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Saumarez Reef April 2003 - A time of calm and plenty at Saumarez

As I sit back and look at the photograph from the top deck of Kanimbla on the Wednesday morning when, the ocean made the average bathtub look choppy, I wonder where the week went to!!!! Some trips are more positively overwhelming than others and, this was one of them. On that Wednesday we were shortly in the dories, miles from the nearest reef and hoping for a small breeze to cool us down as we were trying to haul in oversized Lippers, Green Jobbies and, Japanese Sea Bream. While it is often the ‘fish that get away’ that we remember and have us return on a following trip, on other occasions it is the magic of the environment that indelibly imprints in our memory.

With a good forecast we went straight from Gladstone to Saumarez Reef and arrived at the southern end about lunchtime and endured the 5 knot breeze that stopped us overheating. We caught a few Doggies and a number of typical bottom fish. That afternoon saw us sink my FAD [exact coordinates cost $100-00, with no guarantees that it is still there!!] and into the evening we lost a few large unstopables [? sharks]. One rod was broken by a big Jobbie which in turn was eaten by a shark at the side of the dory. At ‘Trout Corner’ I had a large unknown drag my heaviest line through coral for 20 metres before the inevitable.

Monday saw us head off to Zenobia Rock [about 20 miles west of Saumarez]. We had a good day with 253 packs, mainly jobbies, cod, JSB and, a few hoo. The weather was even calmer than the previous day.

Tuesday saw us east of Zenobia Rock by about six miles and with even calmer conditions we trolled Coral Trout to 7 kg, had 3 Marlin strikes on trolled minnows, jigged wahoo and jobbies, and got 2 large [30 kg] GTs that night. During the morning troll we went further east and could just see the top of the light from the NE cay of Saumarez.

Wednesday was super calm [superlatives do not do the conditions justice]. We initially trolled and after catching a few yellow fin, threw pilchards into the water to watch the sharks and fish rise from about 100 ft of water to take them. This was captured on video. The only ripples on the surface were from the pilchards, as they hit the water! After a few hours of relatively poor trolling we bottom bounced for huge lippers, jobbies and JSB. We were in 30 to 40 metres of water and, I would have liked to try the much deeper water later [in the PM] – only one kilometre away. However within less than 2 hours we filled a large fish box and a milk crate, that we up ended. Such was the action that it was just let the bait drift down and, as it neared the bottom, something would immediately grab it and the tussle would begin. It was time for lunch and the sun was beating down. As mentioned by Geoff [in his email], these were unusual catches for this far out. The fish had to be hauled to the surface fairly quickly in a “beat the man in the brown overcoat” gauntlet. I found the TLD 30 an excellent reel in this situation. After a while the sharks appeared to give up. There were a few reasonable 10 kg Red Emperor caught and a few monumental bust offs from what were probably Doggies on Halco GTs. A few wahoo were also caught – this led to 2 lures having their backs broken by twisting forces. The breeze, rain and a change came up just after lunch [precisely called by Bruce S] and we headed back to Swains Reefs. Jason caught a great 150 kg marlin, quite a feat from a boat such as Kanimbla. Adam Houghton [the deckie] spent 15 to 20 minutes lying prostrate on the duckboard of Kanimbla in a successful attempt at reviving the marlin. For this monumental effort [waves over the top of him in the dark] Adam has earnt his place in the “Super Seaman’s Hall of Fame” A certificate is being prepared to mark this historical event.

Thursday was windy at the Swains and we only caught a few trout and lippers as well as fewer Spaniards. One of the deckies, Les, gave me a few good clues on catching Trout and Lippers around bombies – he had worked on a ‘live trout’ boat for 18 months prior to coming onto Kanimbla.

Friday saw about as much wind but a bigger swell and even less fishing then a return to the mainland. The return journey was pleasantly relaxed as the wind and swell had sufficient easterly component to be on our stern rather than the bow. We had the usual group photos taken. Jason was awarded the “fish of the trip”, Pete gave everyone a VB ‘T shirt’ and, we reminisced about the previous 6 days. We each ended up with about 35 packs and a couple of whole fish.

In summary it was another great trip and Bruce S, the crew and, boat all returned to their expected very high standards. Clearly, Geoff has resumed his sacrifices to the weather gods after a few ‘ordinary’ trips.

A few of us have the coordinates of the “hot spot” in our GPS Machines and when Kanimbla next goes to the NE cay of Saumarez it would not be surprising to see a few dories head over the horizon in a westerly direction!!!!!!! Perhaps we will need to take a bit of extra fuel or just wait to be picked up after we run out of gas –HMMMM!!

Bruce.