After spending 5 days in Exmouth in April this year I was determined to get up there again before 2011 was finished. I made the most of my Uni holidays, cheap Qantas fares, and having a family member living up there (Free accommodation). 10 days were booked with Eddy from peak sportsfishing and I was just banking on the weather, considering it is cyclone season up there. The plan was to spend a few days chasing GT's, a few chasing marlin/sails and when we couldn't get out in the blue water we would hit up the protected waters of the exmouth Gulf.
Day one and two consisted of a very very solid GT bite on stickbaits and poppers. We had a number of oppurtunities to catch fish over 30kg, but the biggest we could manage was around the 26-27kg mark. On the first day we reached the Murion islands about 2 hours before the high tide, and we were planning on working the waters close to the island where there was a bit of swell and current. The first 7-8 casts resulted in a number of fish coming up and slamming the lures, however we only managed to hook one of these fish which was a nice 12kg model. We proceeded to see alot of fish around the size but we couldn't pin the hooks. Then we spotted a larger fish cruising down the back of wave. I cast my stickbait to within 6-8m of the direction the fish was moving, and he flared his pecs and procedded to slam my offering. We estimated this fish to be around the 30kg mark, and after he rattled 20m of line from me, I pulled the hooks. We continued to work along the back of the waves and the shoreline, where we managed to land a number of fish around the 8-13kg mark. At some stages there were swarms of fish (10-15) smashing our stickbaits and poppers. We continued to work along and land a number of different species including: brassy trevally, golden trevally, spangled emporer and flowery cod. Then we spotted a school of GT's holding on a sand bank, where there was some current moving around. I cast my stickbait to within the region of the fish, and with one twitch I had some very very solid fish fighting to eat my lure. I finally dug the hooks into one and after a solid fight I landed my PB GT of around the 26-27kg mark. Saying I was over the moon would be an under statement.
After fishing the islands we made the move and begun to pop the deep water to try and coax something bigger into eating our lures. At one stage we had two very very solid fish come up and slam my cousin's popper, both these fish were estimated in the high 30kg bracket but again we couldn't sink the hooks into either of them. Eddy was busy spotting Fusie balls in the deep water, when he yelled out that there were some seriously frightened baitfish straight in front of the boat. Both me and my cousin cast out, we both hooked up straight away. We pulled the hooks on the GT but I managed to land a 10kg Spanish mackeral on a stickbait. Eddy couldn't help himself and jumped down from the Tuna tower and landed a popper in the middle of the Fusie ball! His second cast for the day netted a solid GT around 15kg.
The first day we ended up landed 14 fish with the largest being the 26-27kg fish, and the second day we landed 11 fish up to 23kg. With the average size fish being around the 12-14kg mark. We caught a number of 6-8kg fish on lighter gear aswell. We had at 10 hits from fish over 30kg which was truely incredible, and we only managed to sink the hooks into 2 fish, one of which dusted me in the reef, while the hooks were pulled on the other fish. There are definatly some solid fish up there!! Here are the results from the first few days fishing.
We only managed to get 2 days GT fishing, but I also spent 2 days light tackle down the gulf and two days blue marlin fishing. One of the blue marlin days we managed two fish at 600lb and 400lb so it was a truely remarkable day. I wont go into too much detail about the marlin fishing but I'll throw a few pics up nonetheless. The light tackle stuff in the Gulf was good fun with a us catching a number of Goldens, brassys, small gt's, mangrove jack and queenfish! Again, I can't recommend Eddy enough. He has made this another epic trip. Do yourself a favour and get up there and get amongst some Ningaloo G's. Thanks for reading guys.
Thanks again for reading. Cheers Clay
