Once I’d finished watching Ken sort out the flood mess around his half of the campsite we headed down to the beach with the intention of completing some serious fishing. I was anticipating BIG fish!
We must have driven 3-4 kilometres along the beach looking for a good spot that wasn’t already occupied. Ken identified a promising gutter and we set up all the gear. We spent a good four hours feeding the crabs the pilchards and squid we'd bought as bait. Well we did catch a few fish. Mostly silver bream, all undersized, which we returned.
That night I was chef reheating the frozen meal prepared by Ken’s lovely wife. It was about this time I realised we had a problem with the trailer storage battery. Minimal sunlight meant the battery was being depleted. Eventually we decided to halve the load on the battery by turning off the freezer and transferring its contents to the fridge or Ken’s cooler bag. I gave the ice creams to our camping neighbours children.
That evening I quadruple folded a blanket lengthwise laying it on top of the foam topper and under the sleeping bag. Either I was more tired or the additional layers worked, because I had a reasonable nights sleep.
The next morning we opted to do some cross country sand track driving rather than go back to the beach.
The easy part
Some very interesting sand driving occurred with Ken stopping on two occasions to let more air out of the tyres. Eventually we reach “The Gap”, an isolated cove only accessible by 4WD.
Here we spent several successful hours fishing for Herring from the rocks. I’m not a fan of fishing from rocks as several rock fishermen drown annually after being swept away by a rogue wave. However this rock formation was rather sheltered. We caught 14-15 Herring before deciding we should leave the rest for another fisher (OK… they had gone off the boil) Ken then fillets the fish under my supervision before we returned to the campsite. I again cooked dinner. This time it was ‘boil in the bag’ lamb shanks with corn on the cob.
The following morning we had Herring fillets on bread for breakfast. Ken dusted the fillets in flour and I cooked them in butter using the frying pan. They were delicious!
On the 3rd Day we drove to ‘Blue Holes’. Another isolated beach in the National Park only accessible by 4WD. Two groups were already on the beach and catch herring. We wanted Salmon. After driving up and down the beach we settled on a promising spot and started fishing. It didn’t matter whether I tried trolling with a lure or a set line using pilchards or squid; I never got a bite all day.
Meanwhile Ken had tossed out a set line and started surf casting with a lure. That’s when this enormous salmon decided to commit suicide on his set line.
This is the size fish I wanted to catch. It’s also the second time I’ve been fishing with Ken where he catches the fish and I catch a cold
That evening Ken filleted his salmon which I then vacuum sealed in bags before placing the fillets in the fridge.
Again I cooked dinner. This time it was a frozen stew Jan had made accompanied by tinned potatoes. For breakfast we ate the last of the sausages, bacon and eggs.
I suspect Ken was feeling guilty about catching all the fish and suggested we try our luck by detouring to Hamelin Bay on the way home. We had almost reached Hamelin Bay when I pointed out to Ken it was 2pm and we still had a four hour drive back to Perth. There wasn’t enough time to fish. And so we drove home. Just to rub salt in the wound Ken gave me his Salmon fillets. He also gave me some advice, suggesting I should do some maintenance on my fishing reels. Apparently you should complete annual reel cleaning and maintenance. I haven’t done that since they were purchased in 1981. Another job to be added to the list.
No comments :
Post a Comment