Steve's redemption @ Woody head

Author: josh

Category: Trip Reports

Created on Sunday, 03 April 2011 22:11

Written by Josh

We were expecting a bit of a wild weekend at Woody head this weekend and thats exactly what we got. Before even bothering to unpack our tents or set up camp we arrived early and took straight to the water, first sailing out into Shark bay and then back around towards the Clarence river mouth, past Yamba and up to Angourie, which is when we turned back. It was a few hundred metres outside of the river mouth when Steve hooked a nice fish, which he fought for several minutes before bringing aboard. Unfortunately for Steve the fish spat the hook when boated and then performed a houdini act as it flapped its way from the deck and onto the tramp from where it bounce-bounce-bounced and then dove for safety over the edge. What would have otherwise been Steve's personal best fish swam away laughing in what was classic comedy catch and release. I don't think Steve quite saw the funny side of it like me and the fish did. 

It was just a short while afterwards that I incurred two solid hook ups - one on each rod - one armed with a Magnum X-Rap, the other armed with the Magnum CD; the latter was tied with a wire trace, the former was not. With the choice of two hook ups to deal with I opted for the CD, which was attached to my larger rod. As I took up the fight the other line went slack soon after - bitten off. Hrmm... toothy... 

Thats the only evidence I needed to assume that we'd just trolled through a school of sharks and that was confirmed about 5 minutes later when I hauled a small 3' blacktip reefshark to the side of the kayak, perfectly ripe to serve for a few feeds of flake. I was, however, fooled by it's modest size and apparent gassing out, driving in the gaff way too early (successfully) which caused quite the tantrum. Whilst I held on tightly the shark thrashed around so violently that it broke the gaff hook, causing it to spin freely, and very nearly right out of the handle. It then pulled free of the gaff just as I lifted it aboard and as it thrashed around on deck I tried to pin it down with my leg, inadvertantly helping it try to escape as it squirmed its way over the side. Right when I thought I was about to lose it the furling line squeezed tightly around it, pinning it under the front aka. This is where I kept it while bleeding it in preparation for lunch.

Holger joined us for lunch (fish & chips, of course) as we pitched tents and set up camp for the night. We cooked up some flake on the Vital stove, which performed really well. Later that night I used the cobb cooker to make a roast, which went down beautifully at the end of the night.  

Weather had made a turn for the worse in the morning, with drizzle holding us back and getting us off to a late start. Following a similar route as the previous day for the most part we turned back much sooner, which turned out to be a fortunate thing to do. As we made our way back north out past Woody Head Steve hooked up and an almighty fight followed. Eventually he managed to man-handle the fish towards the kayak, another mackerel, only bigger, and not a spotty but a rather respectable spanyard.

After a few nervous moments with the gaff Steve finally dragged it aboard and learning from the previous days experience, set about getting it under control. And with that done not only had he redeemed himself from the previous days mishap, he'd notched up a personal best - not just best spanish, but also best fish. In fact, it's one of only a few fish he's so far caught from a kayak. I'd say he's off to a pretty good start! 

A short while after this I hooked up in the same area, the fish going for an almighty run only to spit the lure soon after. Holger was the next to hook up and this one managed to bust him off. As did another a short while later, which also happened to me a couple more times as well. Steve also had another big hook up but he to was bitten off. All of these bites occurred within an hour. All of the lures Rapalas... only those with wire trace survived - and even one of those failed! 

As the bite came on strong so to did the wind and before we knew it 20 knot winds were pushing us to the north, continually further than where we wanted to be. It was hard work sailing back in, for the most part with a half-furled sail to keep from tipping over. Some gusts blew up to around 40 knots, coming hard from the south, which is exactly the direction we were heading. We all made it back safely though, Steve wwearing a massive grin from ear to ear. Good one mate!