Trouble in Paradise - A New Caledonian adventure.

[Al Morrison]

[Kurt de Villiers]

......maybe 33lb....?

[Al Morrison]

Kurt,

We (Scott Rob and I) didnt call the weights on any of the fish, Etienne the guide did. Most of the small fish were very small indeed, sub 10kgs. maybe i need to post some other pics to convince you !

[Mark Harris]

Al.. wow!  It is great that you guys pulled a trip out of some fairly extreme adversity there and still managed to enjoy yourselves.

There is nothing worse in my book than a cancellation due to mechanical problems. And particularly so when it is a long-planned trip at premium charter prices.  Very well done for rising above that and finding an alternative. Your can-do attitude comes across very well in the report.

[Al Morrison]

Mark,
That was possibly the worst hour of my life !! Receiving a call from Rudy at LPB and then calling Scott and Rob to find out where they were at and what we should do. No point in dwelling on it, and had i not already been there in NC on holiday the easy option would have been to roll over and give up. However, i was there, had gear, an internet connection and a phone so it was full steam ahead. The other guys were so desperate to fish we'd have done it for a day I reckon. And whilst the fish werent the biggest or the best they were in fact fish!

Life is too short to not make an effort.

As a post script, Robs rods had arrived back in either Brisbane or Sydney yesterday, the airline wasnt sure which .....

[Jamie Moir]

Hey Al, great you made it out for a fish after all that!

That is some hard-core hassle between LPB's last-minute cancellation, missing rods and grounded flights!

[Jon Li]

Hi Al ,

Good writes , quite a situations with all the mishaps but I am glad you guys pull thru and still fish . At 53 you are not that old yet , certainly by my standard and even younger by GeGe's standard , the GT fisherman from Lyon . 

Jon .

[Al Morrison]

Jamie, With me being a clown and busting one rod, perhaps a thread should be not just how many poppers to take on a trip, but how many rods !! For 2 blokes on different airlines to lose 2 rod tubes on the same trip seems a tad unlucky to say the least ! We were getting very twitchy about rod damage i can tell you.

[Graham McKenzie]

Well done guys
I was part of the crew following you with LPB and we also got cancelled the day before we were to fly over.
Sadly Ocean Blue despite huge efforts on their part could not put a trip together for us.

Ahh well New Cal will still be there all next year

[Al Morrison]

Graham, Sad to hear that. I saw your comment in another post how you also only got a few hours notice, so they must have had over 6 days to fix the issue, but as you say it will still be there and we saw enough to be making plans for a return trip.  Not living in a place with instant GT access we build these infrequent affairs up into far more than merely a fish catching trip. New Cal is a great place indeed, whilst i wish we had converted a couple of the big fish hits we had, after all of the turmoil, we were all just relieved to get on the water. We were happy with the bass and sharks.

[Jay Burgess]

Very well done for rising above that and finding an alternative. Your can-do attitude comes across very well in the report.

Agree! It was a very good read indeed, thanks for sharing Al