A Fishing Trip to the Spencer Gulf

Blue Swimmer Crabs and Garfish

Wednesday afternoon I packed the Landrover, hooked up the trailer with my Windrider 10 sailing kayak and by 8.30 PM I was on the road. The Spencer Gulf is the nearest salt water to Broken Hill and by 1 AM I had arrived at Port Davis boat ramp and jetty on the Broughton River, just south of Port Pirie. The tide had just peaked at 2.5 metres and I had the place to myself. Before long I was launched and had my line in the water.

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Drifting downstream on the run out tide I was bouncing lightly weighted Perch cut strip baits along the sandy bottom and before too long I got my first hookup. Landing a cranky Blue Swimmer Crab on a kayak into the space between my legs was interesting but after three or four more crabs I had the sytem worked out. I was netting them with my landing net and parking my tackle box on top of them for a couple of minutes till they settled down. Disentangling them once they stopped flipping and running all over the limited space was pretty easy then. The crabs went into a large dry bag filled with salt water and lashed to the mast support cross member in front of me.

Dawn saw the crabs increasing and before long I had a dozen aboard with a similar quantity of undersized and female blue swimmers disentangled from the net and released. I nearly jumped out of my skin when there was a loud "chuffing" noise behind me and I swung around to identify the source: A dolphin! He was sounding all around me for the next twenty minutes but sadly I was too slow on the shutter to catch a good shot of him. When the sun got properly up a nice breeze sprang up and I hoisted the sail and headed for the mouth of the river and into the gulf waters. I was trolling an eight inch stumpjumpa deep diving lure on my 12KG rod with the Penn reel loaded with 15KG braid. Not far past the channel markers and into the deeper gulf waters the lure got smashed and the reel was literally smoking with 250 metres of braid, along with the fish and lure disappearing into the blue depths at an alarming speed. I got spooled so fast it made my head hurt... Kingie or maybe a Tuna? Shark? Tying on a new big gulp minnow saw three more hours of fruitless trolling up and down the coast. Whatever it was it was a loner.



The wind got stronger and stronger and bait fishing the bottom was only netting me the odd Shittie (trumpeter). I reefed about half the sail around the mast and headed back across the nasty windswell and waves made by the outgoing tide at the river entrance. By this time it was mid afternoon and I was exhausted. The sail had torn along the luff seam in the raging winds at the river entrance and I was grumpy about that too. Wet, sunburned and tired I hit the ramp and packed the Windrider up on it's trailer and put the fish and crabs on ice. I drove a short distance up into the range and parked up under the first decent stand of shade trees and crashed out in the ute bunk bed for a well earned rest.

The next morning I headed up to Port Germain and took a walk out onto the 1.6KM jetty. Nobody was getting much at all there and the only exitement was the resident kingfish busting off my lures and livebait on the barnacle encrusted pier supports. An afternoon trip down to Port Broughton saw the wind at near gale force making the area unfishable. I camped up in the ranges again that night and had a nice feed of Crabs and brown rice fried with onions and soy sauce.

The next morning found me back on the water at Port Davies having a ball surface fishing for a great haul of Garfish while drifting downstream near the mouth of the river. I paddled back up to my newly purchased crab net every half hour or so and was getting a whole bunch of great Blue Swimmers collected. Nothing touched my trolled lures except the occasional bit of weed. That evening I went and fished the structure in Port Pirie Harbour and got bashed up and busted off by the resident kingies a few times. I really would have liked to land just one of these brawlers but I was not prepared to switch to 50KG mono and handlines which one old salt jetty fisho said was the best method to skull drag them out from the pier timbers. Seemed a bit unsporting to me...

