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Home » Pleasurable Vignettes
Tangos with Tuna in the Land Down Under
Long Tails in Short Water
By Tom Gorman
A circle of salty froth 15 yards wide marked the bait busting school of long tail tuna: our welcome committee on the first morning of a visit to a remote corner of Queensland, Australia. We were in less than 20 feet of water, half a mile from the red bauxite rock face along the shoreline south of Weipa (pronounced wee-pa), on the western side of northern Queensland’s Cape York Peninsula.
Gulls and terns dive bombed from above, tuna slashed bait from below, and much, much larger predators lurked around the edges of the melee. These long tails, unlike many we’d meet later in the week, were not at all boat shy. We tossed our white clousers - the go-to fly in Weipa - into the fray and had a double hook up in no time.
Moments later, a huge gray shape sliced through the tuna ruckus - a bull shark not much smaller than the 16-foot skiff we were fishing from. Whoa! This big dude appeared to be filter feeding on 20-pound tuna. Another shark appeared alongside the skiff, this one a bronze whaler and a mere shrimp, at roughly nine feet in length.
Joe got his tuna into the boat and released it. Mine, after taking me into the backing on a blistering first run, followed by spirited second and third runs, was beginning to tire. I was gaining line. He was on the way in, maybe 15 yards to go. Suddenly the line tore out again at mach speed, and my micron backing began dwindling fast. Shark City.
Dave revved the engine and we set off in pursuit, hoping to save my fly line, which we just managed to do before breaking off. I made a mental note about the virtues of knuckle-saving anti-reverse reels at moments like this, glad that I was fishing with my Islander AR2 and still had the fingers on my left hand intact.
Sharks in the Weipa area are abundant, clever and big. Bronze whalers, bull sharks, and tiger sharks are common. They key on sportsfishing boats chasing schools of tuna, anticipating an easy meal. During four days of fishing there, getting "sharked" became a regular part of our vocabulary.
Weipa, population about 2,000, is roughly two thirds of the way up the western side of Queensland, Australia’s, remote Cape York Peninsula, an area famous for barramundi as well as saltwater and freshwater crocodiles. Cape York is Australia’s northeastern tip, and across the Arafura Sea lies the Great Barrier Reef, the Coral Sea and some of the most fabled marlin fishing waters in the world. Here on the western side, we were fishing in the Gulf of Carpentaria and the mangrove-lined estuaries of various local rivers: the Pine, Nomenade, Hay, Embley, etc.
Weipa is well known as a launch point for live-aboard mother ship expeditions which sail up and down the western coast of Cape York, using towed skiffs to fish estuary and coastal waters.
We opted to fish the Weipa area from a base in comfortable air-conditioned cabins at the seaside Weipa Camp grounds (www.campweipa.com) fishing with veteran guide Dave Bradley (www.billabongsportsfishing.com), who is based in the Cairns area but fishes Weipa regularly in season. The newer cabins are air conditioned, with hot water showers, microwave, stove, gas BBQ and refrigerators. They sleep up to four and cost roughly US $65 per night. Within short walking distance is a supermarket, liquor store, several restaurants, the post office and bait and tackle shop.
Despite wetter than normal weather, the fishing during the first week of May was outstanding. In four days we caught 20 species of fish on the fly, including tuna to 20 pounds, mostly close in to shore or in estuary environments. Dave’s 16-foot welded aluminum skiff is powered by a quiet 40 horsepower Yamaha 4-stroke, which easily enabled us to range 30 or more miles north or south of Weipa each day, as conditions dictated. A typical fishing day began at 7 am as we trailered the skiff to the nearby local boat ramp and set off, usually returning 12 hours later to camp for dinner, socializing and the daily exchange of fish stories with campground neighbors.
Other than being known as Home of the Barramundi, Weipa’s other main claim to fame is that it is home to the world’s largest bauxite mine, owned and operated by Comalco, a unit of Australian mining giant Rio Tinto. Access for most visitors is by a 90-minute flight from Cairns on a De Havilland Dash 50 turboprop operated by Quantaslink, which runs at least daily and sometimes more frequently to and from Weipa. During our visit, the road access option from Cairns had been temporarily wiped out by Cyclone Larry, requiring a matter of months for major rebuilding efforts.
