Just got back from four days fishing at the Jackson river located on the west coast of cape york. There was six guys and three boats that made the trek from Thursday Island which is about a three to four hour trip one way depending on the weather. (About 70 miles)

As luck would have it we had great weather saturday morning when we departed at 6am. the wind had dropped off from the usual 20kt south-east trade winds and the water glassed out for the trip across endevour strait to the coast of the mainland.

We arrived at the camp site mid morning to set up camp set our crab pots and start exploring the river. by mid afternoon we had bagged two barra but both under size at 55cm and 58cm. That was all the barra we managed for therest of the trip but the amount of cod, trevally, jacks and salmon all but made up for it. The mud crabbing was slow but we manged to get a feed.

While trolling around for some macks one afternoon we stumbled upon some good looking reef structure in 6m of water that we decided was worth more investigation after a quick return to camp for some dinner. Well that night will be remembered but all of us as one of the best sessions on goldies (finger mark) as everyone over here calls them. with the biggest at around 6kg. all up between four of us we landed 30 goldies in about an hour and a half. the following night at the same spot saw us enter battle with a school of cobia with 4 landed and 3 lost in the space of 40mins. The biggest cobia was around 8Kg.

All in all a great trip and we are in the planning stage for another trip down to the cape. the highlight of the trip was stopping at a bommie off shore from the cottrell river on the way home where the golden trevally were in plague propurtions munching anything dropped in the water from soft plastcis jigged 2m below the boat to fly fishing. I of the boys also landed a 20kg plus cobia from the same spot on a hand line.

We also had fun feeding the three resident groppers at the mouth of the Jackson and these fish were huge easy 1.5m long and as round as 44 gallon drums.

Had a great trip and will post the pics when i get them from my deckies camera

Cheers Pagey

Excellent report Pagey. Sounds like life's tough at the top!

Heading over to East Cape York for the annual pilgrimage end of Oct-start of Nov. Normally is Barra-trev-queenie-cod expedition but this years is going to have a more bluewater feel, if we get the weather... Awesome spot the Cape. Love it

Get those pics up mate am keen to see the goldies and cobia.

well as promised here are the photo's sorry for the delay.

Well Done and good report..

Nice work Pagey, good pics mate

Hows that "Little Booper" sheesh.. No crocs in the Jackson?

Bigger Balls than me....

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nice work, those little poly tuff tenders are beaut little boats.



geez Ray, you would have had your eyes hanging out if you had have seen me in my 9 foot inflatable at the mouth of buffalo creek night fishing last year....

mind you I was blind drunk...and you would have to be. Never again, until someone dares me to do it again

Yeh the 16 footers think they are great, "tender" morsels in them too

Yeh KK that would have had me shaking my head, croc traps and all... wouldve made a great photo though while sculling VB tinnies, "man has had enough of life" in the NT news...

I was a bit more gung ho until I witnessed one S. Irwin pulled 5 crocs over 15 feet out of out favorite fishing hole in the Cape (including a 16'2" monster, biggest he ever caught) was unbelievabel and a real eye opener as we hadn't seen one over 10 feet, day or night with the spottie, and we had been there for ten days, three years running...

I'll post a pic if I can dig one out.

Rest assured though mate, I will not be daring you to do it again, the FFF would suffer a great loss and Polycraft would lose it's best salesman...

if you come out to the little howard on saturday you will probably see me swimming in a low tide hole, drunk, bored and too hot.

but i'll be right. no crocs out there

but i am much safer than the bloke i am fishing with. he is dead set mad

When I was young and incredibly stupid me and my brother used to swim across the Daly up in the fresh and one weekend we even took the boogie board out for a run That was before we pulled out a 14 and a 13 footer within two weeks right where we swam across. Now I don't even like reaching too far out for my cherabin pot rope

Yeh crazy stuff we do Matty.... You just never really know whether they are there or not... here's the pics of our "croc hole"

and the link to the work he did on that trip, needless to say our carefree attitude is since long gone!

http://www.crocodilerescue.com/nesbit_river/main.html

If you scroll to the bottom there's a PDF downloadable report of the croc tracking.. Amazing stuff, they really get around and surprisingly enough travel on land frequently.. though these are remote crocs and hardly see anyone, guess the ones in the territory are a bit more wary about going for a stroll ???
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Oh and KK, nah no crocs in there at all

Get some pics... just don't get eaten....! Would scar everyone for life!

awesome pictures there mate with the great man himself at work. catch that up wont see me taking a chance with that big saltie RIP steve.