Saturday it got pretty hot and it was a busy day with stink boaters everywhere I went. These Galahs of the water were roaring around and making a nuisance of themselves in general so I settled for some dozing and bank fishing in the shade of the mangroves on one of the Broughton river feeder creeks, with a few tommies caught and released. When the sun got down a bit I went and dropped my crab net off the pier up until sunset with 13 undersized crabs released and no keepers. At this stage I had 24 Garfish cleaned on Ice and 28 Blue Swimmers alongside them in the esky so I decided to hit the road and get home before they deteriorated. A few hours later I arrived back in a rainy Broken Hill. The Neighbors got a package of Gars and cooked crabs each and I slept for 13 hours straight.

Fire!

The Neighbours Shed and House Caught Fire:

On Monday Afternoon the 16th of January 2012 the shed and house of the Neighbours property diagonally behind our place caught fire. It was frightening how quickly the fire completely engulfed the structure and it looked like the fire could spread to the rear neighbours house at this stage. This photo and the others of the fire were taken within 5 minutes of first seeing the smoke. I called the Fire Brigade while James ran up to the house to grab my camera for me. 

The lesson we all learnt is just how quickly a fire can destroy an old building here after many years being dried out by the unrelenting dry heat of our outback summer. Watching this happen, we realise if our place caught fire there is absolutely no time to grab possessions we will need to just get down low and go, go, go!

The sirens could be heard within two minutes of the call which is a testament to how quickly our fire brigade respond here in Broken Hill. The first engine arrived and drove down onto the empty block beside our place and the firemen scrambled into action.

Not long after the first engine arrived another two trucks pulled up, closely followed by the police and an ambulance. Before it was all over we had 7 emergency services vehicles in attendance and even the camera man from the local TV station showed up. It took the Fire Brigade about ten minutes to put the fire out and the police were asking people what they had seen in order to work out whether or not the fire may have been deliberately lit.

An hour later after everything was packed up the Fire Brigade left, responding to another call even as they were pulling away. These guys do a great job and the level of professionalism and skill they displayed was admirable to say the least.

Kayak Sailing Trimaran in the Outback

A Stable Sail Powered Fishing Platform

I've been in the market for a 2nd hand kayak to take fishing for some time. Reading a lot of the forum posts in kayak fishing websites and following the kayak fishing exploits of my younger brother who has been kayaking for many years got me interested again. When I was a young bloke I owned a minnow type sit inside kayak which was fun to paddle around in rivers and mangrove creeks on the central coast of NSW exploring and fishing these secluded, relatively unspoilt waters chasing flathead, whiting and bream.

I started out in plywood canoes at around the age of 12 on scout camping trips. I got a good grounding in canoe safety and paddling techniques while I was in the scouts. Although my favourite type of fishing was rockhopping, fishing and paddling always appealed to me, I bought my first roto-moulded kayak when I was a young apprentice with some disposable income.

A lot has changed in kayak fishing since then and now the SOT (sit on top) type kayak is king. Doing my research online and and watching the great video's about kayak fishing particularly those posted by Josh at Yakass.net had me convinced I'd really like to get my hands on a sailing kayak. My budget was only $1,500 so I wasn't having much joy...

I finally got lucky, I won an Ebay auction for a Windrider 10 sailing trimaran kayak. The pickup was in Albury and $1550 secured the Windrider 10, A quality paddle, a custom road trailer and a spare sail. So after a cool roadtrip and a couple of days back at home in Broken Hill waiting for the right wind and weather conditions we finally got the chance to take the kayak up to Lake Pamamaroo in the Menindee Lakes for a test sail.

I'm fairly happy with the sailability of the Windrider 10. I am super impressed with the stability once the outriggers are fitted and I was very happy with how it paddles sans sail. The sail will require some minor repairs but the guy I bought the kayak from chucked in a spare sail so I have only to do the cutting and sewing to sort things out. Now I have a great deal of work ahead of me pimping my new ride to set it up for fishing. But the guys at Yakass and another good kayak fishing site Australian Kayak Fishing Forum have already covered a lot of that ground so I'll be following the advice and ideas posted on these great forums mostly.

Of particular interest is the post my brother made about doing up his own fishing kayak: Pimping a kingfisher kayak.

