit this morning got up at about 4:30 had a coffee checked the wind then got down to the boat ramp. Was at my favourite spot from last year also got a fish there last friday just before 6, barely any wind at all took ages for the boat to pull the anchor rope tight I just got to work getting the burley sorted out. Casted a line out to see how everything was going to sit and noticed the current was going against the wind almost so had to fiddle around with how the rods were set. Ended up fishing 1 rod in the rocket launcher and 1 in the back corner. Got my first run about 6:40 it was the rod in the launcher going off peeling line reached up and struggled to grab it out with a fush on. Felt like a good fish plenty of head shakes got afew pumps of line back then  another little burst of run then gone  I was devastated pulled up the line everything still there just pulled the hooks. Oh well baited ip and back out. Keep burleying smashed up crayfish and mulie cubes. 7am back corner rod bends over slowly so I grab it out the holder and feel weight line immediately starts peeling off, fish was going nuts straight away I thought it was a snapper but after 4 or 5 runs and the fush still staying down near the bottom I started to think it was a bloody sambo but then I finally got a glimps of it down under the boat its a big snapper,  reached back and grabbed the net ( thanks for the big net Uncle) couple more winds and I had him in the net. Fish went 87cm on the brag mat got him bled and spiked and on ice. Pretty happy with myself kept fishing as the burley bag still had plenty in it about half an hour later kinda cleaning the boat up a little and see the rod in the launcher acting abit funny so grab it out dont feel anything but I just lifted the tip and feel weight again this fish definitely a snapper and right under me very quick fight and had a very green snapper in the net going nuts this fish went 77cm absolutely stoked now. Both fish today bit off the bottom hook of the snelled hooks second fish was gut hooked maybe why I got him in so quick.

Well this is a very rare occurance for me - went out and caught what we were targeting!

The weather on Wednesday looked too good to pass up with less than 4 knots most of the day and a very tolerable swell.

Up at home at 0420, on the road by 0504 and met one of my mates from work at the ramp at 0535. We were in the water on the way shortly after to the markers at the southern end of the cockburn channel to catch some bait (never done that before and jeez there were so many fish there!) which was midly successful. With a few fish in the tank, we headed out to the northern of the two Rockingham Fads (because the Woodies ones are missing).

1.5 hours after leaving Herring Bay, we arrived on site and could see the fish just under the surface and threw in a pair of lures and trolled past where we could see them for an immedate hook up. 

Our first glimpse got the blood pumping and even though it was smaller (600mm), it was still damn exciting and it was shortly at the boat where i netted it.......resulting in the lure getting stuck in the net and the fish flicking its way out and after one slap against the hull, swimming away happily......shit!

After apologising, we went for another loop and fairly quickly hooked up again to a very similar sized fish and after seeing it was hooked well, avoided the net and lifted it into the boat....where in mid air it shook, the hooks pulled....but thankfully this time the boat landed on the dry side of the boat and we offically had our first dolly!

Cheers and hugs and a quick photo and it was dispatched and put into the fish bag, which was christened after getting it for my birthday in late August.....yah ha!


So it was now 0830 and did a heap more loops around the northern fad, saw heaps of fish and with two boats of divers around, played nicely with the 5 divers in the water, watching them catch fish. We had a decent unspoken routene in where they their divers went in and we gave them 100m before starting our run. It worked out which was a concern of mine i.e. what we would do if there were already boats there (there was one boat there).

After not getting any hits on a variety of lures, we cast in a livey which immediately managed to unhook itself......

Then cast in our other one which was immediately belted by a decent fish and after a tussle let go, only to be picked up by another dolly who i had another tussle with before it also let go. Turns out i need to let them not just take the fish but eat it rather than just hold on. Unfortunately mr Slimy Mac was mangled.

Over the next two hours, we tried everything. Managed to catch 4 stupid birds but packed up and headed across to the southern of the two fads where there was one boat drifting around. There were immediately fish there and we just couldnt temp them with poppers, divers, pink squid looking things, stick baits or bits of mulie which the damn birds kept diving for. 

