Ed.

Apart from that, It's also the fact that when the tide changes, the water rips through there, if you jumped or fell in on a outgoing tide you would end up miles from the shore and with the ingoing, you would end up in between Urangan and Fraser Island, with no chance of swimming back to shore, it is very strong. There actually is an emergency ladder about 3/4's of the way out to the end of the jetty on the right hand side which goes onto on the sand, just on where outer sand bar starts, but if you ended up in the water you would not be able to make it to even climb up. You can see where the current rips through and has left the sand bars.

Haven't heard of any large Tigers here before, but no reason they shouldn't be here, quite a few bronzies here, I saw one when I was on the jetty that morning, much smaller version, I didn't get a good look at it but from what I saw it wasn't all that big, still it would have been doable on smaller gear.

Yesterday I had to wait for my car to be fixed at Urangan Hervey bay, and had some time to kill so went for a walk to the jetty as I haven't been there for a while. Talking to the locals near the end, and apparently there has been a very large Tiger shark hanging around there for a couple of days. One of the locals saw it relatively close up and said it was about 4m long and about 1m wide across. It was going for a mackerel he had in the water and had to yank it up quickly. My first thought was I should get my 50W out and have a go later that night but then reality set in, what would I do if I was even managed to hook it? The Urangan jetty isn't really set up to release big fish, there is a lot of height under the jetty and trying to maneuver such a large shark to the start of the jetty and onto the sand would be next to impossible as it is over 1km away. So gave up on that idea as it would be too futile. No doubt plenty of guys will try to target it but don't think anybody will succeed, they will need a very large reel and the biggest I saw there was a TLD25 so not even in the running, even a 50W is probably way too small especially from the a jetty, will keep my ears open if it hits the news .

From some of the reviews I have read in reviews on Amazon, a lot of the reels and other products that buyers have received have been damaged/faulty in some way or else the box has been been opened, bits missing, possibly as in someone has sent the product back for having had a problem, and the seller has resold it again as is. Not so much as Amazons fault but the sellers that sell through Amazon. Check out the seller and the reviews for that reel and see what the comments are like. That might give you an insight on good or bad. Generally speaking, I also generally don't buy any high value items from Aliexpress, very little comeback if you have an issue with the products, cannot talk to or reach anyone to remedy the problem and bloody hard to deal with. ie; bought a baitcaster from one of the sellers there (supposed to be the manufacturer of it) and also 3 spare reels for it. It arrived and each of the 3 spare reels was different from each other. Go figure! Bought an expensive underwater LED torch and I when received it, it didn't work properly, so after being stalled for several weeks ie, send us a video of it not working ect., do the repair of the damaged wiring and send pics of it being done, I ended up having to do a full charge back on the credit card successfully via my bank. Not saying all the sellers on all these platforms are all bad but I have had the most problems with Aliexpress and Amazon, hence I stick mainly with E-Bay and pay via paypal, at least you have a few more chances of getting your money back to some degree and/or talking to someone to resolve any issue. I have got some real good deals on the US E-Bay site. Best one was a genuine Daiwa game reel, SLT-50W, BNIB, I think that it cost me about AU$350 inc delivery ? (that was via auction) and other places were charging over a Grand outright to buy it. So you win some and take your chances on the rest.

Most of the manufacturers claims of the capacity of reels and also line in my opinion are bogus, not just Shimano as there doesn't seems to be a legalized standard method of enforcing measurement. Some measure using mono or braid capacity/strength/length however there are huge variations in the actual line strengths for their given diameter, so one mono line might have a diameter of 0.78mm for 80lb line(Platypus Platinum) and another brand will have the 80lb line in 0.92mm(Stren). Then there is the issue of Pretest/IGFA line or general line with the former supposed to break less than but close to the rated strength but no more than, as against the general purpose line which means squat. Which is where the advertising line comes from ie: "ours is the strongest 20lb line", which generally means it is much thicker than the competition and is mislabeled as 20lb instead of 30 or 40lb line which it should be! The amount of tension when laying the line also effects how much line goes on as the tension thins the line diameter and stretches the line more. I have a spool of braid which says it is 67kg and a diameter of 0.39mm but when I tested it several times with a micrometer it measured close to 0.5mm and broke at half the stated strength on the spool. Also with braid it depends on the amount of strands and the amount of strand twists per given length in the line, high strands count usually means that the line is rounder and it sometimes means that other lines may flatten out more, so the width is more than its height, ect. then you have the issue of how you lay the line, if you manage to get the line to lay right next to the line coil that you just laid and move across to edge of the spool and then repeat to the other side, then you will or should have more line as there will be less air gaps between the coils and less cross over in the layers. However in real life how often does that happen when you spool a reel for the first time or especially when you have hooked up a fish and are winding it in. So when buying a reel assume you will have less capacity then stated and buy the next size up if capacity is important. So its a bit complicated but in the end it's all marketing crap. Just my opinion!

