No Shoes, No Shirt, No Problems (16.5.2008)
A Southern Man’s expectations, versus the reality, of fishing in Darwin – it must be a Territory Thing…
I was born in Sydney 41 years ago and was brought up on fishing. Every holiday we had, we would load up the car and head to the Central Coast with the big, heavy, wooden-poled, green Texas tent. We spent nearly every school holiday possible, camping at a little fishing village called Patonga, at Broken Bay, mouth of the Hawkesbury River!
Upon arrival, the shoes would be left in the car and there they’d stay for six weeks, and the shirt was only worn on formal occasions, like Bingo night at the Progress Hall.
We had feet like leather and a tan like a saddle-bag, innumerable cuts and stabs and assorted flesh wounds from oysters, rusty knives and Flathead spikes. A dash of Zinc on the lips and nose was all the sun-protection we’d heard of and the salt water seemed to keep the wounds clean.
Sitting in the 11 foot fibreglass boat for six hours, baking the dried salt patterns onto our brown shoulders and stiffening our briny-thickened hair was an experience we took for granted. As was dragging in good sized flathead at will, and tailor and garfish, and niggers and bream and mullet and blue-swimmer crabs, or what ever other species took our fancy at the time. We were good at it, and it was heaven.
Then the holidays would end and we’d have to go back to Liverpool and back to school – this is the time you really appreciate the freedom of long days, sprawled under the sun, with a line in your hand.
My brother Al and I were fishing mad, we’d read all the old books and magazines articles by legends like Vic McCrystal and his mates, and we’d tend to our tackle and gear in the off-season. We were 40kms from the coast and the closest water to our place was the Georges River – at a weir that separated the salt from the fresh. Both were filthy and contaminated from the countless factories that lined the banks. Only the toughest of all fish could survive in that cesspool – and we wanted to get ‘em!
Nothing seemed to bite on any bait we tried (I guess even the fish were weary of eating locally), so we resorted to jagging. We’d string along five or six huge suicide hooks and tie a ball sinker to the end, then cast out and rip it back! Wind up the slack and rip again. We became absolute experts, though it was very tough on gear and body.
We raked out whopping bull-nose mullet hand over fist and every now and then, you’d latch on to a thumping big Carp. We never did manage to land one but from my recollection and observation, I would have sworn some would weigh thirty pounds! While that sounds unlikely, I can still picture watching these huge fish, basking in the soupy-water – maybe it was the chemicals that made them so big?
We were tempted to shoot one from the bank, with a spear-gun one time, just for proof, but Dad talked us out of it.
We wasted nothing – had a Malaysian lady across the road, who used to eat all the mullet we could give her!
When we couldn’t get to ‘The Georges’, we’d go down the bottom of the street to Green Valley Creek – which had bush on one side, a park and houses on the other. It had a constant flow but was full of rubbish until a storm hit. At certain times of the year, you could drag eels out of some of the ‘spots’ – we caught a dozen one day, slimy little suckers they were too.
They went down a treat across the road though – something different to mullet I suppose.
In the desperate times, when there weren’t even eels to catch, we’d resort to guppies. We’d find a stick about 4 feet long, tie on some light line and a hook, and bait up a piece of worm. The trick was to pinch the tail of the worm with your finger-nails, so as to make a dangling piece, small enough for the guppies to fit in their mouths. Then you’d drag ‘em up into a bucket, under their own greedy suction.
My grandfather had a pond in his backyard and had generations of these things breeding in there for 25 years – it would have been an interesting experiment to see if they had adapted in any way from the old creek!
On one occasion, we even forged a crude hook out of copper wire, tied it to some string and hooked the Grandfather’s prized gold fish. We struck trouble when we couldn’t get him out through the top of the tank, so we just dropped him, still attached, back into the water.
We struck even more trouble when Pop found him distressed and told Mum what we’d done – then we too, became rather distressed!