In the end, on the last drop, I managed to get a chunk of slimy mack deep enough past where the birds could go and in the clarity under the boat, watched a decent fish swim up to it, have a look, swim past and have a look the other way, then the other way and finially take it. I have it 20m and yanked to set the hooks and we were on!

There was no stuffing around with nets after an entertaining fight with some jumping my mate gaffed the fish and we had our second at 830mm

That got us another 10 minutes of catching birds before we pulled the pin. Headed north to the first fad, saw some fish, caught some birds but then we were done, heading ENE to the rotto fish tower and without troubling the score card, headed back in to the ramp, with the session done at ~1430.

Overall, 91 nautical miles, 115l of fuel consumed and the motor running for 7.5 hours. 

What amazed me was:

1: How sloppy it was out at the fad with some quite uncomfortable chop running against the current, even in the near glass out conditions,

2: A seemingly 50m deep canyon in 200m of water (200m deep just dropped near vertically over ~20m to 250m, then gradually coming back up to 180m). 

3: How much the swell condition improved once we were in less than 50m of water

4: How much current is running with only a 1 degree change in water temperature

5: I actually caught a fish!

 Add: ourtribefishing on Instagram.

 https://youtu.be/UVvGdJXcwdM?si=oYUvUDocXF71Ejjv 

@ourtribefishing on YouTube!

 Went out with the misses and stepson this morning got afew really nice size crabs even the small ones we re about 10mm over size. Lovely morning on the river. 

 Just got back from NZ on Australia Day. Had an absolute ball and got to see a bit of the place too.

We were staying with family and friends in Auckland but got about 4 hours south of there to Whakatane and a couple of hours north to my mate's bach at Mangawhai. Also took the car ferry out to Waiheke Island for a day. We did archery and laser clay shooting. Lots of fun. Also drove down to Hobbiton to see the movie set used for Lord of the Rings and the Hobbit movies. That was pretty cool even though I haven't seen any of the movies!

My daughter and I drove down and spent a night in Whakatane before meeting our awesome guide Cory Scott just outside Opotiki. We didn't fancy a 4 hour drive to start the day's fishing. We fished in some stunning places on the Waioeka River. It was all wet wading and pretty deep at times! My daughter hooked a couple of fish but unfortunately lost them both. I lost a trophy brown at the net which apperently wasn't my fault, a nice rainbow that was absolutely my stupid fault, and landed a couple of nice rainbows around 5 pound. We were either fishing a nymph with an indciator or a dry fly with a nymph below. The fish were all on the nymph except the last fish which was on the dry which was awesome to see!

My casting was pretty good eventually after a rusty start. All in all a bloody good day and it's got me very keen to do more. Nothing wrong with driving 4 hours either way to spend $1,000 on 2 fish that you release is there!

Few photos of the fishing and up the coast.

RDO today so popped the kids out for my first crab sesh of the season.

4 runs for 4 crabs so pretty tough going but kids had a blast, I had  blast and we stopped a Libby Quay for lunch and got a free show watching a meth head get brutally body slammed after hitting on of the 5 cops trying to detain him for having a private bbq in the toilets next to the water playground. Great opportunity to have a chat to my oldest about drugs!

Kids even cleaned and washed diwn the boat... before resuming their space in front of their screensn

 Think I might have finally sussed the land based blue bone code! Have got some stonkers in the 16 months since I have been up here but only consistently in the last month..... I've always found rock crabs a pain in the ass to catch so have just been taking a tiny shovel to the beach with me recently and you can catch as many ghost crabs as you want! Then you just need to hold on for dear life! Here's a couple from the last 2 weekends.

 To be honest I'm have been off fishing for a couple of years and slowly I have been getting back into it through my four year old son. Going back to old spots land based where I used to go when I was a kid in year 7 with a hand line in my back pack walking distance from east Fremantle primary school targeting herring and bream it has been a joy seeing my son catching his first herring, trumpeter and small bream. You get a small window before they run out of patients but a bribe with ice cream buy you an extra 20 minutes. Next target species for him is a flat head on lure in the swan!

With Andy . 3 good ones. one black ass.

