PB Rainbow Victorian High Country

[LuckyFil]

Arrived home last week after a 3 month trek into the red centre and surrounds (Uluru, Kata Tjuta, Kings Canyon, West MacDonnell Ranges, Coober Pedy etc).  Magnificent scenery, hikes and a few bike rides made it a wonderful trip . Everybody has to do it once in your life (I'm 61 so its taken me a while to tick it off the bucket list).

On the return we went via SA and down to the York and Fleurieu Peninsulas, which was the first chance to wet a line. Not so much fishing as squiding as I find it hard to catch anything other than squid off the shore in SA. Pretty much all of the wharves are good for squid any time of day but especially at night. My first was a monster by Sydney standards and I had to lock the drag up on the little Daiwa 2500 to lift it the 3 meters out of the water . I reckon it weighed 2 kg or more. My mate and I managed a few most days for dinner with one night catching 13 as our best (not large but more average sized)- we were eating calamari for days even spread across the 6 of us in our group.

We then headed into Victoria to The Grampians - again a top spot . Mainly hiking and riding  there. Went trout fishing  in a stream one arvo but only turned one trout and he threw the hooks. Next stop was a campground near Bright in the Victorian high country where we fished the streams below Mt Hotham. Spectacular countryside and very pretty streams to walk - just watch out for the snakes as there's plenty of blacks, browns and tigers at this time of year, safer to wade the stream than walk the scrub.

I had a few flicks in the stream near our campsite soon after setting up and hooked and lost a small rainbow on my first cast then shortly after caught a  small brown, which turned out to be the only brown of the trip.

During our week there we did plenty of hikes and cycling on the off-road trails and fished for a few hours most afternoons. We always managed a few fish mostly small that were returned but one session my mate landed a nice female rainbow of 40cm and I landed my PB - a male at 45cm . It took a lot of persistence to get him as he was only vaguely interested in my celta spinner, turning away from it several times in the pool he owned. I changed to a little diver lure with a very twitchy action and he got more revved up. I must have cast it past him 20 times before he finally got the shits and smacked it - yippee! - a few jumps  and he raced up and down the stream and I finally guided him into the shallows and onto the bank. I've only been trout fishing a few times (I'm more a salt water fisho) so I was very happy to get this one.

I went back several times to the same pool as there were at least 2 other large ones I'd seen but they were too clever for me.

After that we stopped on the south coast near Batemans Bay. I did a few beach and rock sessions but struggled to get much, landed one salmon and a couple of average sized drummer.

Back home and finally finished unpacking and cleaning the van and car - now planning my next adventure.

Cheers

Fil

[sam bros]

Sounds like an awesome trip

Well done on the trout

[rickmarlin62]

Nice trout mate  ive caught some good ones in the high country between jamieson an licola  i think they are some of the best coloured fish ive seen   wots next ??

[masterfisho7]

Nice report and top trout well done

[LuckyFil]

On 11/19/2018 at 10:15 AM, rickmarlin62 said:

Nice trout mate  ive caught some good ones in the high country between jamieson an licola  i think they are some of the best coloured fish ive seen   wots next ??

Sorry for the slow reply - thanks for the feedback.

Next big trip is Kakadu and Broome but that will be a while off. Probably just do a few small trips next year - Hat Head and Broken Head are our favourites and maybe Seventeen Seventy if we've got time.