Blown off Brooms Head

Author: josh

Category: Brooms Head

Published on Saturday, 24 September 2011 14:21

Written by Josh

When I turned up a little later than planned at Brooms Head I fully expected to see a collection of boat trailers parked and numerous boats on the water. Instead both were devoid of angler life and I found myself wondering if they knew something I didn't. Last time I checked, forecast was for low seas and winds. Well... at least the seas were low. Winds on the other hand, were howling. Today was the first time in a long time that I had trouble from keeping a CD Rapala from swimming at first, the sheer speed of my northward run was just too great for it. In what seemed like just a few minutes after launching I'd sailed to where I wanted to be, furled the sail and began drift fishing. 

Unlike last weekend (when I was caught unprepared for winds like this) this time I was equipped with a drogue and I deployed it immediately, and then pulled the sail down completely. Although these actions helped matters, it was still difficult to get anything other than my chunkiest Banjo eye bucktail jigs to the sea floor. One of them was taken to and immediately swam under some kind of snag and eventually rubbed off. I wasn't off to a good start. What was worse was that I was moving rapidly, slowly but surely being blown towards Shelleys Beach. If winds stayed this way it might soon become tough to get back so when I determined this I rigged up and set sail to the south, trolling a pillie pattern CD magnum behind me. As I tacked my way back on broad reaches I managed 3 hook ups along the way, each of them snapper, two of them worth keeping, one of them a beauty.

By the time I'd reached a northern point that would give me a good reach back to the beach winds were starting to calm down a bit and I would have stayed out and fished on if I hadn't already satisfied my ambitions. One for me, one for my neighbours, final footage for YCKFS episode 6 shot, mission accomplished.

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