The only time I would lock up a drag would be when you have hooked a largish powerful fish that was heading for structure or was near the bottom when hooked, in which case I figure I have nothing to lose as most likely they will reach a cave/ledge/structure and snag the line and bust you off. I used to target Mullaway in the Swan river and the only ones I ever lost were the ones that I tried to drag in, due to over excitement and not thinking. Those would turn and swim straight towards me and under the jetty, then it was game over and the line parted due to sharp bits on the pylons, the others I played on lighter drag and they would swim down current usually and towards the center of the river, a bit of back and forth till they became tired and much easier to handle when close to the jetty or rocks. So I think it depends on the type of fish and the nearby structure. One of the guys I met up in northern W.A used to fish for up to 30kg mackerel from a boat and used light line, can't remember if it was 4kg or 4lb line, chased it all over the ocean and the fight would go on for a very long time, the fish was pretty much cactus when brought on board. For large sharks, I would try to get them in quicker so they can recover quicker and be released without too much trauma on them, downside is they also tend to be a bit more energetic when being de-hooked so more care must be taken. I suppose it's a bit like running flat out for 300m, at the end you are very tired but can recover rapidly VS a marathon race, whereby afterwards you are completely shattered and have used up all of your reserve energy.

Not a shark but a large ray, many decades ago when I was a young man, I went up to Queensland from Victoria for an extended road trip, living mainly out of my car, an old FE holden sedan and ended up in the Shute Harbour area, knowing very little about fishing and not much cash, I tried to supplement my food supply by going fishing, ended up buying a light handline and also a heavier one with 80lb line. I had snorkeled off the jetty there so I knew there were some decent sized fish in that murky green water, wouldn't do that again now that I now know what else swims around there, anyway I caught some smaller fish on the light line and put one out on the large hand line. A short while later it started to move so I grabbed it and gave it a decent yank which hooked up solid. So about 20 minutes in to the fight I managed to get it off the bottom and saw a flap break the surface so recognized it as a big ray, in those days, the ferries that went to the Islands used to leave from that jetty and there was one tied up at the end of the jetty. Eventually the ray swung around to it and ended up either under the boat or under the jetty and I couldn't stop it, resulting in the line being cut off. In a way I am glad it broke the line as I wouldn't have known what to do with it had I managed to bring it to the shore, so yes it did give me a decent workout even though I was quite strong in those days. The smaller fish I caught which I didn't know at the time turned out to be "Happy Moments" which I took back to fillet and eat, apparently there are a few similar fish called by the same name, didn't know anything about them till I went back the next day and the guy I was fishing with the day before asked what I had done with them, and was quite surprised that I had eaten them. I did start to go for a quick drive that evening and had a hard time driving as the road seemed to be swaying, so quickly did a u turn and went back to sleep it off. Possibly one of those might not have been edible, and possibly a bit hallucinogenic. So after that I made sure that I knew all about the fish I was going to eat! Nowadays if I am going to go after large sharks then it's with a 30II or a 50WII, rod gimble and stand up harness, I am not nearly as strong as I used to be and need all the advantage I can get!

I try to take a simpler approach, have a look at the Platypus Platinum line, (0.78mm) , it might give you a bit more length compared to other mono lines, it is about the thinnest 80lb line that I have found. I usually put on about 50-60m of it as a top shot on to my braid but I connect it direct to a swivel and 4m stainless cable so no going through any rod guides, but I figure that should be long enough so I can grab the stainless cable at the boat/rocks/beach, and should the shark take off at that point, the 80lb mono should be able to take the strain with it's stretch. Having said all that, I use 130-150lb braid so if the line is going to break, chances are that I will loose some mono instead of the more expensive braid.

Just out of curiosity I had a look at the spin reels I have, I only have Penn Spinfisher Liveliners V4 and V5, 2500-4500-6500 sizes and mine barely moved about 1mm or so, (I didn't test the 8500 as it was buried amongst the other reels), I don't know if it is just the design of the spools, or it might have to do with how the drag stack or bearings are done. I personally wouldn't be happy with that much wobble as it would just annoy me. I mainly use overheads/baitcasters and very rarely the spin gear, so don't get that issue.

As Neil said, I would be more concerned about flushing the trailer after each use, than the motor if you are using it daily.

Happy New Year to everyone.

