We were down at Leigh and Corina's place on the coast - Brulee, a 2-hour drive through the mountains and forests. Leigh's version of R and R turned out to be pretty tiring. We were up at 5.30 am ready for a spot of dawn fishing from some nearby rocks.A red sky, quickly turning pale, with clouds and a rainbow in the distance. we lined up with about 6 others on the edge of the rocks and I followed Leigh's direction, casting into the ocean and hoping for something to happen. And for quite a while it didn't; while men (and this does seem to be a man thing) either side of us were hauling them in we got the impression fish were nibbling the bait off our hooks and laughing at us. Then, just as we were about to pack up, I had a bite, there was a short tussle as Leigh shouted orders to me for reeling it in, and a decent sized pacific salmon came to land. As we were leaving, I looked down from our rock into the water and saw a sting-ray several feet across swimming by, with a small mottled shark (Leigh: 'that kind very rarely give a serious bite'!) for companionship. Only as we were back in the car did Leigh reveal that not only is rock fishing Australia's no 1 sport, it is also it's most dangerous. Apparently, 'You can always tell the best fishing spots by the memorial plaques for people who've been washed away'!
Back at the holiday home, the fish (and another we acquired) were duly photographed and put in the smoker to cook. Leigh had more planned. Body boarding in the surf turned out to be one of the many things I'm not terribly good at (and, at my age, why should I be?) - there's clearly a knack to picking when to hurl yourself into the wave and to balancing your weight on the board. I felt I'd done enough for the day just be surviving, but Leigh took me for a lesson in surf-casting after lunch before we hit the road and arrived back in Quenbeyan in time for dinner with Bonni and Peter.
Holding the fish close to the camera makes them look bigger.
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