Darren Keep

Just about sorted for the trip.
Leave to Perth on Thursday and back end of August.
See you all when I get back, might take a little while to write the report. 😉
Rods in a rod tube, now to throw some clothes and camera equipment in.

 

The best part about not working any more is being able to pick the best days of the week to go fishing.  Yesterday was certainly a cracker to be out on the water. Had a little solo trip to the front of the rock wall, leaving the port ramp about 8am.  Pretty quiet with just a few very pretty wrasse, some bream around the 25cm mark and a sole to keep me entertained early. Not a single snapper, which is what I was looking for. 
Decided to move to a spot close by where I often find flatties. Threw a prawn on a bream rig while I tossed plastics around looking for the flathead. The prawn was taken by a winter whiting so I changed hooks and started feeding them half a peeled prawn.  Gathered 19 in no time, and thought that would be enough filleting for one day, so moved into the river to see if I could bag a snap on the outgoing tide. Very quiet to begin with, but came on the chew 30 minutes before I needed to get off the water.  Caught 4 or 5 that were around the 34cm mark and then bagged a decent 45cm model for the esky on my last cast.
Overall a beautiful day on the water.  Interesting too - I saw the Japanese warships and a sunken tinnie tied off to a channel marker. Never a dull moment down there.  Here is a bad picture of a couple of dead fish. Thanks for reading.
 

After some negotiation with the owner of Gobblers Lures, my wife and I have purchased the small business.
We will be taking it over in early July and manufacturing from home. (Just in time for me to make a few lures for the Kimberly trip coming up in end of July). 🙂
It will take a few months to find our feet and then hopefully we can start making some small changes to improve the Gobbler experience.
Predominantly my Julie will be manufacturing the lures while I be doing marketing, development etc.
I'm sure there will a special for AFO members when we are sorted.😉
This is why I have been quite on the forum for a little while.

Headed out from Mooloolaba last week in some nicer weather. Well it might have been a bit too nice as the fish weren’t playing the game! Fished hard all day for a couple of tuskies, Maori cod, Moses, a nice snapper and the biggest hussar I’ve ever seen!
Between 6 of us on two boats we kept about 20 reefies for the day. 
Conditions were so nice my spearo mate was foaming at the mouth to jump in, even after we saw a decent shark on one of the spots! 
Brilliant day on the water nonetheless. 
Mmmm fish tacos!

What a trip!
Not exactly the one I wanted but there are stories none the less. To explain briefly without going into to much personal detail 1.5 days into the triup and my dad got extrmely sick forcing me to leave and take him back to Kimbe for care. Gutted. I was happy to write it off as I have enjoyed the experience before. I was devastated for him as he was having such a good time. He managed one small black bass for his efforts. Thus I am left with not a lot to report except images. I am sure @John would be happy to fill in many details.
Points of interest were the bass were challenging to target due to an early arrival of white bait but some creative use of soft plastics enticed many to bite.
As far as hard bodies go trends moved back to my first trip experience with FCL Labo lures killing.
I do not have heaps of time to write paragraphs so will add some pictures now and more text later or reply to questions as they come.
Visit to the village:

Black  Bass (Have so many more but how many can you see?):


 
Other Lutjanus species for the trip:

Trevally:



 
Questions? I have so many more pictures of bass, cod, randoms, jacks... just trying to choose highlights.