 Went out Tuesday and Wednesday for a bash with two different deckies. Both of which showed me up! Fished the 30s on Tuesday running home in some average conditions then 50s on Wednesday running home in glamour conditions. Plenty of whales about so take care out there. Big dhu Went 92cm smaller Went 85cm and a nice blackass at 45cm few smaller dhus and unfortunately one small baldie that tasted amazing baked whole.

 pretty sure fisheries & punch will see it as vindication, { to date no pics ,no proof =demersal decimated to an all time low & next round no choice but to extend ban same as cockburn crabs . 

 Thought I would do a write up as I havnt seen a story for a while, grab a beer and have a read if your keen!!

 I recently had the priveledge of going up and doing the Gibb River road from Kununurra down towards Broome, Cape Leveque and then going out to the Montebello Islands on the way home. Safe to say it was an Epic trip. Thought I would do a bit of a story for anyone keen for a read.

Gibb

I headed up from Perth and drove straight to Kununurra. Took me 2 and a half days to get there, stopped outside of Newman on the first night, near Fitzroy on the second and into Kununurra the 3rd day. We timed the trip perfectly as 2 weeks before there was “un-seasonal” rain which closed the majority of the Gibb and washed away the temporary crossing at Fitzroy. The Fitzroy crossing was opened the day before I arrived so the timing was impeccable. Talked to a few nomads outside of Fitzroy and some of them had been stuck at the crossing for 4 or 5 days. Anyway got into Kununurra and stayed at a good friends house. I flew my partner and 2 year old into Kununurra so that the trip up was a lot easier than having to stop every couple of hours.

This was the first trip in our new caravan and so far it was awesome! Anyone looking for a caravan Everest Caravans are bloody brilliant. We met the other couple we were travelling with the following day and started the journey along the Gibb. First stop Emma Gorge and El Questro, amazing places. Don’t need to say too much about these as they are so commercialised with plenty of detail available. We spent 3 nights at EL Q and then headed south. We were going to stop at a free camp somewhere between El Q and Ellenbrae but we decided just to keep going to Ellenbrae as the camp “Top of the world” was a sandy dust bowl. The road between El Q and Ellenbrae was shocking, worst on the Gibb when we went. Not a grader in site. Sitting on 15km per hour for 2 hours one end. 230kms took us around 7 hours. Ellenbrae was amazing, beautiful camp ground with nice swimming hole, scones were awesome, staff were brilliant. Would highly recommend! Not many people stay here but the camp ground, toilets, showers were the best on the Gibb. Tried catching cherabin in the river as we were told there are heaps in there…. Didn’t even see 1 haha

We drove from Ellenbrae through to Drysdale, really non-eventful. Theres a really nice sandy river, the first one you get to when you get on the Drysdale road. Stopped here for a couple of hours for the kids to swim and a bit of lunch. Perfect little spot for the kids. Headed into Drysdale, great camp spot and the burgers are awesome! Just spent 1 night here and then headed to Munuru which is right near the intersection for Mitchell falls and Kulumburu road. Munuru is a nice camp ground with a good swimming spot, theres cherribin in the river but we only managed to catch small ones. Headed to Mitchell falls the next day leaving the vans at Munuru. Caught a helicopter in and walked out. Beautiful spot… Really long walk haha wouldn’t want to walk both ways that’s for sure.

From Munuru the next day headed up to Kulumburu and McGowen Island camp… The Kulumburu road was washed out in places and we had to stop and fill in wash outs etc to get the vans through. Mine is a 19’7 van but we made it with minimal issues. This is where I was excited to get to… here we get to take the roof topper off and go fishing haha! Unfortunately the wind was howling, the camp host said it is very very unusual.. Just my luck. We stayed for 5 nights and only got to go out in the boat once. But it was worth it. Catching large mouth nannygai in 6m of water was bloody great fun! Got a decent feed which was great. Whole fish on the fire and fish curry a few nights later. Bloody brilliant. McGowens camp is awesome, fresh water, good beach even though you cant swim and the sunsets were amazing…. The rocks around the camp had the biggest oysters I have ever seen. We went walking for about an hour and got 20 no worries. Others were out and got a heap too, there were that many its crazy! Oysters killpatrick almost every night, bloody brilliant. The new roof topper went awesome, stoked with that! The boat loader I made also went well. Real happy with the set up.