So as I said, we were mad, keen fishermen and would wet a line at any opportunity, with the majority of my experience being in estuaries, rivers, beaches, rocks and a little off-shore stuff. Though, just before I moved up north, I took to inland fishing – discovered the beauty of bush camping and fishing in unlikely places. There’s no bigger thrill than dragging out a big rainbow trout from a little narrow, shallow river in the bush – the ocean, you expect big fish, but bush rivers, it’s just a different kind of thrill. Same stands for jigging Redfin in local dams, that used to be cow paddocks – it was great.
So it was with great enthusiasm eight years ago, that I loaded up my Landcruiser and headed for the Big Top End!
Darwin, the Mecca of all fishing spots – and I was moving there! I was wondering just how big a chest freezer I would need to hold all my barra fillets, then I realised that I wouldn’t need a huge freezer at all – I’d just go out and catch some more fresh ones! How easy was this gonna be? How much fun was I gonna be having? I made a mental list of people I would send posing-photos to and just how I’d guide the rellos round, when they came in search of the metery barra I’d been bragging about.
In fact, the first message I left on my answering machine, was “This is Steve – I’m probably out dragging in another massive Barra. Leave your name and I might get back to ya!”
It turned out that things were not quite so easy as I had expected. I moved into a two bedroom unit at Fannie Bay and began to socialise with some of the boys from work.
Tex asked if I’d be interested in joining his boat crew and doing a fishing trip in the harbour? “You bet your life buddy, I’m in!” That was Thursday, he was gonna pick me up 5:30 Saturday morning, down on the corner. I was there on time, with a load of fishing gear and a belly full of excitement. Tex was not. After half an hour, I rang him – woke him up – he’d “got on the booze the night before and forgot about the fishin’, but would be there in twenty!”
Tex wheeled around the big swooper at Fannie Bay, with the hefty Green-Machine 5 metre fibre-glass monster on the back. I jumped in and we grabbed Andy – Tex had to stop at the Shell garage to pick up a copy of Northern Australia Fish Finder, some bait and a sausage roll.
It struck me as unusual that a local lad would require such a guide, and didn’t seem to already have any specific plan of attack. We launched at Dinah Beach and I was being careful to cover my lures, for fear the barra would leap into the boat before I was quite prepared.
We had a massive storm and everyone got soaked as we headed out into the harbour. I asked if that was the open ocean over there – it turned out to be Mandorah – you just couldn’t see the land through the rain!
Tex asked where we’d like to go, as he began to consult the trusty guidebook. I had no idea and Andy wasn’t much better, so we headed toward Channel Island. Andy and Tex stood up at the windscreen, so I sat back toward the rear, somewhat puzzled at the apparent lack of preparation and direction on show thus far.
I looked up and noticed Andy, who is a tallish, slender young chap, with an easy going nature and a keen wit, was this day wearing cotton boardshorts. They had a tear in them about halfway down, stretching from mid-thigh to the bum-crack seem! I said “Hey Andy – you know your arse is hanging out of your pants there?” He replied “Oh yeah – I’m free-bagging it today”, and just turned back around. I looked around and conceded that it must just be a Territory-thing.
They commenced throwing lures at what, at the time, seemed to me the most unlikely of spots – tiny little run-off drains etc. I quickly realised that I was under-gunned, with my little 8lb mono bream rod and inch long craw-daddy lure, compared to their 30lb braid, 45lb leader and 6 inch bomber lures.
Luckily, my gear was never tested that day – but nor were the bombers! We had been out for about four and a half hours when Tex began to complain about getting sunburnt.
It turns out that in his hangover-inspired, foggy minded rush to pick me up, he forgot to pull on a shirt. Now I had a long sleeve shirt, hanging loosely undone over the top of a singlet, so being the generous bloke that I am, I offered it to Tex – we probably wouldn’t be out there much longer anyway.
We stumbled upon a croc trap, sitting up a small creek, with a dead chicken calling to the reptilians like an ancient siren. This was the first hard evidence that really reinforced to me the dangers of crocs up here.
After another hour, we conceded defeat and decided to head back. Though I was becoming a little disillusioned with my skipper’s local knowledge re the Hot-Spots, I was glad to be going home, as I too was now succumbing to the sunburn.