Here is the Windrider 10 also known as the Windrider Tango all packed up on it's custom trailer. The mast and sail are up on the roof of my Landrover Defender 130. The trailer is very sturdy and it survived a serious torture test coming back from Albury where I went to buy it. Between Ivanhoe and Menindee there is 200km of road comprising bulldust, sand, gravel and black river clay. This road is heavily corrugated and rutted and makes for a great load and trailer test track for anyone serious about outback travel off the bitumen. As I always remind my readers, always carry ample water, fuel, spares, tools and food when driving the remote outback tracks.

Here is the young bloke learning a bit about paddling and getting comfortable with the seating position and the rudder foot pedal steering mechanism. Not long after I took this photo I explained to him that he would have to practice capsizing and recovery drills next, his big smile turned into a big frown fairly quick...

Having passed his recovery drill and rescued the kayak, righting it and reboarding properly I went and got the Amas or outrigger pontoons and fitted them to the kayak. The outriggers turn this small vessel into a super stable platform and standing up on board to fish is perfectly possible without worrying about flipping over. Being so low to the surface of the water means a double dose of UV rays from the surface reflection so some serious sun protection will be in order for all day fishing. We both got a bit sunburned this day even though it was hazy and overcast much of the time.

Later in the afternoon the wind picked up a fair bit and I put on a PFD and took the Windrider 10 out and pushed it pretty hard in winds around 20kmh with gusts up around 35kmh. I could not tip it over even when I got silly deliberatly running hard sheeted perpendicular to the wind and the rigging, rudder and outriggers stood up to this initial stress testing without any drama at all. I managed to lift the windward Ama completely clear of the water and very nearly buried the lee Ama a few times. The craft never felt like pitch poling which is something I've managed to do with Hobie 14 and 16 catamarans on several occasions. The asymetrical shape and the forward positioning of the Amas seems to make this sailing kayak close to perfect in terms of stability under sail. I'm toying with the idea of modifying the sail to roller furl on the fly, adding a furling genoa and installing trapeze platforms to either side, that would put the stabiltiy of this design to the test.

The 2010 price for a new Windrider Tango was $3,000 dollars US. So I'm guessing around that mark plus freight will get you one if you were keen, but go take a look at the Windrider website for information on the Tangoes bigger brothers, the 16, the two person 17 and the incredible hydrofoil trimaran the Rave. I'll buy a 17 before I buy a Hobie Catamaran for sure if I ever win Lotto... http://www.windrider.com/windridertango.aspx

Yes, we did do a bit of fishing while we were there. I never go near water without trying for a fish. The Carp got a hiding this day. The young bloke got 10 and the biggest and I managed 8. We only saw four vehicles on the road to the weir and a dozen people the whole day which is considered crowded by Menindee Lakes standards. The fishing inspector showed up later in the day which was a real surprise, I've never seen an inland fishing inspector on any NSW freshwater before but as always I had my licence with me and we were following the rules so there were no dramas. The Fisho was more interested in the Windrider than the opera house bait nets we had and he didn't even look in our big camp esky to see if we had undersized fish or more than our bag limit of Golden Perch or Murray Cod. I'd told him we had caught nothing but Carp that day and he just took me for my word which was pretty decent of him.

A Road Trip From The Outback To The Riverina

From Broken Hill to Albury and Back.

I recently won an auction on Ebay for a Windrider 10 kayak based trimaran sailing vessel. The pickup was in Albury which is a city on the Murray River on the western side of the Snowy Mountains in south eastern NSW.

On Thursday night just after midnight we hit the road. It was one of those perfect moonlit, still nights and the roo's were out in force, we saw 200 roo's in the first 300km and had to brake hard to avoid collision at least 40 times. The roo's were really thick between Broken Hill and Menindee in particular. Our plan was to hit the dirt between Menindee and Ivanhoe for 200km and then run down the Cobb Highway to Hay, then to Deniliquin, turning more Easterly to Albury. All up a journey of 850km. The driving conditions were pretty much perfect with very little traffic on the roads, we covered over 300km from Menindee to half way between Ivanhoe and Hay without seeing a single vehicle.