 After the 5 nights at Mcgowens headed back down to Drysdale for a night. On the way our friends van broke the main suspension arm bolt and elongated the mount holes. Luckily my shocky bolts on my van were the same size so we were able to steal my bolt and put his broken bolt into my shocky mounts. Driving real slow we basically got 150-200kms out of the bolt before it sheered again… Pull another one out of my van to get him going again. We were able to limp into Gibb River station where we spoke with a few cattle farmers there and borrowed their welder. Welded a few bolts back together to get us through to the “Over the hill mechanical” not far from mount barnett. We stopped at a free camp along the way, forgot the name but beautiful spot and the cherrabin there were huge!! Stoked to get a few that’s for sure! We had to skip a few places that we wanted to go to but got to the mechanic and went through his containers and found a few bolts that got us out of trouble.

 Continued on and did a few gorges along the way, did Bells gorge which was pretty cool, awesome spot to swim! We kind of rushed the last 3 days from Drysdale towards Broome because we didn’t know if the suspension in the mates van was going to hold up. Got to Broome safe after spending close to 2 weeks doing the Gibb. Stayed in Broome 3 nights, re-stocked everything and had a good time at cable beach, crocodile park and doing the usual tourist things.. Broome is a bloody busy joint and it is so hard to get into a caravan park, even the over flow park at the gun club is booked out so if you go there you need to book well in advance.

From Broome we went up to Cape Leveque. We stayed at Cygnet bay pearl farm, used it as a base and went and did all the spots up and down the cape, beautiful part of the country but a lot of areas are closed and you need permission from land owners to get in. If you do get permission which we did through a friend there are mud crabs everywhere haha. Literally walked for 50m and got 2 giant crabs, didn’t need anymore so walked back out.. Was there for 20 minutes, saw 5 crabs, kept 2 huge males and left haha really really easy! We were lucky enough to be at Cape Leveque during the “Stairway to the moon” was pretty spectacular!!

 From Cape Leveque we went back to Broome where I dropped the missus and kid at the airport and they flew back to Perth. I continued down to Karratha where I was meeting a mate who lives there but is mobbing back in October. Perfect opportunity to get out on his 8m boat and go to the Monties. Another mate flew into Karratha for the trip

Monties

Got to Karratha on a Sunday afternoon and picked my mate up who was flying in. Went to the pub for dinner and checked the wind / weather situation. Was basically going to be rough when we wanted to leave the next morning but then was pretty calm for the next 3 days we were planning on going over. Had dinner and it was bout 8pm and the wind was dead flat, none at all. W looked at the weather and it wasn’t predicted to come up until early morning so we made the call to head to my mates, pack the boat and head out that night. Mate has done the monties a few times so he was pretty confident in leaving at night so we left the Karratha boat ramp around 9:30pm…. So glad we did. It was glass the whole way over. Cruising at 24 knots, auto pilot in his 8m diesel boat was unreal!! 125kms over there we pulled up and anchored inside the islands around 1am. Rolled the swag on the deck and had a good sleep…. Woke up with the sound of a drag screaming!! Mate had gotten up and dropped a line over and hooked onto a massive fish, we were in sand so I was predicting a shark… after a battle one of the biggest chinaman came up!! Awesome way to wake up at the monties…

 Had a bit of breaky and went to a few spots my mate had been to before spearing. Jumped in the pristine clear water. Trout, spangos, crays, tevally, mackies everything was there. Bloody amazing way to spend the morning. We weren’t really there to get a bag full of fish and fillets as this was going to be a quick trip over and we still had a heap of fillets left from an earlier Gnaraloo trip. So we only wanted our trout limit and a few extras so we weren’t spearing too much. Did a bit of trolling and casting for GT’s. Didn’t get any massive GT’s but they were there.. We could see them, big black backs chasing the lures but not taking them, would have been in excess of 20kgs easy but didn’t get any to strike… Stayed in the bay at Alpha island… At night there were squid everywhere! Awesome feed of squid, crays and fish!! Next morning went out for a bottom bounce. Found some decent fish on the sounder and it was the best fishing I have ever experienced. In 17m of water for around an hour every drop we were catching massive trout, reds, blue bone, spanglie after spanglie, mackies, saddle tail, anything you could think of we were catching them every drop. It was insane fishing, then just like that it stopped, either sharks or turn of the tide and that was it they were gone!!