Though we had fresh drinking water on board, we’d brought nothing to eat, so after six hours of throwing lures, I had worked me up a powerful hunger. I was looking forward to a big lunch – I realised by now however, that it was not to be that golden-fried barra I’d expected in the morning. I figured that sometimes, what we expect is not necessarily what we always get.
And so it was with Tex and his limited comprehension of Top End tidal movements. We rounded the bend and approached the ramp, only to find the tide had receded and left us stuck high and dry, and about three hours short of being able to drag the boat out! At this stage I really began rethinking my generous offer to El Capitan, of the long sleave shirt – as I slowly began to blister in the sun.
However, even at that early stage of my Top End life, I’d already learned to roll with the punches, so once again I calmly conceded – yep, it must just be a Territory-thing….
I took a trip down to the Eleven Mile tackle shop, strangely, in search of a pencil float. I returned with $370 worth of Top End barra gear!
I had the Ugly Stick rod, the Abu baitcaster real (which I’d never used before), braid, leader, hooks and swivels, replacement triple-strength trebles and a fist full of assorted lures……oh, and one pencil float.
Pip was the salesman and a fine job he did too – obviously saw me coming a mile off! Though granted, he did take time to teach me a few local knots.
Next trip I took was with my mate Mickey, out of Buffalo Creek – we got a heap of crabs but all were about two millimetres too small. Mickey caught a nice salmon on the troll and then, as we made our way back to the ramp, I finally got my first Territory fish – a flathead! Of all things, a flathead – I’d caught a million before that, so it was hardly exotic or impressive. At least it confirmed that one of my costly, hard-bodied lures actually worked.
I tried all my gear out with several trips to Buffalo Creek – only ever caught a few catties. I found that each trip would cost me about two twelve buck lures – learning now that I needed to be in amongst the cover or not bother fishing at all.
I honed my baitcaster casting skills via the fine art of casting my hastily attached flouro-green popper at my disappearing, snapped off lure as it floated away with the tide. In the end, I retrieved, via the popper, as many lures as I lost to snags – though to this day I am yet to catch a live fish on that popper (thanks Pip!).
Mickey called up and asked if I was interested in heading out of Buffalo in his 14 foot tinny – “Too right Mate – book me in”. He told me to meet at his place at Cullen Bay and we’d leave from there, which I thought strange, as we’d drive past my place on the way. I’m not saying that I’m particularly suspicious or cynical by nature – but I decided to pull the pin, disconnect and leave my Hayman-Reece towbar at home that day.
I got to Mickey’s, we loaded the boat up and then he suggested it would probably be easier to use my car, since it was already out and all. I commended him on a worthy suggestion but explained how unfortunate we were that I had in fact left my towbar at home. He muttered a few swear words and said something about the high likelihood of having his car broken into at the ramp and goods stolen. I suggested she’d most likely be right – I’m starting to warm to this Territory Thing.
Well we launched the boat and sat a hundred metres away from the ramp for two and a half hours, till the water became deep enough to move. We had a few beers and laughs and fed some of our crab bait to the kites and Sea Eagle. I’m beginning to expect such delays by now – but still think a little more planning could be very helpful and may have some bearing on our success rate.
We were catching nothing much and the sun was going down – Mickey wanted to head out 6k’s off shore and go for Jewies. My survival instinct hinted that this may not be the best of ideas, given our recent form, so we headed back. The car was still in one piece.
A few weeks later, I got a late call from a very excited Mickey – our mate Col, had been out in the harbour and cleaned up on Jewies the night before. He wanted to know if I was interested in fishing the Mauna Loa?
Though I was severely hungover, I said “Giddyup buddy – what time do we leave?”
