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Trip Reports Woody Head, Clarence coast Sailing out wide, Woody Head | Sailing out wide, Woody Head | | Print | |
| Written by Josh | |
| Monday, 05 October 2009 | |
Great sailing makes up for average fishing As I drove to Woody Head on Sunday morning I was hoping that the weather reports were right about wind conditions, but wrong about the swell. As it turns out they were right on both counts, so to some degree at least, the former made up for the latter. Among my primary objectives today, one of them succeeded and two of them failed. The success story occured just minutes after launch. That was to attempt attaching the tramps together on the water - I've rolled them up on the water but not yet rolled them back, so I decided to give it a try, succesfully. Although it was difficult to get the tramps taught (as I suspected) that turned out to be a blessing in disguise. The two failed objectives were finding & watching whales, as well as catching at least one noteworthy fish. Not only did I not catch a fish, in 4 hours of fishing, covering some 30km trolling in that time, I didn't even get a bite. Nor did I see so much as a humpback tail slap on the water. Of course, it's always difficult to see much when the swell is 8' high though. Despite the fact that I failed in those primary objectives, I succeeded in accomplishing the ultimate objective, which was to have fun. Even though conditions were heavily overcast and that I spent at least an hour getting rained on, it was pretty exhilarating sailing out there at times. Bolstered by a steady southerly I was able to tack out some 10km off shore and when the wind swung around into an easterly I was blessed with some great downwind action. There were a few moments where wind got under the tramps, but I think partly because they weren't as tight as I normally keep them, they were unable to catch wind anywhere near as effectively, and this did make the experience feel just a little bit safer when the going got rough. I did emerge from the water with a dark cloud hanging over my head, however, because somewhere along the line - and I don't know how for sure - I managed to lose my favourite rig - the Nitro Viper matched with a Diawa Certate reel. I suspect that I leaned back to place the rod in the rear tube and incorrectly assumed the but was seated within the tube when I released it. I was sailing at the time with following seas giving a turbo boost (doing over 12km an hour) so perhaps I was too heavily focused on the action. However it happened, it was definitely a bad way to end the day.  Where: Woody Head, Shark Bay, Clarence Coast, NSW |
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