Apart from abundant long tail tuna, another hallmark of Weipa fishing is sight fishing the inshore beaches and flats for a host of species, including various types of trevally (golden, brassy, giant, diamond), threadfin and blue salmon, barramundi, oxeye herring (Australian tarpon), queenfish, and permit.
Prevailing winds in Queensland’s dry season months (May - October) tend to blow in an offshore direction, which is good news for inshore fly fishers. The rainy season is typically November through March/April, so prime fishing time is May through June.
During our visit, untypically squally and overcast weather prevailed, so our inshore sight fishing opportunities were limited. Still, we had plenty of action while wading and fly fishing in shallow water around rocky points where the water was roiled by the wave action.
Only shallow wading during daylight hours in relatively clear water is recommended, due to the presence of large saltwater crocodiles. While wading, anglers are encouraged to keep a careful lookout to the front as well as the back.
At one point, our guide, Dave Bradley, signaled me, which I mistook to be a sign that were moving onto another spot. Later I realized he was warning me that I was wading too far out in murky water, presenting myself as possible crocodile bait. I reverted to ankle deep wading and still caught plenty of fish, which were thick in the very shallow water, feeding among schools of jelly prawns and other bait.
The crocodile warning gave me a heads up and additional incentive to keep looking over my shoulder: a great excuse for taking Lefty’s advice and continuously checking the size and shape of my casting loop.
(Fly casting instructors take note: the mere hint of the presence of crocodiles will ensure that even the most intransigent forward-looking fly casters will be looking backwards with great frequency, checking both for crocs and on their casting loops).
Between the crocs and the sharks, my buddy Joe was advised by all and sundry to put his diving agenda on hold while in the Weipa area. No argument there. Deadly poisonous box jellyfish, seasonal visitors, offer yet another very good reason to stay on dry land or in the boat.
One piece of advice Dave had offered me in advance of our visit was to tie plenty of white clousers in 1/0, 2/0, and 3/0 sizes with various different eye sizes and sink rates. This turned out to be very solid advice. White clousers worked everywhere in Weipa: for tuna, inshore along the beach, in the estuaries, on rocky points - you name it.
Other patterns which produced very well were crease flies, gurgles; gold bombers tied bend back style, deceivers, and surf candies. White, white and chartreuse, white and yellow are the winning combinations, year in and out.
Intermediate fly lines were the best all around choice since none of the fish were holding in very deep water. The fish were not leader shy, although this would have been different if we’d had calm and sunny weather enabling us to fish permit in skinny water.
The area boasts quite an array of bird life, including a large black and white heron-type bird called a abiru, colorful lorikeets and bee eaters, oyster-catchers, kingfishers, sea eagles, ospreys and rahming kites. We spotted a wild boar on the beach one morning which must have tipped the scales at 300 pounds. Boar hunting is sufficiently popular in Queensland to support at least two specialized magazines, one of which is called Bacon Busters. A lucky visitor might also catch sight of the rare and protected manatee-like dugong.
A few words of advice for first-time visitors to Australia: First, the Australian Customs authorities are extremely strict in prohibiting food products of any sort being brought into their country, either in checked or carry-on baggage. Their efforts are supported by expert sniffer dogs. Moral: leave it at home or eat it during your flight.
Second, Aussie guides and skippers share a deeply rooted superstition about the bad luck impact of bringing bananas on board any fishing boat. With all due respect to Chiquita, leave the bananas on shore or risk having them tossed overhead by the skipper/guide.
Third, be prepared to bone up on some colorful new Australian vocabulary. Some examples: snodger refers to a good-sized specimen of a fish (e.g. a snodger of a coral trout), "don’t come to raw prawn with me" means "don’t bullshit me", a technicolor yawn means to vomit; and so on.
For lovers of diverse variety and productivity in an inshore flyfishing environment, plus the adventure element involved in remote and relatively undeveloped location, Weipa should be on your target list of destinations. Consider combining it with and offshore trip on Cape York’s eastern coast.
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