1. Rocky Creek
2. Claustral
3. To Be Decided

Resolution No. 2

I will catch the following game fish in 2006

1. Bonito
2. Mulloway
3. Yellowtail Kingfish
4. Tuna
5. Brown Trout

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Goal Species No 2 - Bonito - Goal Accomplished 25 April 2006
I've Finally Caught a Bonito - This species has been eluding me for ages, and I was stoked to finally catch one at Tomaree on Anzac Day, 2006.  Geeze it felt good.       Sea temp for Tuesday 25th April 2006 Image from CSIRO	My First Australian Bonito What a Beaut Bonito Australian Bonito Close-up

Tuesday 25th April 2006 - Bonito are a species that I have aspired to catch for years, but for one reason or another, landing a Bonito has eluded me - until today.  It was a morning of great highs, a major surprise, and a mate who wishes to remain anonymous won Lotto. 

My mate and I were a bit concerned by the prevailing conditions.  I checked beach on the way home late last night after work, and there was no way we were going to head to my usual spot to chase Kingfish- there was about two metres of swell running and it was coming straight from the south east.  It would be out of control down there today.  After my experience at Tomaree on Monday 17th April I figured that this place would be the best spot to fish by far.  The only way to deal with the crowds is to get there early and claim a spot before it gets too crowded.  So we left Belmont, bleary eyed but excited at 3am.

The "early" start turned out to not be early enough.  The car park was nearly full at 4.00 am.  Bugger.  I've been told that you really have to spend the night to get the best spots here - and now I believe it.  The walk in to Tomaree always gets my heart pounding.  It's pretty steep but by head torch your world shrinks to the size of the beam of your light.  I am just about over my flu, so it's a lot easier walking the track this morning than it was a week ago.

The whole platform has groups of blokes fishing for bait in the dark.  We find a free spot straight out the front, about mid way to the point, and start to berley and rig up.  The seas are a bit lumpy, but nothing too drastic.  It was a southerly swell, and the spot is quite sheltered from it, but not totally.  The day was pretty well identical to the day shown in Phil Atkinson's video - the Land Based Addiction.  It was overcast, dull and a bit windy. 

At first I tried to secure some live bait, and hooked up almost immediately.  And promptly reefed.  I rigged up again, and had exactly the same thing happen.  I had no trouble getting bites, and converting them to hook-ups.  I just couldn't land whatever it was I was hooking though.  My mate headed off to the far western corner where we had been successful catching slimy mackerel and an Australian Salmon last week.  It was just starting to get light and there were birds working frantically over bait.  I decided to change to a blue & white 85 gram raider.

What a good move that was.  After 3 or 4 casts the raider was stopped dead in it's tracks.  I was on well and truly.  I was using my MT7144 and Triton Speed Master 4 threadline, spooled with 10KG Trilene.  The fish took a solid five minutes to subdue, and it fought all the way to the platform.  I had the drag screwed up tightly, as I had been reefed while trying to catch bait earlier.  The fish could barely take line against the drag, and the MT7144 cushioned the lunges beautifully.  It arced around, shaking it's head and bumped away, until the fish eventually tired.  It fought all the way to the edge of the rock shelf, using it's body to advantage until I was able to surf it ashore on a wave.  I was extremely happy to see a couple of pounds of Australian Bonito emerge from the whitewash.  AT LAST !  Everyone I had told about my New Year's Resolution could hardly believe that I had not caught a Bonito before.  They are a very common species, but have managed to elude me until this morning. 

A couple of quick shots with the camera and I was back into it.  I showed my mate the fish, and he congratulated me before heading back to trying to catch slimy mackerel.  Next cast and I was on again!  You bloody beauty !  This fish fought almost the same style of fight as the first Australian Bonito, but was a bit lighter.  I got a real surprise to see this fish was no Bonito - I thought at first it was a spotted mackerel, but when I got a good look at it, it was actually a Watson's Leaping Bonito !  It was amazingly beautiful - bright green spotted back, stripes ventrally, canary yellow anal fin, jet black dorsal.  What a pretty little fish.  It would have been about 2lb's in weight. 


   
Watson's Leaping Bonito

I raced over to my mate to show him what he was missing out on.  He had managed to get a mado, and the slimys & yakkas were not co-operating.  He gave up on the bait catching and started to rig up a raider.  Next cast, and I was on again!  Another magnificent Watson's Leaping Bonito comes ashore.  I was ecstatic.  An Australian Bonito and two Watson's Leaping Bonito in three casts.  It was like the winter tailor run off the local beaches.  It was a diamond day, one that would not be easily forgotten. 



Australian Bonito (centre) and
two Watson's Leaping Bonitos.

