[eFishent]

G'day to all, I've yakked with a couple of you guys on fishnet before and the last few months have enjoyed the standard of discussion on akff, albeit sitting in the background. I live in Essendon, Victoria and predominantly fish for natives in the Murray and Gunbower creek around the Cohuna/Echuca area.

I have a Bass boat which I had also hoped to use in the Bay and particularly on the Maribyrnong river, however the nearest place to launch is Williamstown or Altona which is a half an hour drive and can be a one to two hour saga to launch because of ramp traffic. Living a few hundred metres from the rowing club I thought it would be ideal to launch a canoe or kayak in probably ten minutes or less.

At last years fishing show I saw the Hobie kayaks for the first time and have wanted one ever since. A mate at work and his brother have also become interested. A few weeks ago I commenced discussions with Scott Lovig (HobieVic), who has been an absolute pleasure to deal with, and have ordered two Hobie Sport fisherman for my mate and his brother and two 2007 Outbacks for myself and my wife/kids/mates. We've also ordered the sail kit.

My mate and his brother have ordered "sand" and I've ordered "Khaki" (the new sand color) and am still deciding between another Khaki or the new "Moss" for the second one. I hope to pick them up this Friday otherwise it will be next week.

I'm now looking forward to the fit-out or should I say conversion to fishing battleship. "Of course I'll post some pics as I go"

Now for my first question. I want to fit a rear seat for my 5 & 2 year old to sit. I'm thinking of checking out the Gator hatch for size to see if it will fit on the very rear of the outbacks. Has anyone else got any ideas?

Cheers, Robbo

 

[Davey G]

G'day Robbo.

Welcome to the forum, I'm sure that you'll love it. Your story sounds similar to a lot of others on AKFF that they were tired of launching their tinny's etc and wanted something easier and quicker. I'm sure you'll also be rapped with the Hobie - have heard nothing but good reports from the growing Hobie fraternity....

Re the seat for your littl'uns. My 6 year old daughter can sit comfortably in the rear hatch of my yak or alternatively she can also sit between my legs and still allow me to paddle quite OK. Not sure about the Hobie pedal arrangement with a little one between your legs, but the 5 year old will probably love riding in the rear tankwell.

I have a 1 year old who hasn't come out yet, but again I'll be sitting him between my legs as I reckon any kids younger than 3 or 4 you'd be worried about them diving / falling overboard. This would probably still be the case with the Gator seat.. (I thought that only fitted Malibu kayaks??)

Best of luck with it, and hope to hear of your first catch real soon.

 

[Guest]

efishent, welcome to the site and welcome to the ever growing Hobie 'club'.
I bought my Hobie from Scott as well and I have to agree - he was really good to deal with. I'll be buying from him again for sure.

You might find that the Outback is too large for the kids. I'm not a big guy and it was too big for me. By that I mean, I'm not heavy enough to have it sitting in the water properly (one needs to be around 75kg or thereabouts for it to sit well). I did trial an Outback (and loved it) but found the Sport to suit my weight a lot better. Rule of thumb is smaller or lighter people are better off with the Sport, heavier guys are better off with the Outback.

The missus feels like a Hobie 'widow' now, constantly telling me I love it more than her. She'll shut her trap when I buy her one of her own though - I'll be picking up 2 Adventures (maybe even the new Adventure Island) in the near future and my Sport will then be relegated to river trips and in a few years down the track, will be inherited by my son.

 

[RedPhoenix]

Unfortunately, due to the change in ownership of this web site and the lack of response by the owners to my requests to remove my email address from all administrative-level notifications and functionality, I have decided to remove my posts on AKFF. Thank you for the great times, the fantastic learning experiences and the many many fish. If you are desperate for the old content of this particular post, it is available below base64 encoded and bzip2 compressed.

Red.

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[eFishent]

Hi Red, I'm looking forward to fishing in the Outback around Gunbower; there's some very old, extra snaggy spots that i can't get the boat into that I'm sure have been home to some large, old cod.
Hi 5th, The new 2007 Outback has a different hull shape (flatter) that addresses the previous issue of "tippyness" with lightweight paddlers. I thought of getting either the sport or revolution as the second yak but I want to use both of them for camping, carrying the kids around from time to time and sailing, so stability and load carrying capacity were primary considerations.
Dave, re: the Gator hatch, you're right it is from the Malibu, I was hoping to adapt it to the rear most section of the Outback. I'm wanting to have a child seat that provides a little more security and comfort than sitting on the tank well and I want any modifications to look as OEM as possible. I was thinking also of using another kayak seat or a smaller version and rigging that up on the rear tank well. At least it could be easily unclipped when not in use. I guess it will all make sense when I've got it so i can start playing around and testing ideas out.

Cheers, Robbo

 

[PoddyMullet]

Hiya Robbo, welcome aboard. I'd love to see a report of a big old cod...I keep seeing em on the front of fishing mags....but never seen one in the flesh by any of the boaties I've stumbled across. Ya more than welcome along on a salt bash if ya keep an eye out in fishing trips

 

[Sunhobie]

Robbo, Get Scott to show you a regular Hobie paddle kayak seat. With just a little modification, you could set one up behind your seat for the little fella.