new south wales Nsw Road Trip For Xmas/NY

[kmcrosby78]

Did a road trip to spend Xmas with my brother in Singleton (coal miner), stopping at a farmstay (sheep) at Deepwater (just north of Glenn Innes) on the way for a couple of nights (which was very cool - got to drive a tractor!). After Xmas we then spent 3 nights each at Shoal Bay (Port Stephens), Port Macquarie and Coffs Harbour, and thoroughly enjoyed each of them. All of our accommodation except Coffs Harbour (because it was darned hard to get something we were happy with) was booked through Air BnB which I'd thoroughly recommend - so much better than staying in Motor Inns and a lot cheaper than booking at hotels, etc.

With tight timeframes at each place and young kids to wear out (or is that the other way round ....?) I did what fishing I could (apart from with the kids, which was fun) early in the mornings. With no time (or energy in the middle of the day while they were asleep) to do recon missions, I resigned myself to the fact that I may not gain access to the spots I'd like to look of on Google Earth, and that at worst my fishing trips may end up just being bush walks/hikes with a fishing rod in my hand (and backpack on my back) ....... 

The morning after we arrived at Shoal Bay (which is beautiful - nice clear water and weed beds just off the shore that Liam and I took advantage of and snorkelled - well, sort of, we just had swimming goggles and no actual 'snorkel' - and checked out plenty of bream, large whiting (one of which was attacked by something else right in front of us a couple of times, still don't know what it was but a few minutes later we saw what must have been some sort of saltwater eel-tailed catfish so that may have been the culprit) I got up early and headed down to the beach and came up trumps with a 53cm flattie in amongst the weed (took a while to get into a rhythm and not get weed caught on my jighead EVERY single time!!) beds. I was using a 1/4oz 3/0 jighead with a 5 inch white/pearl Zman GrubZ.

Happy with that, I decided the next morning it was time to turn my attention to rock fishing, which I have an affinity for. I was keen to explore Tomaree Headland and without a recon mission, couldn't decide whether to head clockwise around it from our unit, or go over to the surf beach and head anti-clockwise. I opted for the former, and sure enough reached a point where I couldn't/wouldn't get access to the water (I'm very cautious).

 

 

[kmcrosby78]

So I took a photo of the ocean side 

and then turned around and climbed onto a nice flat perch (a local joined me later and said the platform was used during one of the wars to lug supplies/artillery off the boats) and flicked a slug and then plastics for not a touch, before using a mullet fillet he left me to only find pickers. Despite the lack of success, I still managed to enjoy myself and was back home for bacon and eggs by 8:30am.

[kmcrosby78]

From Shoal Bay, we moved on to Port Macquarie, stopping for lunch at Forster/Toncurry. Had fun in Port Macquarie but didn't end up having a fish, apart from one quick one off the beach with the boys. 

We then headed for Coffs Harbour, stopping at Nambucca Heads on the way for lunch. There were so many other headlands that I'd love to stop in at but you can't stop at them all unfortunately. Plenty of fishing options at Coffs and I started dreaming of landbased jewies (a long-time goal/dream of mine) but to no avail. After deliberating long and hard about the different options, and again without a recon mission, I settled on rockhopping Macauley's Headland. Got there just before first light on a beautiful morning and headed around to the first intended spot but it was very slippery closer to the water, so I flicked a slug from higher up the rocks and then changed to a plastic, but decided to move on as I couldn't see how I would land a decent sized fish safely if I was lucky enough to hook up. 

I'd hoped to fish this point (below) and flick towards the large exposed rock, but time was getting away, the tide had risen and it was a fair hike out to it so I opted to just continue around the headland and tried another couple of spots.

[kmcrosby78]

Had hoped/planned to fish the start of the southern rock wall at the harbour itself as on the day we arrived we drove past and the beach gutter up against it seemed decent and had nice foamy water covering it, but this didn't eventuate. I settled for a bait session (pillies with LOTS of berley as apparently there can be decent GT's in there) on the last night inside the marina but it was amazingly quiet (despite the berley) although I did hook up to something huge on Liam's rod (typical - couldn't have been on my 5000FJ Stradic that had a floating pillie with two snelled hooks in it ...... grrr!!!!) that ran for a long way and inevitably busted me off.

We also did the Muttonbird Island walk (bit steeper than we'd anticipated which was fun carrying almost 3yr old George ....) which gave great views.

All in all an awesome family holiday at some great spots with some great sights. Would love to go back to each and have a more serious go (better equipped, seek out local knowledge and do recon walks) sometime in the future. Cheers for reading if you got this far  

[ellicat]

Good account, Kelvin. It reminded me of when my two were youngsters and we'd head down that way. I'd fish every day from 5 to 7 am and then pm.

Beautiful part of the World. Glad you managed to eat some miles and return safely.

 

[Old Scaley]

There sure are some nice spots on the NSW coast. You could be tempted to move there if it wasn’t for those 3 special nights each year when you have to be a QUEENSLANDER

[Luvit]

Working it in with the family ensures everyone has a good time. Like Ellicat I used do the same at Merimbula, NSW.

A successful holiday completed and flathead one night for dinner.   

All before the new job kicks off.

Good luck with the new school.

[Drop Bear]

On 1/7/2018 at 10:39 PM, kmcrosby78 said:

There were so many other headlands that I'd love to stop in at but you can't stop at them all unfortunately.

Bucket list. Stop at all of them.

On 1/7/2018 at 11:03 PM, kmcrosby78 said:

All in all an awesome family holiday at some great spots with some great sights. Would love to go back to each and have a more serious go (better equipped, seek out local knowledge and do recon walks) sometime in the future. Cheers for reading if you got this far

Sounds like a cracker. Enjoy the kids while they are this age. they grow up really fast. 

Top read thanks mate. Makes me want to spend more time down that way. We are heading to Wooli at easter and this has made me more excited about it thanks

Its annoying when best laid plans don't turn out but heartening to read that its not just me that has slow days.