Driving into the sunrise approaching Hay was a bit tricky but once the sun got up off the horizon it was smooth sailing. We stopped for fuel and a late breakfast in Deniliquin which is a nice town and signals the end of the monotony of the Hay Plain which is a vast flat treeless and featureless expanse of essentially nothing. A tip for travelling this vast open country is to be prepared, carry spares, tools, plenty of water, food, extra fuel, recovery equipment, two spare wheels and ideally have a UHF radio installed in the vehicle. You could spend a lot of time stranded a long way from town in the event of a breakdown or a flooded track.

Not too far past Deniliquin, known to the locals as just "Deni" we came to Finley. What a beaut little town! Finley has it's own lake on the northern edge of town and it is just lovely. We stopped in at the Finley Lakeside Caravan Park where the staff were really friendly and helpful, the lady there told us the Rodeo was on that evening too, so our mind was easily made up. After arranging to return and securing a camp spot for a very reasonable $18 off we went to Albury to pickup the Windrider 10.

Albury has certainly grown since I was last there in the late 80's. The traffic was fairly heavy and lots of people everywhere, particularly in the CBD. We popped into the Albury Ray's Outdoors store and grabbed some ratchet straps and extra fishing tackle. Arriving at Hume Lake which is 15km past Albury we met up with the Ebay seller Jack and purchased our neat little kayak trimaran. James had a swim in the lake while I strapped the trimaran to it's custom built trailer and then we hit the road again making a bee line back to Finley and the Rodeo.

The Finley Rodeo was a great show but after being on the road for over 1000km's and 17 hours including sightseeing and shopping we only stayed for the first half of the program. The MC was great, he kept up an informative and often humorous banter throughout the show and the bull riding was, as always, our favourite part of the turnout. There was quite a crowd there and people had obviously come from all over the district. Finley only has a population of around 2,000 people. We tried a bit of night fishing on the Finley Lake but the mozzies were a good enough reason to jump inside our mesh tent and just have a good yarn till we crashed out.

After our night camping at the Lakeside Caravan Park in Finley and a quick test sail on the lovely little lake in sadly unreliable wind we soon realised that it was getting to be a really hot day. So we packed everything up and hit the road with the idea of getting to the Menindee lakes where there would be more reliable steady breeze and the advantage of being very close to home. The driving that day was hard going with the temperature up around 40 degrees all day and also high relative humidity. James was a bit crook from heat stress and did it tough for the first couple of hundred KM's. I started stopping at every river and creek we crossed so we could cool off. The nicest spot was at a place called Booroorban. James felt much better after a half hour rest and a swim in the creek there.

The Landrover ran like a Swiss watch and effortlessly towed the small craft on it's custom trailer. I checked the load every 100km's or so and there were no nasty surprises. We got a few light showers on the dirt road between Ivanhoe and Menindee and I was glad we got across this 200km section without a big storm, when the grey clay section of this road gets properly wet it becomes impassable and the only real solution is to camp and wait for the road to dry out. Many Outback desert tracks and dirt roads are similar which is another good reason for being prepared when travelling in the remote outback. We got into Menindee around dusk and it was obvious there had been a lot of rain there. The Darling River at Menindee was even higher than it was during our recent camping and fishing trip before Christmas. We decided not to camp on the lakes with the threat of further storms and took a run for home instead. We got home around 10pm Saturday night and the day had been hot in Broken Hill too but the showers had followed us in and things were cooling off nicely. Over the whole trip I was averaging about 12.5 litres/100km fully loaded and towing which is fairly good fuel economy for the TD5 turbo diesel.

We're heading up to the Menindee Lakes tomorrow (Tuesday) for a bit of sailing, paddling and fishing for the day so I'll do a write up about the Windrider 10 once we have tested it out a bit.