We made the wreck as the sun was setting and after three attempts at anchoring, with myself on rope duty, we found the mark. I sat down at the pointy end and began sucking in the big breaths – I was crook – the water rushes in my mouth were seconds away and I had cleared a spot to reach my head over the side. Mickey was still jumping out of his skin in anticipation and asking me to tell him jokes or sing him a song – I muttered ‘Maybe later’ and kept working on my recovery. Mickey commenced with “I’m just a gigolo, and everywhere I go…..”. Did I mention that Mickey is a Pakistani? Well he is, and a very funny one at that! His accent really added character to the old David Lee Roth classic. He’s a very entertaining man, young Mickey and is always a pleasure to fish with.
After a few hours, I caught a decent sized estuary cod (5lb) but wasn’t sure what it was – Mickey told me they were no good to eat and tossed it back (which is at odds with the advice I later discovered in the Fish Finder). We also got a few Snapper but no jewies that night.
The night of The Golden Slipper, I got a call up from Col – one of his crew had dropped out and he asked me to come and target the Jews on the Mauna Loa that night, with himself and his brother Mick – “Oh yeah – I’m there!”
I grabbed the heaviest rod I owned, loaded up with brand new Platypus 30lb pre-test mono – they laughed at me. I was way under-gunned again! Col threw me a 100lb handline and a Mr Barra squid – said just put the big circle-hook once through his pointy tube and away you go. The brothers advised me that these things pull pretty hard and if they get to the wreck, then they’re home. You have to stop them dead in their tracks, right from the get go!
They also said it was a rule that everyone had to catch their first jewie on a handline, with no gloves allowed. All this sounded pretty fair and I believed them – I put it down to just another Territory Thing. That was until I felt a bit of a tug on the old handline – I said “Ohh – here’s a go!’ I thought it might have been a jewie taking a bite – but quickly realised that in fact I had hooked myself a Collins Class submarine that was charging forth at full throttle, straight for the wreck!
This thing ripped line through my hands and cut the bejesus out of them – I had no chance in the world of pulling him up before the wreck. Col and Mick laughed their heads off – ‘Told ya the jewies pull pretty hard’.
Mick hooked one and gripped the line like an anchor-man in a tug-o-war – which was fine for him, he was a road worker with tough, man’s hands. I, on the other hand, had pussy little, soft, computer operator fingers!
I ended up catching three that night, between 12 and 16kg, and we got 6 all up (though Col used a rod for his). My fingers on both hands were torn to shreds and for the first time ever, I threw my line out, truly hoping I didn’t get another bite! It was the best night’s fishing I’d ever had and for a long time, I had the scars to prove it!
I thought I’d try the much fabled Shady Camp next – Mickey was going that way and taking his girlfriend, so I decided to hire a boat and join them. I read up in the Fish Finder book and there were many warnings about the dangers of crocs in the Mary River system – I believe one quote said “Wading in these waters is suicidal”.
My hired tinny was tiny and only had a15Hp Johnson – the Shady hire bloke had just put the boat in the water, because the ramp was flooded and there was a boiling torrent of brown water and logs, barrelling over the barrage. I put my gear in and took off downstream.
About 200 metres down I noticed the boat was filling up with water – he’d left the bungs out!
I swung it round and headed against the torrent. With my weight and that of the water, the stern was getting heavier and lower and I was looking at all my gear about to be washed away, as well as the ringing in my ears “wading in these waters is suicidal!” I would have ended up 700 metres down stream, had the boat actually gone down, but in a stressed and cranky state, I finally made it back to the ramp.
I hopped straight out and began walking round the boat – next second I was up to my chest in the water, with some bloke advising me to “Watch out mate – there’s a big hole there”. Wading in these waters is suicidal….. So with wet clothes, wallet etc I approached Hire-Guy “How ya goin’ mate – you wouldn’t happen to have any FKN BUNGS FOR THAT BOAT THERE WOULD YA?”
“Ahh yeah – I’ve got a couple in my top pocket here – I wondered what they were doing there. Here, we’ll knock twenty bucks off your hire fee”
No apologies given, nor care shown – I took the bungs, shook my head and walked back to the boat, thinking – that definitely must be a Territory Thing!
