loxo

Beaut Kingie there mate. Gotta love our harbour.

Nice bag mate, good feed there.

Wow. YUM!

Great feed there Yowie. Congrats again.

What a whiting!

G'day mate, I spent about 10 days down there with the family over Easter and loved it. I'm by no means an expert but managed to catch fish every day we were down there even if it meant getting plagued by small Salmon.. We stayed in the Island View Resort just south of town which backs on to it's own surf beach. I fished there most arvos just relaxing leading up to sunset with a cold beer and caught Salmon every time. Mostly small stuff though. It actually got frustrating at times because I'd decided to try and chase some bread and butter fish there after catching Salmon the first few days and hunted down some fresh beach worms and even tried some local prawns but you just couldn't get through the little Salmon they were that thick. They would eat anything. I'm talking in the 22-26cm range with just the odd larger one thrown in. Bigger ones seemed to go the bigger baits like whole pillies, it was a lot slower though but nice to get the occasional decent fish. We had a tinnie so decided to try the inlet a couple of times and caught our fair share of plate size flatties which was good for the BBQ. They weren't too fussy on baits, we just fished drop offs and sand bars wherever looked likely and went ok. Got a couple of bream mixed in as well. The inlet just really looks fishy and a bit of experiment in there would go a long way I reckon. I didn't catch a whiting the entire trip which surprised me (and disappointed because I love a good feed of whiting fillets) but it probably had more to do with me than anything else. There is plenty of nippers to be pumped on the flats just behind the park there, no need for a boat at all. Didn't fish the breakwall but saw plenty of people doing so for various degrees of success. There is a little swimming beach just netted off on the northern side of the mouth of the river just inside the heads. Kids loved it there so we spent a couple of days there having a swim and lunch ect and I obviously always had a couple of rods on the go. Pulled a couple of nice little flatties just off the outside edge of the netting. Seemed to just get hammered by those little Salmon if I went much further up the beach. Great spot for a day with the family though. Lastly, the second last day we were down there the Mr's and I took a charter outside to chase the kings and whatever else was about. Gotta be honest it was a pretty disappointing day in the end. Firstly I couldn't believe the amount of boats that were out and about, with reports the kings were still thick and fast boats were heading to the island from Bermagui and other nearby areas plus plenty of boats from Narooma it was as busy as anything I've experienced. The day started off well enough with the bait tanks being filled with livies in what felt like no time to me. It was while we were catching the bait that we first saw what would ultimately ruin the rest of the day. While the wifey was taking a few photos of the dozens of beautiful seals all around the rocks I heard the skipper mumbling to the deckie about 'the wretched bloody things'. It didn't take long to find out what he was on about. We moved off to the first spot and within 20 mins another bloke on the boat landed a 90cm kingie. we were like HOW GOOD IS THIS GUNNA BE!!! Unfortunately it turned out to be the only one landed all day. There was plenty of hook ups and some decent fights but from that time on every fish we hooked was lost to the bloody seals. There was hoards of them and they killed us, nothing worse than seeing that kingy coming up to the surface only for a greedy seal to pinch the bloody thing off you. We moved spots several times and tried other stuff but just kept having the same result. Captain told us that sometimes the older seals teach the pups how to hunt and that was what was happening today. I don't know but between the seals and basically being able to reach out and grab several other boats next to us as soon as we had started to hook up to anything it started to get on my nerves. Anyway, very frustrating day. Narooma's a beautiful spot mate. Just drive around and you'll find yourself plenty of places to fish. I found I ran out of time before I got to try everywhere I would have liked to.

Thx mate.

Thx Linc. Doesn't exactly look like the easiest knot to tie? What do you think?

So how exactly do you rig up for lure fishing?

What knot does everyone like to use? Is the Blood Knot the best/ok? Thanks

What a great day. Days like that are the ones to remember, congrats.

Looks like a great trip, nice work.

Thanks guys, been to Bermagui before and loved it but a day trip to Narooma while there really got me interested in staying there at some point. We did check out Tilba Tilba as well and enjoyed a few beers in the little pub down there while the girls checked out all the local little shops. Was a great day. As for the tinnie I definitely wont be taking her out of the inlet, will be strictly estuary fishing in the boat unless I get on a charter one day. Thanks again for all the info, really appreciate your help fellas.

Awesome. We used to live in Cronulla but moved when we had our second boy. 2 bdr unit wouldn't cut it anymore. I love the Hacking, still find myself getting down to Maianbar as often as time allows, great part of the world.

Also thinking of going out on a charter one day possibly. Not sure if it's allowed in here or not but does anyone have any recommendations? If it's not allowed in here feel free to PM me. Thanks again everyone.