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Well worth the Drive

ONTHECHEW

By ONTHECHEW
in Saltwater

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ONTHECHEW Newbie

ONTHECHEW

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Last Sunday I have just moved to Toowoomba for work for a two year contract, this is the first time I have ever lived out of the Redlands or any more than 15 minutes from the water. In the process of moving up here which was a bit of a whirl wind, 2 weeks from being asked to move to actually living here, I decided to make a few ground rules for fishing on my days off. Knowing that it was a 2 hour drive to get back to Brisbane to fish, (and where my boat is being stored) I thought it would be sensible not to fish on my second day off, as would be shattered the next day for work and also never drive down or back in the dark.

Well after sitting watching Bathurst all day Sunday (not much else to do in Toowoomba), and reading posts on AFO, mainly the boys trip to the Ribbons, I looked at the weather forecast and saw it was pretty good for monday, thought try and get myself another local GT. Thought what the hell, my two main fishing rules broken after only being up here for 6 days, not much point keeping them any more :whistle:

Gave a couple of my mates a quick call Sunday and the trip was on, now just had to drive two bloody hours, then pick the boat up, that night. Well at 4am we met at the cleveland boat ramp to be met by no wind at all, all looked very promising. Travelled across a glassed out bay, in the dark and was greeted by first sunlight upon reaching south passage bar, if you could call it a bar, also glassed out with a big run in tide.

Decision was made to pop first so decided to try some of the reefs in close to Straddie, whales every where on the way out which is cool the first time you see them but when you are on plane doing 50ks per hour the thought of hitting one keeps me a little uneasy.

At the first mark and first drift I chuck out my plastic combo with my favourite GT plastic and jig head and I get smashed, 15 minutes after chasing it all around the place he just spat the hook. Funny enough Matty and Nathan change over to plastics straight away and after not much time Matty is now hooked up to a good GT, but same result just spat the hook..

Nathan is chucking around his favourite Nomad Skipjack and gets a good strike on the surface from a GT but no hook up. After this it got a little blurry can't remember what went on it what order, but I can remember, Nathan lost 2 GT's, a yellow fin tuna and a huge mackeral, Matty lost a GT and a yellow fin and I had already lost a GT from first up. This was all with 2 hours of being out there.

With all of the action going on, I decided natural colours where working the best, so took off my favourite FCL lure (fluro yellow) and chucked on a silver skip jack. I saw a school of small tuna working not far off the boat so chucked a cast in. Out of the middle of it a beast from the sea comes up and swallows the stick bait whole, from that point onwards it was just a whole lot of pain.

As usual he went straight for the bottom to try and bust me off on the reef, I run very heavy drag on my popping combo and this meant that I almost got levered over the side of the boat. I have a rail around the front of my boat for this very reason, but it was not helping this time, this fish was putting more pressure on me than any other fish I had fought. After a hectic and furious battle finally I saw colour and it was like I was lifting a dinner table up through the water column. He was big, Matty and Nathan struggled to lift him into the boat and it was high fives all round, I was shattered.

New GT pb 37kg, weapon of choice, Fcl Labo rod matched with Stella 10000sw, only problem is photos don't do it justice, it was a solid fish. As you can see in a few of the photos I was destroyed after this fish. We had a few more drifts and and decided to call it a day, we all had a good morning even though I think the tally was 9 lost to 1 landed. Nathan lost about $150 worth of tackle, which he has to explain to the wife when he got home :blush:

All in all a good day, so much for my Toowoomba rules, from now on if the weather is good enough I will be there, and it is only 103 weekends and I will be back. For any one who wants to know, the water temp was 20.8 degrees and the good news is, the GT's don't fire up until it is about 23 degrees, come on summer pelagic season should be a cracker of a popping and jigging season.

Andrew

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Bagless Newbie

Bagless

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That's an incredible fish, very nice work. Never ceases to amaze me how good the fishing is around here.

Would love to give this style of fishing a go if anyone ever has any deckie spots :). Mind you think I'd need a few months down the gym before I could pull a beast like that up. Superb :)

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ONTHECHEW Newbie

ONTHECHEW

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Thanks guys for all of the replies, still stoked, just done another 13 hour day but all I can think about is getting back on the water. Try and answer a few of the questions sorry if I have missed any.

J-Dog 115 - they are not as common as up north but they are definately down here and even further down south as well :whistle: There are a couple of spots locally you can get them that average between 20-30kg, and some locations where the average size is about 10kg.

Do$tylz - Was blooping the skip jack, I think around here as there are not so many of them fighting for the popper you need that little bit extra noise to bring them up. In saying that we got a few strikes yesterday on stickbaits which is a first for us which is a really good sign they might be becoming more active. Welcome on the deckie spot.

Genesis - I run about 15kg of drag, which puts a lot of hurt on the fish but also puts a lot of hurt on the angler. This really shortens the fight time but really limits their chances of reefing you, took about 5 minutes of pure pain.

Manni79 - Back is actually pretty good, found a really good physio that has put my op back as far as he can keep me managing it.

whatscracken - Yah not a fan of the two hour drive but that won't stop me from fishing, just means I leave the day before instead and crash in the redlands the night before, then fishing as usual.

Mark - Its been a while between drinks, but that is probably because I spend most of our trips driving around after your fish, and then for you to lose them. I have no problems putting other people onto a pb, it is an awesome style of fishing that once you are hooked is very addictive. I get as much enjoyment out of putting other people onto a pb as getting one myself, as long as it is no bigger than my own pb. :cheer:

Andrew

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dhess Newbie

dhess

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What can I say but super impressive. Doing what we set out to do up north but doing it bigger and better locally.

I was a bit worried when you started the post describing your move to Toowoomba. Was a bit worried you were going to take up popping for giant carp. :silly:

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