Honeymoon road trip part 2, saltwater

[dirvin21]

As a follow on from the report in the freshwater section, our honeymoon road trip didn't involve a great deal of saltwater fishing

We did have a couple of sessions on palm cove jetty north of Cairns 

We didn't land any fish, but Amy jumped off a solid queenie and I got bitten off by a presumed mackerel.

The main portion of our saltwater fishing was a booked charter to the outer reef off Port Douglas. 

It was a long rough trip out to the reef but as you coukd guess excitement levels were high

We had new rods to blood and a score to settle after our very disappointing reef trip off Hinchinbrook in 2018.

Amy opted to start with baits (this guide had good quality bait), I stuck with my stubborn lure purist attitude and dropped soft vibes.

The start was a little slow, plenty of hits for Amy on the baits  I dropped a very small reef fish beside the boat  then Amy's hooked up, the fish shot for the surface first call was mackerel but turned out to be a lesser queenfish

A good start and Amy broke the doughnut for us.

The sounder was lit up with life, I persisted with the softvibe jigging it on the bottom, I tried something different giving it a few rips up in the water column and on the pause it was slammed. The resulting fight was brutal the fish pulling a near locked drag with ease the fight went on for awhile eith some serious cursing from me and laughing from Amy

I was crazy excited when this fish came up, golden trevally off the bucket list damn these things can fight.

With new enthusiasm we kept dropping, we caught plenty of fish like purple cod and barracuda to name a few nothing big but fun, Amy ended up with a fair few queenies.

Eventually I had another better take and after a decent tussle a gold spot trevally

Another fish I wanted to catch, the picture doesn't do the colours justice, note the rid in the holder, I carelessly left my vibe dangling in the water which was slammed  the beast took a straight nose dove to the bottom, thinking shark I slowly struggled to pull the submarine back from the depths, then this thing appeared

A monster batfish that had been hanging around the boat still can't believe how strong they are.

We still had the pressing matter of needing a couple of fish fir dinner, we tried a few trout spots for very little apart from me being smoked by a beast, we moved onto some reef flats, the water was a little dirty but didn't take long for Amy's lure to get slammed

A nice blue spot trout and quickly followed by a small emperor 

I managed a small honeycomb cod

There were plenty of hits and misses and with the tide change we moved back to find a dinner fish. 

Amy put the first fish in the esky with a nice stripey on a vibe

But the legal trout kept evading us  we caught a few smaller stripeys which were kept for bait.

Amy made the switch to fresh bait and the results were immediate with more small variety, queenies and a few royal dustings, them Amy gets slammed she did a great job turning the fish and musclingit to the surface

A cracker of a spangled emperor, it measured in the mid 50s as you can tell Amy was a little pleased with herself 

With time running low and the small fish and queenies plaguing me  I finally hooked a decent reefie, and at long last my first coral trout

A nice bar cheek  a good fish to finish our reef session, we landed many species and had a blast.

The next night in the Daintree we cooked our catch must say the stripey outshone coral trout by a mile

We fished the salt around the Daintree a bit with no luck, did drop a barra and miss a few jacks but it's crazy croc country

Theres was some great clise in reef at Cape Tribulation but it's a green zone 

Gotta love how the rainforest meets the reef 

That's it for our saltwater portion of our honeymoon 

Hopefully we'll have some more adventures to come soon

Cheers for reading 

Dave 

[Blackfish]

Fantastic again Dave and Amy, thanks for taking us along. 

Again looking forward to the next instalment. 

Travel safely.

[Isaac Ct]

Great report mate, enjoy the Honeymoon. Plenty of fantastic fish caught. Keep it up

Well done.

[Rebel]

Super report.

Just love the photos.

Well done you two.

[mrsswordfisherman]

Sensational reporting 

Love these pics!!!

[Green Hornet]

Great pics and variety of species guys. 
Hope there’s more coming for you both. 

[masterfisho7]

Love your photos and report well done 

 

[tobycb]

Great read and excellent photos!

Can't wit for the water to warm up a little here in Sydney.

Regards, Toby

[Bluebenbomb]

Well done on part 2! Hopefully you tick off all species from the bucket list and enjoy your time there! Beautiful photos as well.

[Larkin]

Living the dream! 👍

Some beautiful fish, amazing colours!

[Yowie]

Another great adventure, many species of different colours and fighting abilities, looks like a great time had by all.

[big Neil]

1st class report Dave and Amy. Tough when you expect so much from FNQ but I reckon you did very well and also managed to tick some off the wish list. Well done. bn

[Pickles]

Brilliant report and fantastic pics Dave - Trip of memories”

[Fab1]

I’m with all the others.Fantastic photos mate!!!Enjoy.

[bessell1955]

Once again a great report.

[Squidless]

Thanks for sharing your journey with us. Looks like you guys had an absolute blast, the anticipation, the tribulations and the results are all apart of the adventure. Wishing you many more in each other's company.

[Rock&Beach]

Awesome report. 

Certainly jealous.