Illawarra Flyfishers Club
7TH AUGUST 2006
Breaking news - my new boat that was suppose to take 6 weeks to deliver from late January 2006 finally arrived in August. It took 6 months rather than 6 weeks but at least is a s good as it was expected to be. Its a fully tricked up for fly fishing Poly Craft 4.55 in 2E and 2D survey and ideal for Lock Style fly fishing.
On the morning of the
expectant delivery Julie said I was like an expectant father. I told
her it was much more important than that this is a new fishing boat.
For some reason Julie didn't understand how I felt and made sure I knew
it. In any case my comments had paved the way for her not really
wanting my company for a few hours and I knew that I would be able to
extend that to time for a fishing trip the next day if I applied myself.
A
quick call to Leo and Ray and arrangements were made for the fist
outing on the new boat "fish on fly". Whilst I took a couple of flies
with me I didn't take any fishing gear as I was keen to muck around
with the boat, and in any case, I knew that Leo and Ray would give me a
flick of their fly rods as the morning progressed. We set off from
Berkeley harbor at about 9 am and because a southerly of around 15 kph
was blowing we pulled in to the lee shore of Gooseberry island and Leo
and Ray worked the shore line and drop off methodically. After half an
hour or so of that and not a touch we moved up Mullet creek. The water
around the island had been very clear and we were pleased to see more
colour in the creek. We worked up the North arm of the creek to the
hole just before the private bridge and gave that a pretty good work
over. On the other side of the bridge we watched a father and son
fishing with dead prawns catch a couple of good bream and 
then one
thumper of around 1.5kg. Our fishing was interrupted a couple of time
by groups of canoeists but even as they passed, the father and son
landed a couple of fish. Ray offered me a flick of his fly
rod which I eagerly accepted. Ray had been fishing a legless Rays
Shrimp and Leo was fishing a BMS. We had earlier seen a bloke
collecting blood worms at the entrance of the creek so I was keen to
tie on one of my mud prawns with red and black barred (blood worm
coloured) legs. It didn't take long and as we moved up toward the
father and son, first a knock and then bang I was on. Not a big fish,
but the first fish, probably 32cm, for my boat. Leo breathed a sigh of
relief and explained that he and Ray had been holding back for the last
hour or so because they wanted me to catch the first fish in my new
boat - I of course thanked them. Even though another boat
moved up past us and fished rudely close to the father and son, we
excused our selves for moving through their water and moved up around
the corner to resume fishing. I picked up a second bream near a drop
off, again around 32cm. I handed the rod back to Ray still with the mud
prawn on and took over control of the electric motor again. Ray picked
up a nice bream of 35cm around some heave timber. During the morning I
had a fish with Leo's rod also and even though he swapped over
to a mud prawn with chartreuse legs all he could manage was a
couple of knocks.
In any case I finished up 3 bream, Ray with one and Leo just plenty of style.
