Ed.

It would depend on what type or style of fishing you prefer to do. Surf is the least important to me and unfortunately to my wifes annoyment, whenever we travel on holidays near the coast I pack about 4 to 6 setups. My preference is towards overheads such as baitcasters and overheads. But those aren't every ones favourites, having said that I usually pack a 400 sized bait caster or small 2500 sized spin setup ( or both). Several overheads ranging from 15 to 30 sized, these will cover most of the general fishing I may come across. Currently I am getting organized to go up to Port Douglas in November to do a couple of fishing trips on charter boats out to the reef and I am leaving my larger game reels behind, as the ones I'm taking will cover most of the fishing that I will encounter doing the bottom bashing that these charters do. Hopefully the car won't break down like it did last year! I was planning to do the same as you a while ago and do the lap, but instead we ended up building a house instead, so the caravan idea is on the back burner, If I end up doing the lap, I would be taking at least half of the gear I own as you just can't go and get something you left at home if you are thousands of Kilometres away. As a basic collection, a 2500 sized spin setup, a 4500 spin and a 6500+ setup would cover most bases if you don't like overheads or baitcasters, as you haven't fished for a long time I wouldn't go out and get crazy buying gear, get a decent 2500 and a 4500 setup, and that would cover most of the fish you will come across, you can also get a smaller spin rod to suit the 4500 reel for estuary/rock fishing or put it on the surf road when you hit beach or big rock fishing. You can always buy more gear if you are on the road and are getting smoked regularly.

Personally I think that 1 teaspoon of Anise (Aniseed) oil is too much, when I used to use it, I used to use 2-3 drops of Aniseed oil per 2.5kg block of pilchards or in a large packet of bread crumbs (with fish oil) as it has a pretty potent smell.

My 2 cents worth is that if you are going to the great lap and intend to go fishing during the trip, you should get two or three rod/reel setups as one setup isn't going to be ideal. You are going to come across different locations with different fishing requirements. ie; it is going to be hard to cast a surf setup if you are in an area with overhead trees and low branches, conversely a small rod will not be ideal on a surf beach. Whilst most rods can do double duty in several different settings, it helps to have a bigger spread to better suit the location/fish types. Lastly welcome to the forum and enjoy your retirement.

If possible, raise an edge in the front and also the back of the boat, that will let any breeze through and still keep the rain out. Any breeze going through should help with the problem of condensation not forming.

I can't get rid of that message on my system but try an add blocker such as AdBlocker Ultimate or Adguard Adblocker and they should take care of any other ads on this or any other web pages.

And they still would have made a profit on them, has anyone taken notice of the ridiculous prices of lures lately, some of the larger ones are heading towards about $70 each. It is getting to be a very expensive sport.

I had a similar situation to what Angry51 said, the previous owner of my boat had fitted an additional filter to the fuel line as well as a bulb and the inner lining of the fuel line had separated and bunched up in front of the fittings, so it would let some fuel through but once you were going for a while at medium to high revs, it would eventually catch up and starve the motor of fuel, causing the motor to lose power intermittently.

There is nothing like a bargain! You should be right for gear for a while... till the next set of specials come along.

Closest I got to that area was Hamelin Station for a couple of days staying in the shearers sheds, and that was in 1979, my girlfriend and I at the time drove up in a 2WD from Perth during winter, can't remember even what her car was but it was a small rear wheel drive and we managed. The conditions have probably changed heaps since then, but I didn't get to go to Steep Point which was much further West then North. I do remember there was a lot of sand/gravel road just to get to the station. Maybe we were just lucky. As Mangajack said, try Youtube.

So who has been picking up some fishing tackle at the special prices? There have been some good clearance sales going on from most of the tackle stores. I have been tempted to, but have resisted (so far).

I suppose that is true but by the time you chase up and collect all the components, then add your margin and the time to make it, would it still be worth it? If you enjoy doing that sort of thing then fair enough. For me if I wanted a specific good quality type of rod then I just make one regardless of the time, effort and cost, which by the way ends up costing way, way more than a store bought one, and that is without taking into consideration my labour.

I don't particularly like repairing rods, I would prefer to make a new one instead if possible, as I don't do repairs for other people I have the choice, although I can't justify making any more rods. I have more than enough gear and haven't been fishing for ages, still a little while to go before I can. Just got the keys to our new house, so all my time is now being spent moving. So just keep looking at all the gear I have and wishing to use some but it's not going to happen any time soon. With the price of components and the time to make a rod, I would be surprised if you made any money out of making them to sell.

I would imagine it would be quite a bit, but at least the Catch can, helps minimise the amount of crud (oil mist, carbon and diesel fuel) that would otherwise be recirculated back through the engine which ends up sticking the insides walls of the manifolds. Usually with turbo diesels the volume of "oil" increases, and that is due to the fuel being added to the oil in the sump so it's important to have regular services.

