10th July 2021Forty Mile Beach

When we looked out this morning it was very heavy cloud and black and raining on the horizon it almost looked as though we were in for a thunderstorm, there was no wind.

We had thought about going over to Eaglehawk Island but seeing as it looked like thunder we didn't want to get 27kms away and have lightening around us, so we went to the island that was approximately 10kms away.

The water was perfect, the night had been warm and it was still very humid and calm.

As we travelled out we saw large sea snakes, turtles and heaps of fish jumping all so easy to see when the water is calm.

We went fairly close to the island, the water was so clear we could see the most beautiful large colourful corals of all shapes and types, with fish swimming past, the biggest sea snake ever and a huge turtle.

It didn't take long for us to get pulled in to the coral when we started fishing or just getting caught up on the coral so we took our stinkers off and just let the bait sink, wasn't long we got some good sized mangrove jack and charlie court cod, with lots of undersized striped snapper and blue bone, they were all just under but undersized is undersized.

We hadn't been out there long and the fisheries visited us checked our licence and had a look in our bin to check and even what we were using for bait, they were very nice and as long as we do the right thing they don't give any hassle, they always have plenty of laughs.

We couldn't stay out very long as the tide would be getting nearly too low for us around

 2 o'clock and we were a little late getting out there but it was one of the best days for a long time, not only the fish but sitting looking at the beauty beneath us.

When we were coming in we decided to troll a lure and within seconds Merv had a very big Spanish mackerel, it was a challenge as it had got around a huge heap of weed and really running, I put the boat in reverse and chased while Merv tried to keep him on the line then when it got to the boat I had to take the rod while Merv got on the marlin board to try to get the weed off the line while trying not to loose the fish, finally got rid of the weed which allowed Merv to gaff the fish.

There was one boat after another coming in, when we were cleaning the fish at the table a local guy who should have known better, came in too late tried to winch his sizable boat onto the trailer and broke the winch strap. It ended up about six guys including Merv down there and physical pushing the boat onto the trailer, their biggest problem was they had been drinking all day, you see a lot of funny things when people are coming and going, like today a woman thought she could jump out the front of her tinnie, the water was deeper than she thought so she went straight over then she grabbed the side of the boat but ended up going under the bow, it was funny to watch.

After we cleaned the fish we went around the camp and shared some out. If we catch another Spanish mackerel it will be released there is a lot of fish on one of those.