Far North dreaming

Readers Story July 2009

(Bottom Left) Aaron with a hard- fighting trevally from the rocks. (Top Left) ‘The Boys’ and the spoils of a hard day off the bricks in snapper heaven: 7.7kg, 8.2kg, 5.5kg and 6.35kg. (Top Right) Some rough weather saw us chasing kingfish in Parengarenga Harbour. Andy hooked up to a nice fish. (Bottom Right) Felix took this kingfish from ‘Rodholders’ on a live bait.

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Five in the morning at Spirits Bay and we were having coffee and Weetbix; after enduring 16 hours behind the wheel from Wellington it was good to finally be going fishing.

Once on the rocks the berley was brewed and ladled into the wash. Gear was rigged and we were in business. I can’t remember who hooked the first fish, but it was madness, with 3-6kg trevally gulping in the berley and baits with not a red cod in sight. We were in heaven.

After several large trevs had been landed and released, I cracked out the 2kg tackle and hooked an estimated 4kg trevor that blistered off 100-plus metres of line. Plenty of fancy footwork enabled me to remain attached and provided a sliver of hope. Thirty minutes later the trevor was there on its side at the rock, but just out of reach of the gaff. One last dive saw the 2kg line touch the ledge and, just like that, the show was over. My moment of glory was gone.

I handed my 2kg outfit to Andy so he could have a crack at it. He hooked up in seconds, but the trevor hadn’t read the script and burned off along the ledge, showing no regard for Andy’s copious angling talents, and proceeding to deal a knock-out blow in seconds. Just another whizz-bang hook-up to add to our quickly growing list.

Buzzing like livewires about the day’s fishing, we packed up and headed back to the landing. Those trevor’s were unreal! Fat, fit, cunning – and they had rockets up their backsides, too. Tough fish in a tough environment – now that’s fishing!

Day two, 6am, and we headed back along the rocks to ‘Rodholders’, out to the point, set up the berley trail and sorted our gear. This time the big outfits came along for some serious live-baiting, and within a few minutes we all had livies out, enabling us to get back to the berley trail.

I cast a jig around and hooked a good fish that ripped off 30 metres of 10kg and fought deep and strong. A few minutes later another good trevor of 4kg came up on the rocks.

Around 9am Felix’s live bait was eaten, the howling Shimano TLD50 broadcasting the successful deception. This fish took several strong bursts of line, but was eventually coaxed back to the rock, where a good gaff shot saw 19.12kg of kingfish landed and back slaps all round – we were on the board.

Things went a bit quiet after that, so Felix and I sparked up a 2kg Line Blue Maomao Challenge. I had just successfully landed my second maomao to Felix’ none, and was getting comfortable with my lead when there was a huge explosion out in front of us. Bleep! Bleep! Bleep! Did you see that? Then again water went everywhere and my balloon was dragged below.

I scorched over to the rod and waited a second or two for the pressure to come on, but nothing happened, so wound for all I was worth. Twenty metres of line came back on before it finally came up tight, enabling me to strike hard two or three times.

I then bullied the fish to the rock where Felix waited with the gaff. The king turned out to have five other kingfish to 25 kilos following, so I yelled for Felix to drop the gaff and cast in a pillie. The kings charged the pillie but refused to take, so in the end my king was dragged onto the rocks. Weighing around 15kg, I was pretty happy. No more hook-ups for the rest of the day, and we again headed back to the landing.
Days three, four and five where pretty wild on the weather front, but we stuck with it, and the boys knocked over another couple of 10 to 15-kilo kings from the local harbour. We were all on the scoreboard with nice fish, but not the monster 30-plus kilo fish we all wanted.

Day six and we were up and preparing for another round. We had to beat the tide and navigate an unknown beach to get to our chosen ledge, so it was a 3am start and headlamps on.

A good amount of wading, slogging uphill and bush-bashing saw us finally on the outer ledge as the sun came up, and boy, was it looking good. There was a very nice wash running along the ledge, with deep water and reef nearby. We had been told that the snapper fishing here was good, and already we could see the potential.
I rigged up a one-hook-dropper rig on my surf rod with a big whole macky and cast out. A few bites and no macky, so I baited up with half a large kahawai fillet and again cast out. Bite, bite, bite, then the rod heeled well over and the reel screamed. I grabbed the rod and hung on hard as the fish powered off. This was obviously a good snapper.

Working the fish as hard as I could on 10kg, I still couldn’t stop it powering off another 30 metres of line. A few minutes later brought it close, and I was giving it death when a big basset [Wellington slang for snapper] came to the surface. Felix was quick with the gaff, and 6.35kg of gleaming fish was mine – a nice start to the morning.

The guys also rigged up with one-hook dropper rigs, and this saw us wading into thick snapper action, the bite running red-hot for two hours and the fish averaging five kilos. Andy managed to land an 8.2kg fish, Toby chimed in with a 7.7kg specimen and Felix’ best was a 5.5kg fish.
 
Throughout this time Toby had persevered with the heavy gear and a large kahawai live bait, and when his balloon effortlessly sank below the surface, this perseverance looked as if it was about to pay off.

The resulting hook-up saw Toby giving a superb rendition of a drunken ballerina as he scrambled across the jagged rocks in only his socks. (Never tempt Murphy when the big gear is out, mate.)

This was a big, strong fish, and it made straight for the reef, severing the 200-pound leader just like that. We all agreed it was either a very big kingie or a bronzie. Either way, a great fish to end the trip on; we now had unfinished business and a reason to return.

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