After a long period of no fly fishing, I finally managed to get back into the water, and was more excited than ever. The main reason being that during the week I joined the Natal Fly Fishers Club (NFFC). This means that I now have access to large selection of club waters holding everything from trout, to yellows, to bass. However after all of this I still ended up fishing the salt, and will have to wait a while until I can get out to those waters, since most of August is already booked up for me.
Onto the fishing report…
On Saturday morning Nick and I headed down to the harbour with the hopes of picking up a Garrick or two. Low tide was at 12pm, but being springs, it was pulling out quickly so we opted to get down there at 9am. My main concern was that the wind had been blowing hard all week, and on Saturday morning it was a south wester, which is not known for good fishing. None the less we were eager and decided on a new strategy.
After chatting to a local tour operator we organised to be dropped off on the center bank, meaning we could fish a part of the harbour we don’t normally have access to. His first boat was only going out at 10am, so we had an hour to kill, and spent part of it throwing a fly by the concrete block. I was in luck and managed to pick up a decent East Coast Sole on my fifth cast. This of course lead to some mocking from Nick, since he claimed I wasn’t targeting the game fish, but still, the score was now 1-0.
We then got dropped off on the center bank and got down to some more serious fishing. I flicked my fly out 5 meters in front of me and preceded to strip line into my basket for my first cast. I lifted my rod to cast, and ON DAD!! I couldn’t believe it, a nice size Gurnard from at my feet. The score…2-0. Nick was now yelling that bottom feeders don’t count.
A few cast later and I was into something else. There was little to no fight, and for a while I thought it was a bag. Then, much to my amazement, I pulled out a large swimming crab, which had actually eaten the fly. And then more mockery from Nick about catching crabs.
We continued fishing as the south-wester picked up, eagerly awaiting the tide to swing to a pushing. I managed another Sole and another Gurnard…the score…4-0. Nick was getting a bit agitated at this point, and then finally, he was on. And low and behold, it was a crab. Finally the mockery was reversed.
At this point the tide swung to a pushing and we were hoping to get into some bigger fish. Sadly this wasn’t the case and we battled for another hour before calling it quits. I managed one more small gurnard, leaving the final score at 5-0.
After the fishing we had our customary beer and grabbed a quick bite from Casbah which we ate on the beach. All in all a good days fishing, and a new harbour champion!