I didn’t catch any fish but saw a few crocs, got rained upon and searched by the Fisheries Inspector. On the drive home, I actually watched three 80cm plus barra feeding in a causeway that ran across the road – I considered throwing a soft plastic at them. Then I figured there would probably be some obscure law about catching barramundi on a public thoroughfare, so I hopped back in my car and shot through.
I had to dodge a snake on the road, a dingo and a buffalo – now that is surely a Territory Thing.
They ran a raffle at work, for the Darwin Darts Club – an overnight trip on a charter boat. I bought my tickets but lost. In the end, some poor bloke couldn’t make it, so I was offered his ticket “You ripper mate – love to!”
I had visions of an esky full of Coral trout and red emperor.
We went out on the Andros, caught a few sharks, one bloke got a nice cod and that was it for the arvo. A few of the girls got sick, so we moved to Bynoe Harbour – I slept in one of the little ‘iron-lung’ bunks while we travelled. Then stayed up all night and caught nada.
One bloke got a decent mackerel on the way home next day but the skipper Bunjee declared it the ‘second worst trip they had ever had’. I guess a bloke can’t win all the time! It was a great time, good boat and excellent service though – I’d recommend them to anyone – we were just unlucky. However, a word of warning to the unwary – if you’re not used to the rocking motion of a boat and you stay over night and drink lots of beer, be prepared to endure that same rocking once you return home. I almost fell off my toilet when I got back!
At different times I hired boats and took out my visitors around the harbour – never really scored big, but certainly enough to encourage another trip, through crabs or fish or just a good time. The first barra I actually caught measured out to 54cm (the limit being 55cm) – he was a beautiful looking silvery thing too – I chucked him back. A few people later suggested that they grow at least another centimetre if you cut the throat and stretch the spine. Though it was hard to let him go, I still feel morally content with the decision I made.
I had a great thrill one time, played a monster for 20 minutes – only to discover a six foot shovel nose shark emerge from the murky depths! Bummer.
I took some southern non-fishing mates out one day – they were uncharacteristically enthusiastic and strangely under the impression that fishing was easy up here. I quickly realised the light mono-line I had on one of their rigs was rotten – I was confident they’d catch nothing, so I tied the Rapala clear lure on anyway (which incidentally looks exactly like a small whiting!) and said nothing.
While I was rigging up the second bloke, the first one casts back over his shoulder then yells out “I got one!”
I looked up and he was hooked up on a Spanish Mackerel! I couldn’t believe it. Now I was starting to feel pretty edgy, waiting for the line to snap like cotton, as it did in my hand when I first tied the lure on. No one else in the vessel was wise to our predicament.
To my astonishment, he landed the fish and though it was small, it was definitely a Spaniard. I double checked the ID in the Fish Finder mag – didn’t believe you’d catch them in Catalina Creek.
Eventually, I teamed up with Chad, master of the Barra Beast and he took me on a few trips to the Adelaide River, where I finally had a bit of luck with the Barramundi.
One trip saw Chad, Matt Flynn and myself casting a variety of lures at a small floating weedy cover, adjacent to a creek outlet – we were hooking up on rats nigh on every cast! It was good fun to test a few different lures, both hard and soft and in every colour and size.
A bit of trolling and casting at different well known spots saw a few decent fish come aboard – 60 – 85cm. So on occasion I have actually taken a few wild barra home to eat – though after cleaning and filleting them in my kitchen, the place strongly resembled a slaughterhouse.
Note – home butchering and fish-monger business are art-forms best avoided if your domicile is shared with a woman!
These days I have developed the instinct to recognise where the barra may be hiding, whether it be colour changes, runoffs, barrages or timber cover – though it certainly didn’t come naturally, or easily.
Blokes like ET, Rex Hunt and a host of other ‘fishing gurus’ have a lot to answer for – perpetuating the myth that you need only turn up and throw a lure if you want to wrestle with forty pounds of leaping, thrashing barramundi.
No doubt, the professional guides can put you in a prime spot in minimum time, but for the true fisherman, who respects his quarry and takes pleasure in the constant the battle of wits with his adversary, it’s a challenging path to tread and a very rewarding trip.
