Wow
based on ^ I'm glad I booked my flights late last year. Dont think I'll travel abroad until 2024 at this rate.
Anyhow! FNQ trip report. I cant post photos from work (and not really inclined to use my home time as its a major pain in the behind) and anyhow you guys will have seen them on FB where I'm posting in the TGA Saltfly page.
Day 0. I Flew Ak-Brisbane-Cairns. At the time I booked there was nor flight direct into Cairns and the absolute "must not miss" flight from Cairns to Weipa on day 2 dictated that overnighting in Cairns was the only sensible option.
Day 1. - Cairns-Weipa-Mapoon. The home of Bauxite. Just literally billions of tonnes mined and shipped all over the place inc a derivative, Alumina which comes to Tiwai Pt. Our group jumped on the mothership and we headed north. Arriving in the afternoon refreshed with mudcrab and beers, we got our gear together as the sun dropped.
Day 2. With 6 anglers (4 of us a 'core' group of mates) and 3 tenders we decided to rotate anglers and guides over the next 6 days. After a BIG brekkie (food was abundant..) Steve and I headed out with Clint our host guide and went looking for tuna. Every Aussie angler wants a longtail tuna on their line and so as bustups were found we'd head over to get upwind. Thing is, most of the bustups are from Mackerel Tuna which for some reason are treated as 'sh1t fish'. They are in fact awesome bundles of line stretching muscle and soo we were into them on very small Candies to match the bait. What awesome fun. We went north to look for other 'things' and found large bait balls being herded by all sorts of fish. Unlike the tuna workups, the predators on the big bait were very orderly, shadowing and picking off odd fish. My mate Steve picked up a large Golden Trev which fought like crazy. Later I hooked a horse of a goldie from the top of a bait ball, saw the eat and hit the fly in. The fish first went went deep, then wide and simply swam away at walking pace. I couldn't stop it. We trundled after it in the boat, I had my #9 Sage Salt HD bent as hard as I dared and the drag on the Abel at what I thought was an ideal setting to protect the 8kg tippet. It just kept swimming. And swimming. Clint told me to up the drag 2 clicks and I really wish I'd just said no. The hook pulled soon after. On the next bait ball I hit a fish that behaved strangely, first shooting away at pace then circling and circling. After a decent fight we saw a Spanish Mack under the boat - with my leader being straight 8kg fluoro this just shouldn't have happened and I couldn't believe it when we boated the fish. He went into the hold for dinner. With the sun setting we headed back to base. So, species 2 firsts - Spanish Mack and Mack Tuna. Also, dropped a rod locker hatch on my Sage X #8 breaking it in 2 places. I'd (luckily) packed an exact spare...
Day 3. I was teamed with Gaz and we were on Wade's boat. Wade runs the opp and is a wealth of fishing info having left school at 15 to just go fishing. We ran out to look for tuna and soon Gaz and I had rods bent on Mack Tuna. The Longtails were present but popped up and down randomly, a pattern that repeated all week. They would be elusive... I threw an olive clouser on a long cast and as it sank below the tuna it was picked up. I fit that fish hard. It went away at an alarming pace and with Gaz hooked up on a tuna going in a different direction I made the call to chase and subdue Gaz's fish which when done we focused on mine. I'd been hooked up for 15 mins at that stage and finally began to regain line with small rod pumps. The fish went deep and began to circle.. Tuna or Trev? The answer became apparent when we saw a relatively huge (they max out at 90cm) Bludger Trevally - another first for me! We tried hard for a longtail to no avail, and then spent the rest of the morning up a smaller river in the estuary where we caught Golden Trevs, saw a Dugong, caught queenfish, a catfish, a Stout Tom. Heading back to the main river where our mothership was we found the entire lower river awash with queenfish smashing bait. Each of us caught one or more queens over a metre long. I've never seen them that consistently large in the past. We got into Giant Herring also but I couldnt land any as they threw hook after hook. Species firsts: Bludger Trev, Golden Trev, Catfish, Stout Tom.
Day 4. Gaz and I fished with Lee from his well appointed boat. Side scan was mint! Again we chased tuna first thing. I was hooked to presumably a Mack Tuna which went deep when there was a bump and everything went slack. I knew straight away that the flyline was gone, along with leader, fly and fish. We surmised that Spanish Mack had hit the loop to loop between line and backing. I had spare lines onboard so quickly rigged a 24 turn bimini and got a new line on. We caught smaller bludgers from a school under the boat and mack tuna before going looking for permit. (They just weren't there and later speaking to guys on other trips they had none with. I figured that there were approx 15 anglers in the general vicinity and none got permit in the week we were there). Up the river I was playing a small queenie when a grouper simply smashed it beside the boat... pointing the rod I broke it off. We later caught goldies and small GTs, queens and various odds and sods. Lee had to leave for home so we jumped off and grabbed gins while the other crews fished on.
Day 5. Dion and I fished with Clint. This morning the tuna schools were different, with longtails circling the mack tuna carnage. We consistently were able to get in front of schools and put flies in front of the longtails and finally, I set the hook on one. The fight was more sedate than the mack tuna fight and after a while my longie was circling the boat. Clint leadered it and was about to tail it when it gave a thrust and the leader hit the prop. Leadered is caught in fly fishing, but I'd have loved a photo. Dion soon hooked and landed a great longtail, after which we decided to go and look for permit. We worked some great flats to no avail. New species: Longtail tuna
Day 6. Steve and I fished with Wade. We went sth to a large river system, and setup an ambush zone, nailing GTs, Goldens and queenies in the rapid current where 2 systems met. This was the day of the biggest tides so getting over river bars needed good timing. With not much going on (full moon maybe?) we headed back to our home river system. Wade parked us on a sandbank near creek which we had driven up the afternoon before with 8' of water under the boat - BIG tides. We wandered up to a series of pools and began to cast at snags. Wade casually told me he'd spotted an 8' croc at the bottom of one pool downstream of me... I didn't go in more than ankle deep. Soon I hooked a wirenet cod and a little later on landed a barra. Turned out to be me only barra of the trip as our barra plan would be thwarted on the morrow. New species: Wirenet cod
Day 7. Last night the mothership sailed south on the high tide. The plan was to park and fish the Wenlock River for barra and threadfin salmon. Dion and I set off with the new guide Duane and soon I had a Fingermark aboard. Cool fish it ate a jerkily retrieved tan clouser. We went EVERYWHERE but the huge tides had displaced tons of mud and every side stream, creek, hollow for kms upstream was just a mess of murk. Only one boat scored fish this day, and they'd found a patch of clean water no longer than 200m and experienced 30 minutes of barra chaos. Hard to be disappointed after such epic fishing.
Day 8 - Mapoon-Weipa-Carins. Moving day. Always a bit sad when a trip ends. Day 9 - Cairns-Ak.
Alright, let's talk flies. In effect I fished 2 main patterns: Candies in size 2 for tuna and (suigh) Clousers in various sizes for everything else. I *sigh* because I just hate fishing clousers, they are so ... well boring. But they were the most effective fly by miles. Hints: Tie the guide version without an underbody/tail on shank. One queenie bit and even if you set the body with UV epoxy or superglue your fly is as good as wrecked. Use synthetics for the wings, they last longer than natural bucktail. For the candies a white tail and body is perfect, we had mack tuna spew up their breakfast and it was like small pure white whitebait. Surface flies for queenies: Hard body poppers, again to resist teeth. I used a crease fly that lasted one bite before ditching that idea.
Finally. I'd go back. I probably will when travel costs are less silly. Best fishing place I've ever been to.