Wind: Light and variable
Swell: 1m ESE
Current: none
Launch point: Doggie Beach
Participants: tunny, bomber, pedro, lazybugger, sunshiner
Not quite the easiest Doggie Beach launch ever today, but certainly pretty easy.
Way before sunrise we assembled in the carpark where pedro, who had already taken his Revo down to the beach, told me on my arrival that the launch was doable. I'd been listening for the last hour or so to the gentle roar of the small surf and wondered if it had changed much from the previous afternoon. But the air was calm, as forecast and as indicated by the live wind reports so I was confident the beach launch would be OK.
By the time tunny and I got down to the water's edge, pedro and bomber, the only users of plastic yaks today, were already out the back. Lazybugger, the last to arrive, all the way from Brissy, was still setting up in the carpark.
Our two yaks and tunny, launch time, on schedule.
This was tunny's second Doggie Beach launch and he followed me out through the messy but manageable mangle of shoreys and soon we were heading for the unpacking area, about 300m out. Not quite dry bums but certainly not soaked.
Magnificent morning, crystal clear smooth water, gentle rolling swell, a few terns dipping nearby, sun not yet up. Looked good!
Pedro announced that he was heading for a mark further south while bomber, tunny and I headed for Doggie Beach reef. Lazybugger, launching for the first time at Doggie Beach, announced via a radio check that he was now out the back also; all five out safely.
Less than 30 minutes and 1.6 km from the beach I'd started fishing, around 06:30. Up popped pedro on the radio to announce that he'd boated a keeper snapper taken on a trolled deep running hb as he approached his mark to the south. Then lazybugger announced that a decent bonito was already cooling its finny heels in his fishbox (also taken on hb just outside the break, where the terns were dipping). Things were looking good already.
It turned out that pedro's fish was a bit of a flash in the pan for his mark, although he did boat a nice flounder too. In the general area of Doggie Beach reef the other four of us plied our trade, all using SPs except for bomber who drifted some pillies. One by one the catches were announced over the radio, mainly by tunny, who was killing them and lazybugger who was also having some success, including a significant encounter with an unstoppable. At my location I couldn't buy a bite so I eventually moved to where tunny was as he'd already boated two keeper snapper and a nice grassy. This of course resulted in the bite shutting down for both of us.
Never mind, just to be out there on such a day was a privilege, especially when a whale showed up a safe distance away and put on a breaching display (three breaches within a minute or so). Only a couple of other boats were visible and they had arrived only lately. We and the whales, oh, and the dolphins, pretty much had the place to ourselves.
Two hours after I'd started fishing I still hadn't had a touch, and among us I was the only one with that status as bomber had caught what turned out to be a finny scad (aka torpedo scad). Then came my turn. I thought I'd hooked a plastic bag, but no, it was a real fish, hooked in the mouth.
Trigger fish of some sort. Released.
A short time later bomber, fishing near me, yelled out that he was on so I paddled over to get a pic.
That's a nice grassy, bomber. Taken on drifted pillie.
By now I'm the only one with no fish to take home. Oh, the shame of it! A few minutes later (three hours after I'd started) my SP got hammered and the fight was on. This fish was really valuable to me and I played it very carefully. A beautiful snapper, around 45cm. Here it was, flapping on the surface. Nah, won't use the gaff, just lift it in by the jighead. A quick flip and it was gone. Worse, bomber and tunny had been watching.
The weather was just starting to change when we headed for the beach at 10:15. The return through the surf was really easy as the tide was now higher than before and on the track we took, a deep section, there was no white water at all until about 30m from the shore.
We hung around on the beach a short while to watch pedro skilfully bring his revo through then relived our morning's experiences on the beach.
Some pics
Yaks at the return point.
Pedro using his yellow rod bag in the last stage of the surf zone transit (frame from movie).
Finny scad, top, (potential Noosa Yakkers record) and grassy. Bomber's catch.
Bonito (potential Noosa Yakkers record). Part of lazybugger's haul which included two snapper.
Grassy and two snapper. By tunny.
Pedro's huge 45cm snapper
The successful fishos.
Kev Long
Sunshiner
Author Kayak Fishing Manual for iPad (click linked text to view)
Stealth Supalite X, yellow/orange
No comments:
Post a Comment