We left Exmouth at 9.30am on Tuesday morning with about 530 miles in front of us and hoping to get to Broome by the weekend. The weather looked about as good as it was going to get. We had to tack our way up through the Dampier Archipelago, motoring and sailing into North Easterlies at 10 up to 15plus knots. There were oil/gas rigs everywhere (not surprising really) and many many islands - looking forward to exploring this area on our way back down.But for now just pushing through.
We cleared Legendre Island (tip of the Archipelago) late on Wednesday night with the next target Port Hedland. We got across to PH on about 4pm the next day, lots of big ships here with PH being the busiest harbour in the Southern Hemisphere. I was glad of our Automatic Identification System (AIS) which shows us what ships are around, how fast and where they are going. But more importantly they can see us.
With days of sailing ahead of us the focus turned to fishing again. I had limited time left to prove my manhood before our friends Monica and Paul get on the boat at Broome. Paul is a world champion fisher person, and for me to have travelled 1200 odd miles up the WA coast without catching a fish would be a failure I could never live down.
I put out a line with a beautiful bright squid rig on it. If I was a fish, I could not resist. A few hours later and Bang, something took the line, but Ping. Lure was gone. I said to Nic, we need a wire trace, some piano wire or something. Unfortunately we didn't have any wire fishing trace on board. Nic said how about using my old G-string? I had a bit of a double take, but then realised she was talking about a spare G-string on her guitar. Perfect!
I set it up with a nice shiny lure, and started trolling. Unfortunately no luck. Finally on Saturday morning on our final run to Broome - I said to Nic lets have one more go - I have to get a fish. Lo and Behold - Bang, we got a fish on! I slowed the boat, started reeling it in, it was hooked - no getting off this time - Nic's G-string was doing the trick. As I pulled it closer to the boat I was saying to Nic, gee this is a good fish. It feels big, and then looking up saw a shark on the end of the line - oh no. Then it was gone, but there was still a bit of a fish. A half a spanish Mackerel to be exact - chomped in half.
So there you have it. The unluckiest fish in the world, caught by me and then chomped by a shark before it could suffer the disgrace of me landing it. I pulled the remains on board, and we still got 4 nice big fillets. My manhood is intact, and we are having fish for dinner tonight! Safely moored now in Gantheame Bay and looking forward to catching up with our Broome friends and picking up our crew over the next few days.
We cleared Legendre Island (tip of the Archipelago) late on Wednesday night with the next target Port Hedland. We got across to PH on about 4pm the next day, lots of big ships here with PH being the busiest harbour in the Southern Hemisphere. I was glad of our Automatic Identification System (AIS) which shows us what ships are around, how fast and where they are going. But more importantly they can see us.
With days of sailing ahead of us the focus turned to fishing again. I had limited time left to prove my manhood before our friends Monica and Paul get on the boat at Broome. Paul is a world champion fisher person, and for me to have travelled 1200 odd miles up the WA coast without catching a fish would be a failure I could never live down.
I put out a line with a beautiful bright squid rig on it. If I was a fish, I could not resist. A few hours later and Bang, something took the line, but Ping. Lure was gone. I said to Nic, we need a wire trace, some piano wire or something. Unfortunately we didn't have any wire fishing trace on board. Nic said how about using my old G-string? I had a bit of a double take, but then realised she was talking about a spare G-string on her guitar. Perfect!
I set it up with a nice shiny lure, and started trolling. Unfortunately no luck. Finally on Saturday morning on our final run to Broome - I said to Nic lets have one more go - I have to get a fish. Lo and Behold - Bang, we got a fish on! I slowed the boat, started reeling it in, it was hooked - no getting off this time - Nic's G-string was doing the trick. As I pulled it closer to the boat I was saying to Nic, gee this is a good fish. It feels big, and then looking up saw a shark on the end of the line - oh no. Then it was gone, but there was still a bit of a fish. A half a spanish Mackerel to be exact - chomped in half.
So there you have it. The unluckiest fish in the world, caught by me and then chomped by a shark before it could suffer the disgrace of me landing it. I pulled the remains on board, and we still got 4 nice big fillets. My manhood is intact, and we are having fish for dinner tonight! Safely moored now in Gantheame Bay and looking forward to catching up with our Broome friends and picking up our crew over the next few days.
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