Belated Darwin report

[kiwineil]

HI all

Belated report from a father (moderate fisherman) and  son (mad keen fishing nut type kid) fishing charter near Darwin in late September. This was a bucket list trip for me and my boy, and it delivered so far over and above....  and while I wont say who the charter operator was (forum rules I think) I highly highly recommend, and I'm happy to PM details if anyone is interested

We fished four days, from 8am to 5.30pm every day, with a variety of techniques (some of which were new to us) depending on target species. Aside from one trickier day, we caught a lot of fish, most of which went back if not taken for dinner, or for bait.  As usual, the kid outfished me. This was one trip where his hard and fast rule that no one touches his gear if he's on a fish (he'd rather lose it than have someone land it for him) worked in my favour as more often than not I was often too busy with my own fish to give him a hand, not that he ever wanted it.

Pix below are mostly from the last day, where we set out just went out to have as much fun as possible. From memory we cast surface metals for mack tuna/trevally/queenies etc, bottom baited for black jewfish and other bottom dwellers, jigged plastics for gt's/cobia, live baited for Spanish mack's, trolled for the same plus sailfish (no joy there) among other things. .

Too many trip highlights to mention, but a couple that stick out

First off the Day 4 double hookup when a cobia hit my plastic while jigging and headed due north at rapid speed at exactly the same time as a Spanish mackerel hit my boys live bait and headed due south at a similar speed. Amazingly, we got them both in ....  (attached as the first pic - note its my first go at uploading pix so I hope this works). For reference, the Spanish mack went about 140 cm, and the cobia about 110cm. Second pic is the same Spanish mack  

Second highlight is one that got away.. in 10 feet of water the boy hooked a giant lead weight which after an hour of wrestling turned into a 8-9ft shark (lemon shark I think) at the side of the boat. That may have been on Day 2, but I dont think that matters! While he did get it to the side of the boat, we couldn't land it (IM not sure we tried all that hard, to be fair), and when it got bored with us away it went. But a lot of fun watching him fight it so hard, and for so long...

In general we were having too much fun to measure, or take too many pix, but Ive attached a couple more give a flavor

These including my sons best jewie ....

.. although I think mine (obviously a PB) from earlier in the trip (Day 2?) might have just shaded him .....

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 and a couple of assorted others.  

Needless to say the fishing nut son is even more of one now... and im saving my pennies for a repeat visit ....

If you made it this far, thanks for reading 

Cheers

[neilm]

Great report, I love Darwin (been there 3 times now, once without fishing ) there is some wonderful fishing to be had, but it's hard landbased due to the 8 metre tides.

[mrsswordfisherman]

Your boy will always have great memories. Pm me the operator we are always looking for good businesses to sponsor fr

[Rah]

Great report. Something your son will remember forever.

 

Cheers

Tara

[big Neil]

Thanx for your late report kiwineil. The smiles on the kids faces say it all. They will remember the trip for the rest of their lives mate. Good onya. BN