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Thread: North West Island again

  1. #1

    North West Island again

    Hello all,
    I haven't logged in here for a while. It looks like the old offshore forum isn't getting many new threads - so I have one for all you long time members. I've copied an pasted it from another website report I did. Yes it's September just gone.

    Back in September I spent 15 days fishing on North West Island off Gladstone in the Great Barrier Reef. It’s an annual pilgrimage for a group of Sunshine Coast fishos that I join every now and again. There’s 25 blokes, 6 big boats and 2 tinnies. There’s also 3 pallets of beer, mess tents, 2 ovens, 3 gas freezers, 3 gas fridge freezers, a commercial deep fryer, two smokers and this year a television with a digital set top box to watch the footy finals. Everything is gas or 12 volt – there’s no generators allowed on the island.
    The island is only a tiny sand cay with walking tracks only. Everything is carried by hand off the chartered landing barge and then carried back on (except the beer) when its time to go home. It takes a full two days to set up and 1.5 days to pull down.
    I took my big boat and with the 5 others we drive across the day before the rest of the crew to set up the tents etc.
    The island is surrounded by fringing reef and the lagoon dries at low tide meaning access to the sea is restricted to 3 hours over the top of the tide or you go to see for at least 10 hours coming and going on the high. One day in perfect weather the tide wasn’t high enough for me to exit the lagoon so my crew and I were restricted to drinking deer on the beach listening on the radio to everyone catching good fish.
    All up I had 7 fishing trips in my boat ranging from one 24 hour sortie to one quick 2 hour mackerel dash. We did quite a few 12 hours either leaving or coming home in the dark which were highly successful. The biggest red emperor of the trip went 12.4kgs while we managed a Spanish at 15kgs a Gold Spot Snapper at 7.6kg and a GT that snapped a rod and went nearly 40kgs before being successfully released. All the bread and butter species are caught like Red Throat, Spangled Emperor, Coral Trout, Cods, Wrasse, Husser, Nannagai. My favourite form of fishing is big 7 inch soft plastics which means no bait mess and much better quality of fish. One morning my mate (Brooksy) and I had 12 good fish in the boat on plastics before the two bait fishos onboard had landed anything.
    The award for the trip went to one poor unfortunate soul who go so drunk on the way over on the barge that he snapped his ankle and didn’t even set foot on the island – forced to return on the barge before a helicopter picked him up in Gladstone and flew him to Rockhampton where had surgery to implant 2 plates and 9 screws. He still received his share of the fish when we got home.
    Brett
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  2. #2

    Re: North West Island again

    Few more pics
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  3. #3

    Re: North West Island again

    Sounds like a great trip bugman, hows old mates form snapping his ankle. I hope the poor bugger is on the mend.

  4. #4

    Re: North West Island again

    Hi Buggy like yourself I too havnt logged on for a long time so its good to see some old faces !!! Some cracker fish there mate and the island and its areas look amazing mate top post !!!

    Cheers ray.

  5. #5

    Re: North West Island again


  6. #6
    Ausfish Bronze Member OcciferNick's Avatar
    Join Date
    Jan 2008
    Location
    Caloundra (Aura)

    Re: North West Island again

    Wow, I want to do that trip lol
    “Filthy Oar”
    Stessl 5.3m centre console
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  7. #7

    Re: North West Island again

    The beer tent shot! Love it

  8. #8

    Re: North West Island again

    Thanks for the report. Nice looking haul!

    Two questions.... what’s the cat make/model?

    and why no generators allowed?
    Democracy: Simply a system that allows the 51% to steal from the other 49%.

  9. #9

    Re: North West Island again

    Love that place, haven't been there since the mid 90s. Thats when they banned gennys as it apparently upset the mutton birds. Dive gennys were allowed in one spot back then, don't know about now though.

    Bugman, are there still mice on the island, brought there by the business that used to bring backpackers for a week. They would be 6 weeks on the island then have to take their gear back to Rocky and it would sit in a warehouse for a week, the mice got into their gear and voila, mice where there weren't any before.

  10. #10

    Re: North West Island again

    That's a great looking trip and enjoyable read. Love the beer tent that's gold!!!

    More reports like this and I'll start checking this site more than once every couple of months.
    Cheers

  11. #11

    Re: North West Island again

    Sounds like a great trip


    Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

  12. #12

    Re: North West Island again

    Might be a bit late Bugman as have only read your report today ...Can i ask what type of plastics where you using as im heading to reefs of lucinda later in the year and keen to plastics a go . B T W great report on your trip .Paul .

  13. #13

    Re: North West Island again

    Good stuff Brett ...... I love the sound of this place & came close just 2 yearrs ago when I had to pull the pin after loosing my job and securing a new one .
    It looks like you guys have it sussed though & that makes the difference ... power , cooking , fridges etc etc - a massive cost for all but a big organised group.

    the fishing looks pretty good too ... well done

    chris
    Give a man a fish & he will eat for a day !
    Teach him how to fish
    & he will sit in a boat - & drink beer all day!
    TEAM MOJIKO

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