I decided that I had enough fish for a feed, at it was time to get serious.  I was about to rig up my 24 KG outfit and put the next Bonito back out under a balloon.  I really like the taste of Bonito, and find their flesh tastes very similar to Spanish Mackerel.  To get the best out of them, I always bleed them and ice them down as quickly as I can.  So I decided to clean my three fish to ensure their eating quality before I rigged up.  I found the Australian Bonito was full of small bottle squid.  I never got to examine the stomach contents of the Watson's Leaping Bonito because my mate was knocked off his feet by a wave, and swept straight into the ocean.

We are all aware of the extreme potential danger of our sport.  Rock fishing has killed many people over the years, and is recognised as one of the most dangerous sports in the world.  We always do everything we can to minimise the risks - watch the sea before fishing, plan an escape route out of the water just in case an accident happens, and normally I carry an orange smoke flare and a rescue float/throw line.  Because it was Tomaree, and it has such an arduous walk in with heavy packs, buckets and rods, I had left the rescue gear at home deliberately to save weight.  The simple act of leaving this gear at home would have definitely resulted in my friend's death if it hadn't been for the sheer number of other blokes fishing on the platform and the 6 or 7 fishing boats nearby.  It was really that serious. 


The accident scene

It all happened in slow motion.  The wave was just another normal, run of the mill wave that had washed over the spot every few minutes, regularly all morning.  It wasn't even very big.  I watched it catch my mate from behind, and as he was bending forwards, I think mucking about with his lure, it overbalanced him.  He fell flat on his face, and simply bounced about twenty or thirty feet over the shelf and straight into the water.  I was waiting for him to stop, clinging to a ledge or boulder.  It was with horror I realised he was not going to stop and I was completely powerless to help him.  Absolute mayhem reigned.  Blokes materialized from everywhere, and three or four guys were wading right into the danger zone, reaching out from the very seaward edge of the platform, trying to get to him.  They were a lot closer to the accident scene than I was when it happened, and there simply was no room for me to get in to help.  It is incredible that three or four people weren't swept into the drink in the attempt to rescue him.  He is not a strong swimmer, and amazingly appeared to be uninjured.  He was dog paddling back towards the men on the edge.  I could hear them screaming at him to "stand up, stand up, stand up, you're on the ledge", but he couldn't manage it and was swept back into the ocean by the surge and out of their grasp.  All I could think of was to get some floatation to him, and to raise the alarm.  A bucket was thrown, and a wading pool and a rope.  I grabbed my mobile and rang 000 screaming for the helicopter.  After four minutes or so, my mate looked to be a goner.  I could hardly believe what I was seeing.  With all the running about and screaming, one of the nearby boats realised what had happened, and raced over.  Thank God they did, because he was finished.  They pulled him onboard and he collapsed to the floor, exhausted.  We all were screaming and yelling with relief.  His life was saved by the men on that boat without question.  We couldn't have done anything else from the rocks, and it would been a body recovery by the time the chopper could have made it from Newcastle.


Tomaree Heroes
Andy, Al & Mark

I believe that the three men who put themselves on the line to try to rescue my mate should be nominated for a Bravery Award.  They were so humble about it that they refused to allow me nominate them.  They only said that anyone would have done the same and don't worry about it.  To Alan, Andy and Mark, I would like to thank you for your selfless actions and bravery.  Not many people would have had the stainless steel balls to do what you blokes did. 

My mate was taken to the Shoal Bay Polyclinic, and suffered only a few minor abrasions and a mild case of hypothermia.  There were so many things working against his survival, that we both think that he won Lotto this morning, in the water off Tomaree.

There is normally an angel ring at the platform, and some idiot has stolen it.  It would have saved his life almost without question if it had been there.  If the accident had happened an hour later, there were no boats in the area, the outcome would have been totally different.  I'd left my flare and rescue line at home.  It was a very near thing.   

After it was all over I sat down and quietly went into shock.  I slowly packed up all my gear and my mates, and finished cleaning my fish.  The blokes slowly settled back down to fishing.  A 25 lb Northern Blue fin and a mackerel tuna were landed.  One of the blokes went back to fishing, right where my mate had been swept in - that's how small the waves were and how unlucky it was that he was swept in.  I had to leave, I just couldn't stand there and watch the guy fish. 

              

As you probably imagine, the solo walk out was long, slow and hard as I was burdened down with my mate's gear.  It gave me plenty of time to reflect on what could have been.  Back in the car park, I bumped into a few of the other guys that had been fishing this morning - I got a pleasant surprise to bump into Murph - I gaffed a nice King for him at our Kingfish spot a few months back (see Sat 11 March on the Kingfish page), and we all had a bit of a catch up and reflected on just how lucky my friend had been.