queensland FNQ madness! PB's, Barra Corner. THANKS TIOTONY

[pancakes_and_haggis]

well where to start,,,,, hummmm

a while ago now plans were made to meet up with tony in cairns for a fish whilst i was away

working in townsville. Having read reports from the barra corner there was only one place i was lookign to fish.

Well work on saturday ended 2 hours early as i could just not wait any longer to get on the road to Cairns, so at 2pm i was packing up for

the day and by three i was on my way!

Whilst i was busy trying to stay beneath the speed limit Tony had been out cast netting some livies, I think that he was exited about the evening too,

half way up the highway a pxt come through with the message, " 5th cast in"

If i was doing 99.5 kmph before that message i was doing 99.9 after it!!

Well i finally arrive just before 8pm and met up with tony outside the navy base, proceeded to be signed in as a visitor

and away we went.

Tony showed me a few of his favorite haunts around the base, first peer over the edge of the wharf and we see a big tail cruising around next to a pylon, a quick flash of the torch reveals what must have been a 50+ cm Jack!

Tony went for a quick flik over to the area under lights and get nailed by a tarpon, that had him worried for his 8b leader running up and down the wharf trying to tire the thing out whilst i ran for the net and a good fight later we landed a nice tarpon! to me it was gold to tony it was just another bloody piece of FNQ vermin!

Then we got into the serious business of carefully dropping livies down between the pylons!

First couple of drops down into barra corner were fruitless so 5 mins later Tony made the call to ditch that spot and go for a look at the end of the wharf.

First livies had been in the water for about 2 minutes when i hear a , " Ahh [expletive deleted]" before i turned around Tony pulled up whats left of his rig, NOTHING.

Re-rig and down goes another mullet, 2 mins later " ah [expletive deleted] ", same deal.

Im beginning to wonder whats going on, ive not seen the rod bend once, ive not heard any boofs yet Tony has lost two rigs and has sworn of hooking two unstopables!

Well third cast Tonys hooked onto something, a short but extreemly fiesty tussle later, the choice words were out again as a good 4-5 foot eel graces the surface!

( Tonys face showed something of annoyance mixed with fear)

I eagerly remark " right how we landing this fellah" to which he replied " that things comming nowhere near me im sh1t scare of eels and snakes!! haha

Well as we carried on I got a HUGE hit on my rod ( tonys 24kg overhead on an old trawling rod) jesus this thing did not want to see the surface,

its a while since i had felt force like that on the end of my rod. With the drag seriously close to completely locked the fish still proceeded to strip 5m of line off me!

After a few heart in mouth moments a nice barra hits the surface, is netted and landed.

Mixed emotion on my behalf, a PB barra but off season! frustration i didnt catch a legal fish, but satisfaction of breaking my P.B, an ultra quick happy snap and he was off back into the drink!

We'll rigged another mullet and sunk it down into the depths, let him drift in under with the tide and a minute later WHAMMMMMM. another monster by my standards hooked and another shortish fight as id been told by Tony,

" if they get 5m on you youre done!"

so i locked it up and gave it some serious beef only to find 5 minutes later it was another Barra. quick snap and back to the drink for that fellah too!

Well the conversation topic surfaced, "keep going here or move to avoid the Barra" Tony was adamant that he's never caught Barra at this end of the wharf and its a great jack and fingermark spot.

Next livie that sunk to the depths got nailed again on tonys 80lb handline only to smash him round a pylon, you guessed it the choice words were back again as tony retrieves the end of his frayed 80lb handline.

Re-rig ,,,,,,,,,,,, same deal BAM-- tony's on and more determined than ever to land a fish, after some serious arm work, Tonys off again, bloody,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,,, TARPON

landed this extreemly nice tarpon in my eyes, but to a local its like a puffer fish nothing but a nuscience !! few snaps and he was back to the drink too!

