Family....Sometimes it helps!

Tropical North Queensland has been through a bit of a tough time of late. Not that we can complain too much, but the month of April saw a few negatives. With cyclone Ita hitting the coast near Cooktown, then skirting the coast all the way south with fairly moderate winds but dumping huge amounts of rainfall on the way. Then we had weeks of persistent rainfall, especially in the Daintree / Cape Tribulation area, that saw over a metre (yes...that's correct!) over a metre of rainfall for the month alone. Easter was a washout, so too was Anzac weekend, but lets not forget, these much appreciated long weekends are there for a purpose - to remind us of the sacrifices made by others in the past so that we can lead these wonderful lives - and have time off to go camping / fishing / BBQ's / drink a few beers etc. etc.

But hey, I haven't been able to go fishing for over 3 weeks....I needed a fix!

But what does this have to do with the Family thing you ask!

Apart from not being able to fish because of too much rain and flooded rivers, every spare moment of late had been taken up with painting our home. Why, because Debbie's sister and family were coming over from New Zealand to stay with us. We just had to make sure the house was freshly painted, cleaned from skirting board to ceiling, decks polished, lawns mowed and....beer in the fridge. And all this when they were staying for 1 & 1/2 days!!!! They came all this way to spend 1.5 days with their loving sister and me, buggers....and we never let them forget it either.

Debbie just loves organising things...like we were to pick Helen, Jim, Leon and Chantelle from Cains International Airport at approx. 1:00pm on Thursday.

• Take them to Skyrail at Smithfield
• Meet them in Kuranda (2 cars)...have lunch
• Do the boardwalk thing to the Barron Falls
• Drive 2 cars back down to the Yorkeys Knob Boat Club
• Have a couple of beers
• Drive into town an have dinner at Rattle and Hum
• Walk along the Esplanade - around the lagoon, the Pier, the Salthouse, the Marina, the Casino, the Night Markets
• Phew...and this was all in one afternoon

Yorkeys Knob Boat Club...a perfect watering hole!

 

But wait, next morning was going to be even better. After a good nights sleep in a strange bed, in the tropics, and after leaving Auckland in 5C....we were going to go fishing! Well, share the fishing somehow.

So after a hearty breakfast of home made porridge, chock full of nuts and berries and Greek yoghurt etc. we packed the boat, the eskies, the two cars and I headed north with Jim and Leon. The boys were heading off to fish the Daintree while the girls headed off to do "girlie things" ...like Rusty's Markets, and seeing the shops and SPENDING MONEY! All of this so that we could meet for lunch at the boat ramp at the Daintree township, swap passengers / anglers (Its my boat, so I had to fish all the time right?)

The boys arrived at the ferry crossing ramp and launched the boat. It was immediately apparent that the poor old Daintree had been through some ordeal this past few weeks. The banks were smashed up everywhere, trees broken and piled up facing downstream - all aligned by the flooding waters. Weed beds were gone, gutters destroyed, little feeder creeks were like open drains - the once beautiful overhanging rainforest totally gone! And as we travelled upstream I could see that once prized fishing zones were no more - where once slow moving waters swirled over fringing grass beds and mangrove root structures, deep churning water guzzled downstream - not the place for old bucket mouth to seek cover to wait for unsuspecting bait fish (or lures) to swim lazily past and have an easy meal!

Daintree River - flood damaged island

Typical bankside destruction

And in the broader sections, where once easily navigable sand bars held little danger, the huge volumes of silt had filled in channels and piled upon the river bed. I wondered how long before she would settled down and fishing returned to normal....read, start all over again and retrain your brain in order to "find" the fish!

My usual haunts just weren't working...it was all wrong. The river banks looked decidedly "sick", the weed beds all but disappeared and scoured away, and even back waters, where once huge overhanging trees provided shade and hiding places for fish, were devoid of all living thing...just a depressing stack of downstream pointing timber shards and mud. But Jim placed his lure in the right sport and he was on.

Jim's first ever barra!

He wasn't a big barra, just the usual river juvenile at 52cm, but he was sure very welcome. Jim handled his jumps and lunges with aplomb and soon had this magnificent silver streak swimming gently besides the boat - a quick de hook, a pic and a release. Jim was stoked...his first every barra for this visiting Kiwi...hell, I know people who have fished here for 20 years and are still barra virgins!

Time to head upstream to the Daintree township to meet the girls for lunch...right on time we all congregated at the ramp and sat on the rivers bank to survey the scene and partake of Debbie's famous Bacon & Egg pie (or is it Egg & Bacon...I always get confused)...I have mine with plenty of tomato sauce!

Family picnic - Daintree Town ramp

After much discussion about the fishing, the sad state of the river, the fact that the guys had not only landed a barra but seen a couple of salt water crocs, the decision was made that "the girls" only needed and hour or so to have a bit of a cruise, a bit of a fish and then back to the ramp to enable the real fisherman (i.e. the men) to get back to it. Now that's the democratic way....what's wrong with that?

Whilst fishing with the girls, I was lucky enough to land another little barra the same size as Jim's (it was actually 1/2 cm longer but who's counting) and not long after that the phone rang. Time to head back downstream and swap over, beauty!  Unfortunately the afternoon session proved fruitless, the river was just not in a mood to reveal her new secrets, her fish holding haunts, so we packed it in and made plans for our next adventure.

Yours truly, Helen and Chantelle returning!

On the way back to Cairns we dropped into Hook-a-Barra! Readers will know of my fondness of this place and as several of our party had not been successful with wild stock on the Daintree, we thought it would be a great idea to have a few casts in the pond. Our guests were absolutely stoked. Check out the smiles on these faces. If you think catching barra from a pond is not great fun, then think again.
They are challenging, they hit your lure hard an fight like wild horses. Really, just do it and see!

Chantelle with a b eauty!

Helen and that smile!

Hooked up...you beaut!

As usual, the girls out fished the men in this semi controlled environment...or was it that we were just being gentlemen and let them have 90% of the time! No matter what, it was exciting stuff. To see  quality barra boof those poppers, tear across the pond with screaming drags and jump half a metre into the air...awesome!

Well done Jim!

Leon...last fish, but a beauty!

OK...I had to catch just one!

Just as fascinating was a quick visit to the display area. Drop a food pellet into the pool and hear that "gun shot" of a take - great to hear the girls squeal too! And to finish off the afternoon we purchased one of our prime barra captures and took it home for dinner. Fancy coming all the way from NZ, travelling along the magnificent coast road to the Daintree, cruise the river with a local "expert", catch a couple of wild barra, spot a few crocs, visit the barra farm and have some fun - and catch dinner. 

Check out these albino barra in the display tank!

I was outnumbered in my own house that night, and at half time with the Kiwi's leading 18 - 12 in the rugby league Test, I was a little apprehensive. Even Debbie was barracking for the boys from over the ditch (or was it dutch...I could hardly understand them)....I was outnumbered 5-1!

This morning, at 6:30am, we took the party to the train station.
They were off to Townsville to spend a week on Magnetic Island
In one and a half days we had shown them the treasure that is Tropical North Queensland and helped reinforce in our minds how magic this place really is.

There they go...off to Townsville...SAD!

They had seen the sights, sampled the food, caught a barra - what more could you ask for?

Catch you on the water.
Regards, Les

www.fishingcairns.com.au

 PS - apparently the girls had done quite a bit of detouring! Check it out!

Mouth of Daintree!

St Mary's by the sea

Beautiful Port Douglas