Wivenhoe Dam 12th & 13th fishathon and drinkathon.

It was so great to finally meet some more members of AKFF at the camping/ fishing weekend at Wivenhoe Dam. I arrived at approx 9.45am on Saturday to see that there were two members already there, Yaker and Hagar. They informed me that there was somebody out fishing already, not sure who they were but found out later they scored some catfish and a bass. One by one they started to turn up fully loaded for a great weekend of socialising and yakfishing.

We then started to setup camp so we could have a few coldies while we waited for any more members to turn up. It was agreed to start a bbq to have a sausage and a few more beers before hitting the water. We all eyeballed Dallas's new prowler kayak, very nice indeed. It looks very fast and stable and he was rapt with it's performance. Approx 2pm we all rigged up and hit the water after having to carry the yaks down the hill to launch. We went in different directions, Ross and Tony had to leave early so thay stayed close to the launch area, as some of us went trolling for the cliff area where Yakatak caught his big bass before. I didn't get one hit, not even a catfish which you usually are always guaranteed of catching. I did hear a big yeehhhaaa from behind to see Yakatak finishing of the last of a fight with a very nice yellowbelly. It was kept and into Karl's bag for dinner. Not even 15 minutes later he was on again, he called me over to see the biggest catfish I have ever seen. It would have measured an easy 60cm with one big fat ugly head. A quick photo and it was released.

We all kept fishing but no bass at all, members were still catching catfish, good fun but not what everybody was hoping for. We all headed in by approx 5pm to start dinner and a few more coldies. Karl offered to share a fillet of the yellowbelly with me and it was beautiful, marinated in garlic, ginger and chilli. A first for me to sample freshwater fish. Dodge and Headman had a roast dinner which went down well, from what Dodge was raving about. We all sat around and talked the night away. What a way to spend the weekend with likeminded yak fishos. We all hit the sack at approx 10pm to a very vocal snoring session coming from a certain tent. I didn't sleep to well and was up very early, grabbed some weetbix and wheeled the yak down to launch at approx 5.30am. It was very very foggy but not to cold. I paddled out hopping to find the land opposite from the camping grounds but somewhere got lost and confused. So I just kept paddling around and trolling. I finally stopped on the bank and stretched my legs and waited for the fog to clear a bit to see what direction to head. About 10 minutes later, Hagar was paddling along and said that he got lost as well. So I joined him and he pointed out a stump he new that would put us in area that we new and continued fishing. Hagar/Gary said they were going to get the rescue boat to come and find me. I should have purchased that GPS/fishfinder combo after all.

I spent the next hour sitting above a good school of fish and tried every thing form softplastics, ice jigs, jackall mask vibes and lures but not one touch. I could see the ice jig working on my sounder right in the middle of the school of fish but not one touch. So started heading back and got one very big hit on the Boomerang 65mm blackbettle, but didn't stay connected. I trolled all the way back and did some some jigging in the deeper parts but nothing. I landed about 10.30 and went up to get packed up for the trip home. I was the only one who didn't catch anything. As of Sunday lunchtime, Dodge caught a catfish, Headman caught another catfish (those 2 mates were out to beat each other), Dallas caught a nice yellowbelly to christin the new yak and also caught another catfish, yakatak caught another yellowbelly and couple more catfish, yakatak was on a roll. The rest of the gang will supply more details when they venture in tomorrow morning.

It was a great weekend with a future trip planned at Cressbrook Dam in approx October. All the guys I meet were really great and looking forward to many more weekends away in the future.