We'll we ran out of livies and with such a seriously low tide found it hard to find anymore but we did manage 4 or 5 more and a single prawn, so back to the spot again and i sink the solo prawn

Think it lasted about 40 seconds before it was inhaled by a more manageable fish, up pops my first ever fingermark going 42cm

As things closed down towards the bottom of the tide we called it a night, a quik mcdonalds and we were home!

A nice leisurely 6am start, and a quick plan was made to fish a couple of storm drains as it was high tide.

The 2" gulp shrimp seemed to be tonys line of fire for most of the weekend and it didnt dissapoint when a nice little GT was landed right in the middle of suburbia, followed a couple of casts later by a Jack from the same spot. Seemed Tony's shrimp was tastier than mine,

as all i could manage was a ray! ( A ray on plastics is a first for me too)

Well as the tide lowered things shut down ultra fast and the call was made to search for livies and get our bot bots back to the base!

Well Tony has a few spots to cast net with-in the base, whilst he was cast netting i thought id have a flick in a nice little hole with water flowing quite strongly through it, few casts in and im hooked onto another fiestly little jack who didnt

like the idea of leaving his home! few pictures and back to the drink!

With livies in the bucket we went back in search of more monsters!

We'll we managed to begin where we had left off with the first drop getting nailed on tonys hand line and resultin on a serious fish busting us off!

I managed to land a couple more barra for the photos album and obv released them.

Tony did land a nice cod going legal at 40cm!

and the man who brought about his downfall smiling in the background hahahahaha

Meanwhile tony flicked about the shrimp again and got some follows and a couple of miss hookups from some good sized 60cm+ GT's,,, quite what he was going to achieve with 8lb braid ill never know but its all good fun when the GT's are busting up right in front of you!!!

the call was made to head back to barra corner and see what was lurking, Tony decided to

pop over to the toilet, meanwhile i couldnt resist a cast while he was gone. A few of the navy lads were on-looking as my livies got nailed in true FNQ fashion, poopying myself what was on the other end i gave it some serious arm work, again my drag got stripped from the reel how,,,, i dont know as i couldnt pull any myself when i tried

but all i saw was my line heading closer and closer to a nice rusty jaggedy pylon until it decided to change direction and head for open water, at this point i gave it everything i had and managed to surface to my great suprise RED!!!!! ITS [expletive deleted] RED MAN!

landed it up onto the wharf just as tony comes out the toliet!

high fives all round and a nice 48cm jack measures up!

After that we continued to sink livies down into Tony's fingermark hole, we did continue to get busted up on the heavy heavy gear and didnt manage to land anything from that side of the wharf!

The call was made around 12 to head home. Whilst in the car Tony offered me the chance to catch a Jungle Perch! The conditions were simple , " theres taipans and crocks-a-plenty so be careful!

well we stopped at the fresh water creek and i grabbed tonys 2-5kg rod armed with the trust 2"gulp shrimp! walking the banks we both poopied outself as a very dark brown/black backed snake darts across the path and into the scrub ON THE CREEK SIDE OF THE PATH!!!

Tony has now gone from eager FNQ fishing guide to quivering tag aong! Explaingin to me hes very scared of snakes and eels! hence why the eel the night before wasnt landed!!

Well second cast in and im slow rolling my shrimp back within eye shot, when a dark shadow come up behind it and im starting to shake! bang hes hit it, a short fight later and ive pulled my first JP! stoked to hell!!!

a short walk later with now more hits and were on our way home for a good well earnt feed!

80% of fish released, those not so lucky were given to Tony's wife in exchange for last nights bed!!!!!!!!

All i can add to this report is im now totally in debt to a guy i met for the first time less than 24 hours prior, Tony is a true gent, offering everything he had to make sure i had the best time possible, to name a few

acts,, re rigging my livies, re-rigging my line after bust off's, choosing to fish handlines so i could fish the rod, constant cast netting to secure just 5 livies at 10.30at night, showing me all his honey holes, driving me round like a king

the list goes on, offering me a nice air con room to sleep, cooking a wicked mexican lunch, i could seriously go on!

