Well, another very interesting day trip on Saturday to Lake Rotoiti with Redfinger on his well set up FC430CC fishing machine, thanks to his generous invitation.
Tough work despite big numbers of fish on RF's fish finder, but as you can see below, I took home a lovely 2.5kg jack which made for a delicious lunch on Sunday with fresh bread (the photo was after our 2-year-old helped himself to some near the tail when I had my back turned - he loves it).
Redfinger will no doubt post a report about his success trialling a new technique. I won't steal his thunder.
A real highlight was bumping into (not literally, fortuitously given he's on a kayak!) Herb (aka 'Rainbow' off the forum) who has generously sent both me and Russell flies over the years.
I thought I recognised Herb from his NZ Fishing News articles and forum posts, and sure enough, it was the master drifting towards us. We had a nice chat and found he was having a similarly tough day, despite doing exactly the same thing, in the same place, as he had done two days earlier for 20 fish.
That's fishing, as they say! We struggled to answer why they just weren't biting.
Incidentally, my fish were caught on my own ties - a Green Sparkle Rabbit, and a fluoro green/brown back version of the smelt flies pictured above. Great company, good to be out in a beautiful spot, and with a stunning lunch as the end result.