Got to the ramp about 1400 hours to find the carpark absolutely empty, this was going to be a good day I thought the whole river to myself.
Headed straight up to Goat Island on a near full tide to get the good goss from the man himself the river. You could see the river had been given a flush from the recent rains and there was some distinct colour changes at a few of the creek mouths. I was surprised to be met at the pontoon by Hotdog and his new love (let’s just call her furball). Kai said there had not been too many boats on the river but the serious fishos who had ventured out had managed to find the odd fish or two. He said the hot spot was Manton Creek so after a few beers with him that was going to be my first stop.
1600 hours saw me is some magic colour at the mouth Bald Hill creek as it was bucketing down and I wasn’t going to get to Manton without getting drenched. Stuck out a couple of live baits while I flicked a rubber around slowly bouncing it across the bottom. Didn’t take long and I had a magic powertail grab my rubber and fight like a demon all the way to the boat, boy they just don’t give in easy do they?
Starting to feel a bit depressed after about 20 minutes of torrential down pour it started to ease and this was the sign the fish must have been waiting for as one of the live baits started to take a bit of a run. 
“Easy easy” I kept saying “let him take” after it had taken about 15/20 meters of line I struck and set the hook, out of the water came a nice Barra and three leaps later I had him at the side of the boat beaten. A nice 72cm December Barra, “YES I’m ON THE BOARD” and one for the esky. 
I rebaited and chucked it back out into the line of the colour change and must of chucked it straight onto the nose of a fish as it hit the water and took off like a freight train taking about 20 meter of line before about 85/90 cm of Barra speared out of the water . It’s times like these you scream at the deckie get the net ready, no deckie sh….t, trying to fight the fish and get the net ready was a comedy caper so I ended up just concentrating on fighting the fish. Beaten and lying beside the boat I used the bogga grips to lip her and pull a nice 83cm aboard. A quick photo and off she swam to fight another day. Happy with my afternoons work I pulled up stumps and headed back to see Kai before making the trek home a happy man. What a Christmas day, a game of golf in the morning, big lunch and top it of with an afternoon on the water and catching fish.
Cheers Grumpy
)
Dave M