Thanks mate for an amazing weekend, I hope you enjoyed your weekend as much as i did, i hope your not too worn out from those long sessions!!!!

we will be sure to do it again one day very soon!

3 Jacks in a day again!

PB barra 68cm

PB jack 48cm

PB Jungle perch 26cm

PB fingermark 42CM

until next time

callum

Mod Note

Callum is aware it is currently closed season on barramundi. The barramundi in this report were by-catch whilst fishing from a high wharf. It was necessary to bring these fish to the platform to release them. The fish were landed onto the brag-mat to have the hooks removed. The fish were returned to the water in quick time. The photo time was not in excess of the time it would have taken to release the fish without a photo.

[Jords]

Mad trip man!

Good on you tony!

[Guest]

That is one hell of a fishing session! you got onto so many species & so many different locations. I absolutely loved your report mate! was a fine read! congrats on your pbs to mate.

as for Tony, your a true legend mate! cant wait to take up an offer & session like this with you! if you offer this much of a service, people might aswell pay to come out with you mate.

that drain spot looks super fishy!! some monsters holding there i think

68cm barra, whoaa! im sure those things would pull for sure....SO JELOUS MANNN!!!!!

gonna sus out my finances & dates, see if i cant head up for afew days & get good times like this going!! wow! your really stiring the pot now

gotta love the gulp 2" shrimps :cheer:

ps. i think i have a bromance for you now tony!! the mannn!

[Surfingant]

Great report Callum and wonderful hospitality Tony Congrats on the new pb's, I think out of all those fish my fave is the little JP I love that sort of fishing it would have been great fun, especially with the crocs and snakes :silly: :S

[Dinodadog]

Well done to you and your host, I remember casting a lure in that drain a few years ago when in town with the army

[PlasticFantastic]

Mate awesome work on all the fish, I bet you could easily get used to fishing like that.

Cheers

Mark

[hulk]

Mate that is an awesome read.Well done and good on you Tony for giving up some of your far north spots.Great pics too.

[tiotony]

Hey callum thanks very much mate and I had a great time fishing with you. Welcome to come up and stay with us any time mate.

As for you Moses, I'm flattered by the attentions of a younger guy but am already in a serious bromantic relationship with another man, I'll see if he's ok with me seeing other people :kiss: :kiss: Hey, if he can go to a poker/drinking night on saturday night and not come fishing with me, he's just gonna have to live with it

And yes that drain does hold some beasts that I'm yet to see, on several occassions have hooked things that strip about 50m of 8lb line off me before bricking me up on something!

Next time we should hit up the black jew and XOS fingermark with some big mullet in that deep hole I pointed out to you :woohoo:

[Angus]

Great report!

Proof of the benefits of a AFO community!

Angus

[pancakes_and_haggis]

Definitely it's just I'm not sure that inviting tony to throw lumps of smelly mullet off wellington point jetty would return the favor

[Freshy]

What a cracker report, well done boys!!!!

[madmullet]

callum, mate, great report. congrats on your p.b's.

[werewolf]

best report I've read for ages!

[pancakes_and_haggis]

Cheers guys

[Carter]

Sweet session, Good on you Tony and congrats on the PB's Callum

[Keen-as-fisho]

Sounds like a bloody great trip mate, lucky you and well done :woohoo:

[fishingnut]

Well done fellas, Hopefully afew more jps and sooties for me this weekend

[Greenmachine]

What an awesome trip! Gotta be a record 4 pb's in one trip! I always get quite jealous reading Tony's reports, what a great place to live. Really enjoyed your report

I reckon that has to go Report of the month too.

[fishing_teen]

great report mate looks like a good trip

[zan0_15]

good few days solid fishing there!!!

well done

good on ya tony for doing all u did!

[Hfisho77]

cracker report and what an awesome location, good onya Tony for the hospitality

[T Fisher]

Great report enjoyed the read very much good on you tony for taking time to help your new mate out and show him an unreal time .