As the title says, never high stick on a fish, especially if this fish is resting on a step mud bank... Because this is the story of how I broke one of my favourite fishing rod.
But let's start from the beginning.
on a Saturday morning, I received a phone call and a text message from my good mate Seano, asking if I wanted to go fishing with him latter on in the afternoon.
If you know me, you could easily have guessed that I said yes.
So of we went, to one of his secret spot, and rest assured that his secret spot is safe with me. As we had to drive for a relatively long time in the four wheels drive, through the bush, with the aid of the GPS unit to arrive to the location. Definitively not a place I could go to on my pushbike.
Once the car had stopped in the middle of nowhere, we made our way to a mangrove, and started to walk through it for a little while.
I always found walking inside the mangrove a bit eerie and pleasant at the same time.
Mangrove trekking.
If it wasn't for the mosquitos that would have been a very pleasant walk, but they were out in numbers and apparently starving. We had to reapply insect repellent at very regular intervals.
But in the end we arrived to this beautiful fishing spot, and it was well worth the effort.
The river.
The river was nice and calm, with now and then some ripples on the water, indicating that life was abundant under the surface.
Before the first flick of my lure, I found a lure, a B52's from Reidy's in a colour that I had never seen before, stuck in a tree. Someone must have fished here not that long ago.
In the first few cast we started to have some strikes, but no hookups.
Then Seano got unlucky and snagged his lure on the other side of the river.
This is not a large river, and any average swimmer could crosse it in no time, but with the number of crocodiles that live in there, in no way someone would try it. So he had to break his line and loose the lure.
I had decided that for this trip, I was only going to fish with the Duo Lures that I was sent by Duo Australia not long ago, this was going to be a test. And what a test it was going to be.
At first I put a Tide Minnow SLD-F at the end of my line...
And it worked so well, that I left it on the line t'ill we went back home, and haven't yet tested the other ones.
Has Seano was re-rigging his outfit I casted this new lure in the water, and got my first fish of the day!
Now this was not a huge Barramundi, but I will still remember this fish for a long time...
As it is the one on which I broke my fishing rod...
It was only 53cm (20.866142 inches), not even of a legal size! I could not have a revenge on it by cooking it, I had to release it...
Ha!
The rode breaker.
In fact, it was sorely due to my own fault. Has I had the fish on the mud, standing a few metres from the water edge, because of potential crocodile, I high sticked the rod instead of having it at a low angle, and tried to pull the fish which was stuck in the mud...
The result was a great fishing rod, full of good memories for me, snapped in three pieces.
That was really upsetting, but we had just been driving and walking for long enough to arrive there, and we had just started fishing. So I could only try to take it as best as possible, and continue to fish, with a very very short rod...
At least, even if I was to not catch anything else, I knew that the lure worked.
And it continued to work.
Seano was now ready to fish and we were both casting our lures all around the place.
And getting a lots of hits, and loosing many fishes, but we got a few little one, all just under the legal limits.
Here are a few of my fishes:
Fish number two for me.
Fish number three.
With Seano hard at work, in the background.
Barramundi number four.
Yes I didn't need to change the lure, it was working very well.
We were fishing and now and then, walk a bit along the river.
At one stage Seano pointed out to me a Bull shark cruising in front of us, another good reason not to enter the waters.
Not long after the appearance of the shark, the fishing slowed down in a big way.
We walked a bit further down, Seano got the only legal fish of the day at 59cm (23.228346 inches).
And me, guess what I got?
Yes I did get a hit from a very nice Barramundi, that would have been more than legal, but lost it on the first half jump...
Now what I finally got on the line and hooked proper, was a little shark...
Little shark on the lure.
I brought it up on the bank, and looked for my pliers, I had lost them.
They were old and rusty pliers, but would have come very handy at this very time.
In the end it was with the help of my fish scaler that I was able to unhook this little critter.
This was my last fish of the day.
And now, here is a photo of my broken rod, to give you an idea of what I was using to fish after it broke.
R.I.P dear fishing rod.
Yes this short rod, didn't had a lot of flex to fight the fish that I hooked after it got broken. At one point we even joked with Seano, that anyway, flex was for soft anglers, and that I was going to fish hardcore, with no flex and a full on drag.
Sometimes you have to make the most of what you have, and laughter often help.
So to me this was a trip from which I came back without a feed, despite the very good results obtained with the DUO Tide Minnow SLD-F.
Where I lost my pliers, and broke one of my preferred fishing rod. The one that Double Haul had got for me at the opening night of the Barra National 2010.
But hey, it could be worse.
Have a good day,
Me.
