queensland Whitsundays Mid August

[planetfonz]

Howdy all - we managed to score a good deal for a bareboat charter next month so i come asking if any of you have fished or are familiar with the whitsundays during winter? i've had difficulties finding fishing reports for up that way so any info would be great.

we'll be hoping to go poppering, spinning, trolling and an occasional bout of shore based soft plastics!

[Cowfish13]

I think that the pelagics tend to be in good numbers up there around winter. So would be good on the spinning and poppering front

[Leighton]

im heading up in 3 weeks

From what I have learnt, troll a lure where ever you go

Fish the area like you fish the Bay, drop offs, reef edges both with S/P and poppers

Take a bit of bottom bashing gear

I will take my hand held GPS so if we get onto a few I will palm the marks off

[planetfonz]

ahh nice nice!

yeah last year we trolled thru cid harbour a lot (in fact cid harbour had the most visible fish busting up than anywhere else we were) and picked up a spaniard, tuna, even a shark on the trolled lures and fellow afo'r kratz nailed a mass of fish with his poppers. good to hear pelagics will be there. thats the no.1 thing i want

[Nitris]

Woo im there for 3 nights wooB)

[benno573]

mate, troll big lures like rapalas etc everywhere you go. there are some HUGE spaniards up there, lots of spotties and tuna as well, if you have an option to troll closer to the islands out from the reef edges that's the go. most of the island drop straight off to about 30-60m within 100m of the shore of less! the bays will have coral bommies and stuff, watch the green zones though. take a ridiculously heavy rig and a few of the halco roosta poppers or some stickbaits and find any bommies with good tide flow = GT's!!!! i found unwieghted pillies in around reef edges got smashed by everything, need some serious gear to pull some of the stuff out. same would go for lightly weighted plastics i would assume. lucky bugger!!!

[planetfonz]

hell yeah!

well as long as i get one complete day of sunshine i'm happy - we got rain nearly our whole trip last november.

and nitris - arrrr you'll be a fine boat cook/cleaner/drinks biatch me mateyy

[stewie]

Planetfonz,

We used to bareboat each year, but haven't been for a while (since the kids). If you venture south to Thomas Island give me a yell. At the headland (landbased) there is a great spot for Coral Trout on lures. Last time it really fired up and all you could see was "red water" from the amount of trout following the lure. We often head there early in the trip to get a few for a feed. I also nailed a good queenie there last trip. We also have had good success (large trevors and mackeral) on live baits while moored off Whitehaven Beach.

Stewie.

[Drop Bear]

On 06/07/2008 at 10:40 PM, benno573 said:

mate, troll big lures like rapalas etc everywhere you go. there are some HUGE spaniards up there, lots of spotties and tuna as well, if you have an option to troll closer to the islands out from the reef edges that's the go. most of the island drop straight off to about 30-60m within 100m of the shore of less! the bays will have coral bommies and stuff, watch the green zones though. take a ridiculously heavy rig and a few of the halco roosta poppers or some stickbaits and find any bommies with good tide flow = GT's!!!! i found unwieghted pillies in around reef edges got smashed by everything, need some serious gear to pull some of the stuff out. same would go for lightly weighted plastics i would assume. lucky bugger!!!

I think I am doing a similar trip first week of September... Yew! Thanks for all the tips.