Have a look at this Penn Liveliner model, on special till the 31st Dec 23 for $139.99 including delivery. This one is has a manual bail arm trip and the Liveliner feature which is good for letting fish run with the bait before striking. They are also water resistant which is good for surf areas. https://www.ebay.com.au/itm/292810550338 P.S. The on special date has been extended to the end of Dec, so I updated the date above in case anyone was interested.

Unfortunately we never made it to the Daintree, Mossman Gorge or the Atherton tableland, that might be scheduled for another trip in the future. Went out on the "Dragon Lady" and despite being bricked on the Coral with a couple of huge hits, I managed to only get a legal sized Fingermark bream (Moses perch) and a semi decent Gold Spot Trevally up on board, both ended up on the plate for 6 meals. I had booked to go on the Norseman 2 days later but they notified me that they didn't have the numbers to go out, so missed out as every other boat was booked out whilst I was there. Next day went for a sail to Mackay reef on a 25mft cat, it's a huge boat and only had about 18 people on it for the day, water was quite clean (10-15m visibility) and nice snorkeling, water was cooler than I would have liked but still quite good. They required us to snorkel together so that they could keep an eye on us, which wasn't ideal but probably done for insurance requirements to ensure they didn't lose anyone. By the time we got down to Cairns, the reef closure was in place so no more fishing for me. Did the Kuranda rail trip whilst in Cairns and then started to head back home after 4 days, caught up with Misha (aka Sylvathorn) on the way back at Bowen, got back home and the missus 2 days later decided we should go to go to the Gold Coast to see daughter No 1 and bub, so more driving, all up we did about 4000+ km. The car kept throwing up several more error codes on the way back from Port Douglas, but with a quick jiggle of the sensors they all disappeared, will have to get them checked out now that I am back home. For some reason, I can't seem to post up any pics!

Well the missus and I finally headed North on our way to Port Douglas, this is our second attempt at it, as the first trip last year was terminated early when we blew a coolant hose just near Sarina. Our first overnight stop was at the Denison Hotel (Rockhampton) after leaving Hervey Bay. It's an old Qld railway headquarters building which has been converted into a hotel, with 4 poster king sized bed and a spar bath, the large rooms have 14-16ft ceilings. Left next morning towards Airlie Beach, almost no smoke from the fires on the way up, but when we got there the wind was blowing quite strongly (20-25knots). Went out on the 85ft sailing cat "Camira" for a snorkelling trip to Dumbell Island, the snorkelling was fairly abysmal as the wind the night before got to 30 knots so the water was churned up and high tide to boot. Visibilty was about 1-1.5m and unfortunately afterwards they only took us to Hills Inlet and not Whitehaven beach as we were hoping for. However the trip out and back was really good with as much food as you wanted, and as much free wine, beer and alcoholic cider as you could consume. I broke a heel strap on my flippers and the boat didn't have a size to fit me (I have large flat feet) so just snorkelled without. I bought another pair of flippers and diving socks at Tackle World in Cannonvale. The night before our next leg to Mission Beach, the Jeep threw a hissy fit and the computer displayed a heap of major error codes. We became stressed and were worried that it would be the end of the trip again, managed to get UltraTune in Cannonvale squeeze the Jeep in and to do a scan on it, they were very helpful and apart from one minor voltage issue with the MAP sensor which a clean fixed, we were good to go and left at 10:00am. Had a few more error messages pop up during the drive up, it looks like one or two of the sensors might have a loose connection as after jiggling the connections the errors disappeared and everything was back to normal. After breakfast our next stop was 2 nights at Mission Beach at a B&B, where we saw the local Cassowary's walk around the gardens outside which was nice, dropped into the local winery for wine tastings and picked up 6 bottles of liquors/ports to take back with us. They were a nice drop!. Arrived at Port Douglas and staying at the Ramada, today we visited the "Australian Chocolate Farm". If you like Chocolate, then I highly recommend this place. It's 15 minutes out of town at Shannonvale and the Chocolate deserts are to die for! The chocolate is grown and processed on the farm and the deserts are made by the owner who is a Master Pastry Chef. Unbelievably good! Tomorrow we are heading out on another large sailing Cat out to Mackay Reef for more snorkelling, the wind has died down so should be a great day. The first fishing trip is on Tuesday out on the Dragon Lady followed by another fishing trip on the Norseman on Thursday, they are both large vessels so a bit of wind won't bother them if it picks up. I tore a muscle badly in my lower back just before we left home on this trip and it's only just started to feel better now, I am taking my stand up harness with me fishing so I don't aggravate my back should I hook up on something big, it might look a bit wanky and overkill for bottom bashing but better to be safe than in pain for another 10 days. Will do an update afterwards and looking forward to fishing as it has been a very, very long time since I have been fishing.

Exactly how big is this "little pond" to sustain fish that size?