Originally Posted by
Moonlighter
As usual the PBA 1770 trip was a great week. This year we had about 22 boats along.
Great company and an enjoyable stay - great gang of people.
As Jeff said the weather was less than ideal, and we found that fish numbers were well down on what we caught last year. It was hard work.
We were lucky and got the best red of the trip, this time my skipper Rod was the one, with a 14.5kg model giving him a decent workout.
We were unlucky in that we could have had 2 that size- Rod had his fish 2/3 to the boat and I had put my Terez in the rod holder while I readied the landing net. 30 seconds later my rod arcs over and a big fish takes 30m of line against the 20kg of drag on the big Saragossa reel. Wrestled the rod out but quickly realised the fish had taken the line across Rod's line, so opened the bail arm and fee-spooled so we could give priority to getting the first fish on board.
Netted his fish, untangled my line where it had gone across, and then resumed the fight with my fish, which went every bit as hard as the first one. Had it 3/4 way to the boat and it took a lunge and the leader parted- was roughed up so I suspect the fish had found some reef when I freespooled it. Bugger!
On Thursday we headed out early on a forecast 10-15kn SW-SE forecast that was supposed to drop out and turn NE after lunch. Well, that 10-15 was really 20-25 so we had a long bouncy trip out to Fitzroy with strong wind and swells on our starboard aft quarter. There were some BIG trenches between them too, but once we had the big Striper trimmed right we were making reasonable speed.
But conditions outside Fitzroy were very uncomfortable with waves breaking into the transom and with the fish not cooperating we went and hid on the leeward side of Boult reef and fished the shallows for some redthroats and budgies. Not much action though. Thankfully the wind started to drop off so we headed west of Boult to the paddock area and got a few fish, Maori cod and I picked up one just legal Red and then a nice 9kg model, which helped make the esky half-respectable in quality, if not quantity.
Rod had some fun on a chunky Red Bass which when we first saw it coming up looked like an XOS size trout. Rats again!