 We went for another dive and got a few more crays and I speared the biggest barramundi cod I have ever seen!! They are amazing eating too!!

One of the highlights of the trip was stopping in the middle of no where, around 6m of water and throwing the vibes that we got from Euge and Mackdog tackle. Massive spangos, mackies even a decent size blue bone in 6m of water on light gear was awesome fishing!!

Back to the island and moored again for the night! The wind was blowing up the next day in the arvo so we decided to have 1 last dive and start heading back towards Karratha, did a bit of sight seeing along the way and checked out a few wrecks. Back to Karratha that night for a clean up and beers.

Next morning the mate that flew in from Perth and I headed to the fortescue river to get the roof topper off again and get some muddies! Great little spot. We got 8 muddies and that night it was crabs around the fire. Next morning it was an early start and drive straight back to Perth!! Long trip back but with 2 of us driving was pretty easy!!

All in all loved the trip!! The Gibb was awesome, would love to spend a hell of a lot more time up that way! Monties was awesome and so glad that I got to do it in my mates boat. Being the yanmar diesel we only used 250L for the whole trip, in my boat we would have used about 600 I rekon!

The main highlight of the whole trip was seeing how much my daughter enjoyed it. Teaching her how to cook bread on the camp fire, catching cherribums and mud crabs, just to see her smile was pricelsee!!

Few pics for attached but yeah hope you enjoy the story, if you have any questions or anything let me know

Cheers

Not a bad surprize yesterday, east wind was blowing so chugged back in trolling in the big Halco Max after casting to a few small bluefin earlier in the morning.

Great old fella from mangles . We got some real good ones. His face tells story

 After a horrendous crawl out and getting bashed around for most of the day, we managed a small mixed bag and a few tuna dragging lures back to the ramp. One of the bigger metro SBT I've caught.

 Took the young bloke out on Sunday, as soon as the pick went down in 12m the swell scared him and back in we went, but I was lucky enough that the Mrs run up to the ramp to grab him so I could shoot back out. Nursing a hangover it wasn't much fun for me either but I finally found some fish in 35m. After a massive spew I had a bag of pinks 80cm and 65cm. Ran home at a comfortable 32knts and off to bed before the kids haha

 Booked a mid-week RDO for Wednesday with the forecast looking good for a surf. On Tuesday evening, had a call from an ex-work mate from Mandurah who is up in Exxy for the first time with his family asking if I wanted to head out for a fish with them. With the wind looking to back off from midday, we made a plan to launch from Bundegi late morning and shoot north to the islands for some trolling and then a bottom bash when the wind backed off. My little boat spends most of its time inside the reef on the west side so this was a blind trip for both of us. 

Got out with the fam in the morning for some fun waves and to keep the mrs happy who I had promised we would have a surf in the morning and then i'd get some gear ready for a few nights down at Warroora over the weekend. Got nothing ready but at least I kept the first half of the promise and she got some good waves!

Wasn't the nicest launching from Bundegi with the wind still blowing across the gulf but his boat handled it well and we punched across to the islands fairly quickly. Trolled along the west side of the south island for nothing and then a medium size shark mac just between the north and south island. By this time, the wind had dropped a bit so we shot out to the 40s for a look and found a little lump but getting any baits past the smaller emperor models was difficult. We decided to shoot out a bit further for a look and found a likely looking showing on the sounder in about 60m and didn't dissapoint. Pulled my first reds, both of which were good size but the second was a thumper! Happy days all round and lots of whale action to make their first boat trip off Exmouth a memorable one. 

Eldest boy and I headed out recently. Found some flat ground in 41m and were getting smoked with big head shakes then losing fish with chewed through leader and even bitten through kevlar cord on the Mackdog rig so possibly sharks? After losing four Mackdog rigs we changed spots to a lump nearby and bagged out quite quickly with a good feed. One of the baldies (our 4th fish) was smaller than the old size limit but had swallowed all three Bottom Meat hooks so we bagged him and headed in leaving the fish biting.