Man, this heat! It is brilliant! :-) Yesterday had a lazy day, went out for the arvo with a mate bottom fishing off the back of Parara Island. 200m from the island, and you are in 200m of water, fishing for assorted jobfish and snappers etc. Only got a few ,nothing flash, gold line jobfish, rusty jobfish and some comet gropers, but still, a nice way to while away the day.
Just cannot get nough of the sea here. The deepest blue you can imagine, we were bowling along Parara with about 1m swells slowly rolling thru to crash into the cliffs, the contrast of the tropical green jungle on the cliff tops, the pure white spray of hte waves and the deep blue water really just makes you go "woah!"
Today made an excursion across to the Haipei Lagoon/reef area, on the NNW tip of Rendova Island. 3 gts in the bin, plus a couple of bluefin and a queenie on light spin stuff at kurukuru island. Again, lotsa fun, and just drop-dead gorgeous scenery.
Fishing tackle testing is one of hte things I am quite keen on this trip. I have taken a pile of diff toys to play with, all have worked, but with varying degrees of sucess I feel.
Firstly though, the next person that tells me they reckon braid is as good for constant repeted casting as Fireline needs their flamin head read. After casting for 3 days,,,, and up here that means constant work, not the odd flick here and there... I had three..., no, sorry, four, humungous wind=knots in the braid, so I said sod it, and spooled up one of the reels (I have 2 new quantum boca80 reels here this time) with 30lb fireline. All day casting not a hitch, not a problem. As far as I am concerned, if you are planning on serious casting all day... use fireline. Save yourself some heartache and blood-pressure!
Next, the stickbaits.
OK, I have been giving these a fair crack, and shall continue to do so. I have certainly taken fish on all of the different ones so far now, so they DO do the job.
However, I have to say, they are nowhere near as visually sstimulating as the poppers. Half the time you cannot really even see where the damn things are, unlike poppers, whic by their nature announce their presence as loudly as you can imagine, so your attention is always focussed right THERE, where the lure is. To my mind, this makes it way way more appealing fishing. For a comparisson...hmmmm.... compare nymphing for trout in a stream to fishing a deep sinker line in a river mouth at night. Both catch fish, both are enjoyable, but the buzz you get from placing and watching the lure being taken is juswt so much higher then waiting for an anonymous strike.
Well, Joe and i are heading out for anotehr arvos jaunt now, see if we cant find some more popper/stickbait action before dinnertime... cheers all,
Stu.
Oh, PS, ChrisW, those toys.... getting better all the time, bloody good!