We’ve just enjoyed our first family fishing trip at Hinze Dam for some time, with old friend Steve Wilkes from Sports Tuition.
We had a ball. All five of us made the trip: me, Jeanine, James, Jack and Juliana. A full house of J’s, something we only realised after we’d named the last one, five year old Juliana. Saved money with initials on the school gear.
The weather had been pretty rainy, so we headed down to the Western Boat Ramp at Hinze Dam early on a Sunday morning to beat the expected afternoon storm and gave Steve a hand to unload the boats.
From our home in the inner southern suburbs of Brisbane, the trip took only an hour to the boat ramp car park. So there was no calls from the back seat of “are we there yet”, which was a blessed relief.
There’s a clean toilet block near the ramp, which the kids took full advantage of, while a cranky quintet of domestic roosters gave them a noisy welcome. The crowing roosters appeared out of nowhere and the departed similarly. They certainly put the “free” into “free range”.
Once aboard two tinnies, Steve took us straight to a sunken island outlined by dead trees, only a few minutes from the ramp and we started fishing from two boats, with live freshwater shrimp.
The kids had a ball watching Steve and I bait the hooks. Hey, those little guys can give you quite a nip! And I am not a sook.
All of them, even me, caught some small mouthed bass. James and I in a separate boat, pulled in the Jack Sharp of the day, a local monster bass who measured 49 centimetres on the Truth Mat.
Jack and Juliana with their Mum and Steve in the other tinnie, pulled in 20 or so bass in the next two hours, as we motored around the island with the electric outboards, tying up to a dead tree wherever we felt so inclined.
The fishing there is all catch and release, with warnings about high mercury content ensuring the local fisherpersons don’t have any problems with this restriction. We usually catch and release anyway, so no problem for us.
When the rains came after a couple of hours, the kids’ attention span had just about been reached and we headed for home, with a diversion to the Rock and Roll Bakery at Stones Corner for a chunky steak pie and cappuccino lunch for Jeanine and myself, pies and brownies for the boys and a sausage roll and a pink cupcake for Juliana. It had to be pink, trust me.
Fortunately, with boys, some tomato sauce actually made it onto the pies, as well as being smeared across greedy faces and wiped off onto fishing shirts.
It was all good. And so home to showers for all and a nap for your humble scribe.
Great day. We all had fun. Give it a try.
You can find Steve at http://www.sportstuition.com.au/