Australia Visit - Day 12 - BarraPaulLozza 8

Up around 11:30am to pounding rain. Hopefully a good sign for fishing but we don’t want too much so we’re stranded here. Spent the morning just catching up on this journal and speaking shit. Mum was doing her crossword while dad worked on sketches. Paul slept in as long as possible but as soon as he got up he was running on all cylinders doing odds and ends.

Mum, doing her crosswords while Paul slept in

Mum, Paul and I headed down to the servo to fill up the gas bottles and I bought a few odds and ends for the kids. After lunch I went back to sleep while Paul and dad headed out to Escott to check the pots. Paul had no intentions of fishing but dad went to flick a lure while Paul checked for yabbies. Paul even bet ten bucks that he’d get more yabbies than dad caught barra. In the first couple of casts dad had a swipe with a gold bomber on so even after Paul had done with the pots the two of them kept casting at the snags out from the saltwater side of the crossing. Eventually the old man hooked up and it was a good fish. It took a while to land and was worth the wait coming in at 85cm and 11 pounds. A pretty good fish and the largest we’ve seen to date and contrasted sharply with an absence of cherabin in the pots. I suspect somebody may have helped themselves to those pots. Of coarse I was awoken when they returned and the old man certainly has some spring in his step now. It gave us hope that the rain had pushed a few fish up and maybe they’d be chewing on the upcoming tide.

Dad's Barra - A good fish

Same fish but the flash subtracts the background

We finally headed out to Escott around 11:30pm to a very low tide, but it was at least pushing up. In the moons absence the sky was dark and stars were shining bright. I weird textured pattern of clouds known as a mackeral sky stretched out from the south-west. By the time the moon did rise there’d been one small run on a bait and nothing to show for our efforts with lures. Dad and I even rolled a fly over for a while but the country just isn’t very accommodating for the technique. The waning moon looked down cloaked in a moisture ring to witness a familiar sight, the three of us fishing while the fish weren’t eating. The flying foxes were making their regular sorties but there was an absence of wallabies around. The crocs were fairly active but there was no sign of any larger ones. All in all it was a quite night and not wanting to repeat the previous nights efforts we gave it away just after 2am. Still, the day was a success by this trips standards with a nice sized barra. I wonder if that’s the last one? It’s probably pretty safe to suggest it is.