I would be inclined to open it up to see if it needed to be drained or cleaned. As you didn't know you had one, by now it may be full of oil or the filter needs to be cleaned or replaced. With my Provent unit, I have a paper cartridge in it which is good for about 40-50k km before replacing., but I still need to empty the collected oil regularly via a hose and tap on the bottom. Other units have a stainless mesh/screen which needs to be washed. The cheaper units are a waste of time and money as they are just an empty box with no screens or filters in them to trap the oil mist.

Hey Junky, here is a link if you want to increase the performance of your 1HZ https://gturbo.com.au/have-we-created-the-worlds-most-powerful-1hz/

I do a service every 6-8k purely because the car services were required every 6 months or 10k km which ever came first as a condition under my extended warranty. So basically I have never had to top up due to the low milage I travel. I have done about 110k km over 6.5 years. The oil that is collected by the catch can would have been pushed through the engine and lost anyway, so if I do it 2 or 3 times between services it doesn't drop the oil level to any significant degree. High performance (turbo) diesels actually add to the oil volume as unburnt diesel fuel is forced past the rings. So I have never been low in oil hence the reason for the oil changes as the diesel dilutes the oil in the motor.

A while ago my 3l Jeep diesel started to throw up a heap of error codes so after several trips to the dealer, they worked out that the EGR flap motor had seized due to all the oily gasses which gummed up the circulation flaps, they seized up and burnt out the motor as they were unable to move. End result it would have cost me $5700 to have the manifolds replaced except for the fact that I had a reasonable extended warranty which covered the cost. Here is a pic of the intake tube which holds the MAP sensor, which is completely covered in crud which should give you an idea of the state of the intake manifolds on the engine. After I had the repair done, I fitted an oil catch can (PROVENT 200 IV) which I empty about every 3000Km and drain about 50-60ml of oil which otherwise would be redirected though the manifold to be burnt or deposited on the manifold intakes. Eventually the manifold fills up, which prevents the engine breathing properly and then accelerates the problem.

Unfortunately that's the reality of smaller boats, by the time you stow all the safety gear, passengers and other essentials such as fishing gear, etc., there is almost no room left. You probably know this already but if not, sometimes getting into shallower water to ride out bad weather may not work, (assuming that your motor is still running) being in slightly deeper water may keep you out of the surf/breaker zone. Shallower water can get sloppier and rougher. At least you are aware of the potential risks as otherwise you would not have asked the question in the first place! If nothing else, a spare coil of rope plus shackles is always a good thing to have on board.

If you aren't sleeping on it and in reasonable weather that would in my opinion be the very minimum, however I would not rely it holding your boat in place should your motor fail and the weather/ocean becomes rough. It might be just me but I consider my life and those of my passengers to be worth more than the cheapest option. A 3:1 ratio is not great 5:1 or more is better when the sea turns bad, having longer chain or a longer rope will improve your chances with that size anchor not to mention having a larger sized anchor to start with. Just something to consider! As I said this is only my opinion. Some links to help you decide: https://www.whitsundaydiscountmarine.com.au/buying/better-boating-guides/choosing-the-correct-anchor/ https://www.whitworths.com.au/anchor_rope

I have always tended to use larger sized anchors on all my boats in the past, made all of them out of stainless, plus a chain with a minimum of 1-2 times the length of the boat, gave me piece of mind when anchored and the wind/waves start to push the boat around. When walking around marinas, I frequently wonder about the size of anchors on larger sized boats, I would often see 35ft boats which had anchors the size of what I would put on a 23ft boat. My last 17.5ft boat had an Danforth type anchor of 10kg.

We are based at 7 Mile Beach at the Wyndham Resort. So far we have gone to the Junee Caves, Russell Falls, Hastings Caves, had Whiskey cocktails, coffee and cake at the Salamanca Whiskey Bar. Today we might go to the Botanic Gardens and tonight we will try to do the Bonorong wildlife sanctuary. There is potentially snow coming to the highlands near Miena but probably tommorow, but it is a few hours drive and not much else to do up there. It has a pub there,(that is about the only thing there), you can catch trout in the dam but I didn't bring any fishing gear with me. Saw the sights there a few years ago. It's warmed up a since we got here so not holding out much hope for snow.

I sympathise with you, the missus and I are in Tassie till the weekend doing the touristy things, went to Russell Falls yesterday and the outside temp was 7C in the middle of the day, at least we have a very comfy and warm unit to go back to! No way would I go camping in your conditions. I am hoping to see some snow before we head back to Qld.

Yep, did that, they suggested resetting the router to factory settings, so I just uploaded the backup config file to the router which I know worked. I still think that it is Telstra fiddling around with the network as we have been getting weekly notices that they are doing work on the network. Anyway, I will see how this resetting works before contacting them again.

It is also at my end as I have to keep resetting the router and the NBN box to reconnect.

Nope wasn't there, internet keeps disconnecting tonight. Will call you. Cheers Ed.