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Old Mans Hat And Beyond


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I met Kev at 5am at Rose Bay and we ventured over to Clifton Gardens for some squid - no luck.

The weather was absolutely perfect as was the sunrise from CG.

Next we went to Sow & Pigs for a rock cod and a just undersized snapper. Both went back in.

Next we went to Old Mans Hat and thats when things fired up. I trolled a white Rapala sub-walk lure twice passed the hat for nothing. Quickly I changed to the Rapala X-Rap in Blue Sardine and made another pass.

We ventured around the corner from Nth Head and the water became very sloppy but the sounder was beeping away merrily. We trolled from the corner to about 100m along the rocks and about 50m out.

Suddenly.... zzzzzzzzzzzz, the okuma overhead was singing peeling line fast. I slowly up'd the drag and grabbed the rod. Nothing. So I slowly start winding in to check and zzzzzzzzzzz - it came alive again. Kev threw the boat into neutral and I start to retrieve.

To my surprise there was no fight all apart from the initial two bursts. I could only feel a light-ish weight on the line. As the line came back we saw a lovely 40cm bonito and my first - the sounder was going ballistic at this stage. I pulled the lure out and sent it out back again. The fish went into the esky and we kept trolling.

30 mins later with 7 bonnies now in the esky we thought we'd get out of the slop and head back in to calmer waters. It seems we had found a large school and they were hungry! They strike extremely hard and have awesome runs but dont fight much on the retrieve.

After a quick trip to The Spit and Bantry Bay we headed back to clean the fish.

At Rose bay we were met at the wharf by about 30 Japanese tourists who were taking photos of the pelican that was hanging around (not me the bird!!). When they saw the catch they hot-footed it down to where I was for a look. They asked to take some photos so I obliged and posed in a few pics. I didnt realise that they wanted individual pics with me and the fish (Kev got in a few too!) so each one came up and sat next to me holding one of the fish!! Cleaning the fish took way longer than normal!!

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Anyway I'm happy to help a tourist enjoy their holiday in this great country of ours!!

Thanks Kev for taking me out.

Go the X-RAP!!!

And for dinner tonight:

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Edited by tan the fisherman
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At Rose bay we were met at the wharf by about 30 Japanese tourists who were taking photos of the pelican that was hanging around (not me the bird!!). When they saw the catch they hot-footed it down to where I was for a look. They asked to take some photos so I obliged and posed in a few pics. I didnt realise that they wanted individual pics with me and the fish (Kev got in a few too!) so each one came up and sat next to me holding one of the fish!! Cleaning the fish took way longer than normal!!

post-6058-1243228529_thumb.jpg

Anyway I'm happy to help a tourist enjoy their holiday in the great country of ours!!

Thanks Kev for taking me out.

Go the X-RAP!!!

Dont forget that you will be a celebrity in japan.

PS.. This IS the best country in the world, :1worthy: and Im a foriegner

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Go the horsies, they put up a good scrap don't they, glad to see the little buggers are still hanging around..

Cheers.......

They do scrap hard Ray but I was very surprised to see that none of them fought on the retrieve. Just explosive strikes and ferocious runs but once you put the brakes on they just fade away - till they are in the boat then all hell breaks loose!

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Nice fish mate, i really like those xraps in a number of different colours. Next time if your getting into them trolling in relatively the same area, you can pull in the troll rods and chuck around some metals on bream gear, they do go pretty hard on the light stuff!

Edited by dicko
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Nice fish mate, i really like those xraps in a number of different colours. Next time if your getting into them trolling in relatively the same area, you can pull in the troll rods and chuck around some metals on bream gear, they do go pretty hard on the light stuff!

I might try that mate - thanks for the tip.

Which colour xrap's do you prefer?

Edited by tan the fisherman
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I might try that mate - thanks for the tip.

Which colour xrap's do you prefer?

My top 2 choices would be the blue sardine or the green gold mackeral, i dunno why but i always seem to get alot of tailor on the greens. There are quite a few colours in the range that look the goods though and very realistic, but whether a fish would turn it down because of its colour i dunno, the actions are the same so they probably all do the same thing!

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:1prop: Good job! X-raps kick butt, and so do you guys for knowing when and where to use them...(Those bones make excellent sashimi you know;however looks to me like you blokes did 'em up right! Tom the Yank
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