Chapter 17: Grafton - IV

The next morning we were up and breakfasting well before eight.

“It’ll take us two hours to get near the islands and the sugar cane farms,” Evans explained. “There are a few areas I like to fish, about five kilometres up from the mouth. You can look at a chart when we’re on board Rainbow. It looks like a decent day for bream or flathead. We’ll keep some for dinner and release the others.”

I’d phoned Patrick when we got back to South Grafton. He’d be happy to help Olwen in any way he could. Rachel would help, too. They had tickets for ‘Traviata’ that week. Olwen could go with one of them. I then sent email to Willy to be forwarded to Olwen. Another deed accomplished.

I’d thanked Willy and showered and gone to bed early. And up early.

We took my two cans of diesel with us, as well as water, a chunk of cheese, half a salami-like sausage, and about a third of a loaf of bread. I took my last three chocolate bars and my hat from the Rover.

Once we had fuelled Rainbow and gotten underway, Evans hauled out a pair of charts of the Clarence, one from just above Mountain View to Cowper, where the South Arm forked off, the other from the fork to the ocean beyond Hickey Island. The first revealed that Grafton was the southernmost point of the river and that our trip this morning was due north-east. I remarked on it to Evans.

“The Clarence is singular in a lot of ways. There are over 100 islands between the Gorge and the Pacific. There are about a dozen on the Hastings. And even fewer on the Hawkesbury. But, to me, the most interesting thing is the dramatic change in the aquatic life. Not just the fish. The bass, the cod, the perch avoid brackish water. The grouper, the bream, the flathead avoid the sweet water. But the crabs and the shrimp stick to the salt, and the frogs and the yabbies to the fresh.”

“I’ll turn you into an ecologist!”

“Actually, you had an influence. Those lac beetles were impressive. And the tick diagnosis was really something: analysis cross-country by telephone. And then I heard about your helping the local police with a corpse. No, don’t shrug it off! You’re good at spotting little things. The candy wrapper when you got that scar on your left arm.”

“Enough! My ears are burning.”

“Perhaps. But you used your broad knowledge yesterday to help Olwen. Just problem-solving.”

We were making good time. There was no river traffic (yet?) and we’d passed only one or two sandy islands. Evans pointed ahead. “That’s the South Arm branching off ahead to starboard. Almost exactly 20 kilometres from where we were docked to Brushgrove on Woodford Island. We’ll keep to port in the main channel. Then in another ten kilos we’ll be at Munro Island and then we’ll pass the ferry between Woodford and Lawrence. It’s a cable ferry that runs 24-7. I always think it’s the marker of the Lower Clarence. I’ve never seen a bass downstream of Woodford. We passed the Ulmarra Ferry half an hour ago. I neglected to point it out. Willy does a better guided tour than I do.”

“It’s OK. So there are few bridges, eh?”

“Grafton and then the Pacific Highway at Harwood Island. The two ferries handle the traffic in between. If you want, I can rig a rod so you can troll for a while. We might be going too fast, but you never know what a hungry fish will snap at.”

“Sure. But weight it, so I’ll be down nearer the bottom.”

“Fine. Here, you man the helm.” I did, in a relatively open river, there didn’t appear to be much skill involved. He handed me a stouter rod than I’d had on Saturday with a lure attached. “I’m going to throttle back to between five and ten as we near MacLean. Then we’ll veer port into the North Arm.”

“You’re the captain, captain.”

“Very funny. I’ve taken a number of fish west and north of Harwood and Goodwood Islands.”

I let line out and we approached the south arm and veered left a bit... “That’s Ashby to port, opposite MacLean.”

“Right.” Just then there was a tug on my line and then a stronger one. I jerked my rod a bit and then reeled in. My catch proved to be a rather slimy, decaying glove.

“Ah!” said Evans, “The rare five-fingered inedible!”

“If the lure’s not too expensive, let’s just cut the line.” He did so and attached a new lure and only a single split sinker on the line, crimping it with his pliers.

“The lure’s a few dollars, the sinkers are about 1.5 grams and run under ten cents each. Including the diesel, dinner will cost less than yesterday’s lunch.”

We were almost past MacLean and angling towards the north arm, with Ulgundahi Island nearly straight ahead. I dropped the lure, let out line and waited.

“You can’t get a glove every time,” Evans said.

“Well, I had my hopes. Maybe I’ll get a boot...”

“That’s the Ashby Channel over there. Ashby Island just beyond it. The little one to starboard is Caralamo.”

We were even with the Ashby Channel when I felt another tug. I waited till I felt a real pull and raised my rod and began to reel in.

“I think I’ve got something live.”

“Well, take it easy. I’ll get the landing net out.”

It came up. I thought it was quite ugly, flat with bulging eyes.

“That’s a nice dusky flathead. Don’t touch it, those two barbs can deliver a painful sting. I’ve got gloves.” Evans grabbed my line with a bare hand and got the fish into his landing net, it was flopping a lot.

“Nice, just over five kilo, I’d guess.”

“What’s the record?”

“I don’t know. Over seven kilo, anyway. Maybe more.”

Dusky flathead are commercially caught in NSW and VIC fisheries, and are a key recreational fishing target. Although there are no formal stock assessments in either State, commercial catch records indicate that the stocks are not overfished. The “Big Fishes of the World” blog states that the maximum size for a South Pacific dusky flathead is 33 lb. / 15 kg.

“Now that’s a nice dinner.”

“But ugly.”

“You’ll never know when it’s cooked meat on a dinner plate. Now, open the fish well and I’ll put him into storage.” Evans had put on a second glove and removed the lure from the still-struggling fish. He whacked its head with a length of broomstick that was in the well and put the fish into storage. “Let’s try for some bream or grouper next.”

“Aren’t the grouper even bigger?”

“Well, the goliath grouper of the South Atlantic can go over 400 kilos. I’ve never seen one like that. And the Queensland grouper gets to that size. But we won’t get near one of those. Anyway, they’re marked ‘vulnerable, ‘ so we wouldn’t take one home.”

“Certainly not.”

“But you’ve got to realize that a barramundi over 10 kg was caught in Wallis Lake, just south of Macquarie. And we get barra here.”

“But they’re not grouper, they’re perch.

“True. But we’re in the channel. Let’s pull in to starboard near the island and get our lines wet. If we go past Chatsworth Island, we’ll stay on the North Arm.”

“OK.”

For small vessels with a draft of less than 1 metre, there is an opportunity to leave the main river to navigate the North Arm just past Ashby, although there are no navigation aids. The river divides again at Warregah Island, Back Channel to the west of the island is extremely shallow and should be avoided.

Evans was quite lucky, catching small bream one after another and releasing them. I just got my line wet. After an hour I suggested lunch. We both hauled in our lures and Evans got our supplies out. We had makeshift sandwiches, water and chocolate. In the sun and with the salt-marsh scent, it was quite idyllic.