Having held a fascination for me over many years, I finally got to try fly fishing for trout when I moved to Melbourne in August 2009 and discovered I was very close to the headquarters of the Southern Fly Fishers Club at Highett.
Most of my life I have been a salt-water fisherman of sorts … starting in 1943 at age 5, when my mother and new step-father commenced annual camping holidays. They would fish from beach and/or rocks at places like Jerry Bailey (renamed Shoalhaven Heads in 1955), Huskisson /Jervis Bay and Coledale …all great ocean fishing spots on the NSW (Australia) south coast.
Fishermen always have hard luck stories to tell, but before I write about my most recent here in Tasmania, I want to relate not so much ”fish that got away” stories … more situations and events that occurred while on fishing holidays with my parents.
In February 1943, living conditions in Australia were tough because of the Second World War. Basic foodstuffs such as butter, flour, sugar and tea were in really short supply and only available on the production of government-issued food ration coupons.
In my step-father’s 1929 “Bullnose” Morris Cowley tourer just like this: (picture, courtesy Unique Cars & Parts)
we drove from Bondi Junction to Jerry Bailey ... a long, tough drive given the design of that vehicle and the condition of the roads.
My parents were expecting the fish they caught to be our primary food source, supplemented with locally grown vegetables.
However it was stormy all the first week, which put paid to any fishing success, and the only vegetables available in the area were SWEDE TURNIPS!
For the whole damned week, our breakfast, lunch and dinner consisted of nothing but boiled Swede turnips and stale unbuttered bread. I have never again in my life been able to even LOOK at a Swede turnip without wanting to dry wretch!
The second of my “fishing” tales is one of great tragedy. My step-father married my widowed mother when I was 4 years old. By the time I was 11, I had come to loathe him (an attitude that did change in time I must confess)
He was a miserable penny–pinching man who intensely disliked children. Because of this, we never holidayed as a family during designated school vacation time … that would be more expensive and bring him into contact with “too many noisy bloody kids”.
So my parents’ annual vacation was always in February when schools had re-opened after the six week Christmas summer break. In February of 1948 and ‘49 we camped at Coledale, south of Sydney, north of Wollongong. (Picture courtesy Surf-Sisters)
On both occasions I was enrolled for three weeks at the Coledale Public School, which sat atop a cliff overlooking the beach-level camping ground. I hated it. The local children did not like “strangers”, and the school’s curriculum, handled by one teacher taking three grades, was totally foreign to me.
The worst part however, was sitting at my desk, looking out the window and seeing both my parents enjoying themselves fishing off the beach or the northern rocks!
They didn’t do this on Wednesday 23rd February 1949 however. The weather that day was absolutely filthy … gale-force winds, rain squalls, low cloud and ferocious waves pounding the beach.
And those on the beach that day were certainly not fishermen. They were frantically trying to launch the Coledale surf life boat into mountainous seas with little success. Several times the boat was flung high into the air and its hapless volunteer oarsmen thrown into the boiling ocean only meters from the beach. Further out to sea, just discernible in the haze, a Catalina flying boat circled low and dropped a flare.
Can't you can imagine the reaction to all this of a classroom of 9-11 year-olds. Not much school work done that day. Only late in the afternoon did we learn of the capsize during the night of the tiny (500-tonnes) blue-metal-carrying coastal freighter, “Bombo” (Photo courtesy United Divers- see link below)
with the loss of 12 of her 14 crewmen. I urge you to read the story of this disaster via this link. Use your computer’s zoom facility to make more readable the long lines of very small type. It is worth the effort because it is a true story, well told with a diver's video of the sunken Bombo.
I recently re-visited that school which occupied only 6 weeks of my life, but created memories that are forever burned into my brain.
But, back to my hard-luck trout fishing tale. Before coming to Tasmania I met Roger Butler, the principal of Red Tag Trout Tours who operates out of Kingston, a short drive south of Hobart.
He did a presentation on trout fishing in Tasmania to about 70 Melbourne enthusiasts at the Pro Angler shop in Bentleigh
After seeing what Roger was offering I couldn’t wait to get to Tasmania quickly enough to have him guide me to the big ones.
Now I must say at the outset that Roger’s service is not cheap … but let me assure you, he is worth every cent that he charges.
He picked Barbara and me up from Snug caravan park and drove us to a private dam of about 7 acres (3 hectares) with a depth of about 70 feet (20 meters) at the dam wall. The dam was well stocked with brown trout and rainbows.
Even though I had tuition with the Southern Fly Fishers, Roger first proceeded to revise what I had learned and demonstrated the correct techniques for casting under various situations.
He soon had me casting well 80% of the time and untangled the “wind knots” I created with the other 20%.
After a "Red Tag' lunch, we were ready to take on the "big ones". At the deep end of the dam Roger had me casting with a dry fly, and in the background, seated in a folding chair Roger had provided for her, Barbara had the camera aimed and focused right on the lure.
Without warning, there was a huge explosion of surface water and my line tautened. (In pic above, by enlarging to full screen, you can see the fish's big tail and half his body high out of the water) Through lack of experience with fly fishing gear, I failed to raise the rod butt vertically and haul on the line in left hand at the same time ... compounding my errors by taking backward steps. For a brief moment I felt this enormous strain on the line and then nothing ...
And it was all the more painful for both pupil and teacher when the series of shots Barbara had managed to capture were reviewed ... a much more skillful performance with camera than with rod. Score: Barbara One - Gordon Nil.
But that is the wonderful thing about fishing ... there is always tomorrow ...
Was I happy with the first day of Roger Butler's Red Tag Trout Tour? You bet your sweet bippy I was. I can't wait for the day we do the fast running stream section as soon as the weather is right.
And for this lucky couple touring Tasmania ... tomorrow a new day dawns
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