Darwin & Arnhemland Barra

Barra, or Barramundi, they are the iconic Australian sporting fish, they smack lures, pull hard, jump, look cool, inhabit rivers and estuaries and are good on the chew. Everything I love about fishing. I’ve been lucky enough to have fished most of this great land and somehow barra came to be closer to the end of my list then the beginning. A tragedy I know.

I figured since I had waited so long if I was going to do it I may as well do it properly and so I started looking for the best barra lodge this land had to offer. Something remote with guaranteed good fishing was required and it didn’t take me long to stumble across an article in a magazine that Starlo (Steve Starling) called for the best barra lodge in Australia, Arnhem Land Barra Lodge. You can read Starlo's article on the lodge here Starlos Barra Lodge Feature

The lodge just so happens to be owned and run by Alex Julius who publishes not one, but two of the top national fishing magazines in Australia, two mags I also happen to write for! How convenient of Alex! Sounds easy I know but it actually took about two and a half years for our planets to line up and even then the biggest Australian wet in history still changed our plans at the last hour.

Darwin, first impressions…

I flew to Darwin, via Virgin Australia, a nice cruisy three-hour flight with a row to myself, checked into the hotel early evening and met Chris who was travelling with me on this trip as a cameraman, filming for TV show & DVD we have been working on, more details on this later. We headed straight down to the city for dinner where we found that the pleasant Darwin experience begins.

This was my first time to Darwin and I have to say it’s a really modern, vibrant and cool city. There are heaps of great places to eat, lots of things to do right in the city and it’s well laid out with 90% of the high rise buildings looking only a few years old and a more pretty a setting for a capital city I don’t think I have seen in this country, Hobart would be a close second however Darwin harbour truly is a thing a beauty. Everywhere is lush and the sunsets have to be seen to be believed.



Looking out over Darwin Harbour from the foreshore just below Parliament House

We ate out in Darwin quite a few nights and both Chris and I agreed that the overall general service and value for money was excellent. The cafes and restaurants in Perth could learn a thing or two from them that’s for sure. We never had bad service once and the prices were not what I expected you might pay in a city miles from anywhere. You can get a big breakfast for around $15, a steak sandwich for $17 and most mains averaged $25-35 and we scored car parks on the main street every night!

We spent a few days shooting around the city at various locations including the very cool Crocosuraus Cove which is located right on the main street in the heart of the CBD! This is a must do if you visit Darwin and we were very impressed with the quality of the displays and the level of interaction where you can hold and feed baby crocs. I loved the fishing for baby crocs it was childish fun! The staff really looked after us taking us behind the scenes to get better shots and we couldn’t say enough about them or the place, check it out if your in town kids and adults alike will love it.

Crocosaurus Cove

 

This is Burt, about 800 kilos and quite the movie star appearing in Crocodile Dundee and a few other films



When you see them get out of the water like this, you realise a few things

Baby crocs, cute eh...

 The fishing for crocs was cool fun, although I did forget a few times to keep my hands inside the glass and the handler-guide kept reminding me that most wounds average 10-30 stitches at the hospital at this age. I'm not sure what’s more of a worry, either a) that they measure that or b) when she smiled and said, "Don't worry that's what the insurance is for."

 The Mindil Markets are also worth a mention if you are visiting Darwin, they are huge and full of heaps of cool stuff from quality local art and killer food stalls with everything from Indian to Oysters natural.

Fishing in the harbour… 

I did flick a few lures around the harbour from the shore but it wasn’t too successful as it took me a few days to suss the place and tides out etc and then it was time to fly out to the lodge. I did see huge milkfish cruising and western yellowfin bream though they were in a marina where no fishing is allowed. One afternoon we headed to Fannie Bay for some time lapse sunset shots and I spotted someone throwing lures off the rocks right up in the corner of the bay under the cliffs. I’ve never been too shy and being the first lure fisho I had seen all week, I walked over.

Turns out his name is Hiro, a Japanese born now local who fishes lures only and can best described by his blog which is called, Barramundi Lures Secret Fishing Darwin. It says, “I like Darwin. I love barramundi. Unfortunately, I'm not rich. No boat. No car. And I'm very sorry about my wrong English. I must fish from the land. Thank you very much Darwin and Australia.” It made me smile and we talked about all things throwing lures from the shore around Darwin.

The fishing on lures language is universal as the words were few but we knew exactly what the other was talking about. He told me he keeps a fishing diary and that he caught over 120 barra along this stretch of coast last calendar year. He really knew his stuff and he gave me some good tips, you can see his blog here http://secretbarramundi.blogspot.com/ It’s quite comprehensive and he breaks the spots right down in detail, it’s well worth a look.

I got these stunning shots below of Hiro as he threw lures off the rocks.



Hiro's barra stretch at Fannie Bay

 Below are some of the stunning sunsets we witnessed in Darwin



My token artsy sand shot

 After a few days around Darwin it was time to fly out to the Barra Lodge which is located about 500k’s to the east of Darwin. We flew out there compliments of Air North, which was a very pleasant 50min ride in a new 30 seater landing in Maningrida. The lodge manager Dave met us at the airport and ferried us and the other guests back to the lodge on the bus, which is located about fifteen-twenty minutes out of town onto the scarp over looking the river valley below. Smack bang in the natural bush it is quite simply a beautiful setting. A few pre-dinner drinks with the other guests revealed the fishing was good which made for a restless night I can tell you.



Check in at the Maningrida Airport


The lodge outdoor bar area



Locals that come in every evening. The chef Mark puts meat strips out for them



Burn off smoke assisted sunset



Inside the lodge dining area with the chef Mark in the kitchen in the background
and from the other view below



 

One of the guides Jason is also quite the artist and these beautiful paintings are one
off's available for sale by contacting Jason at the lodge. I just love the night one

With whatever you want for breakfast done it was straight to the boat ramp where the guides were waiting for us to board, mmm I could get used to this service! With six rivers and 150k’s of coastline to choose from our guide Sean asked us what we wanted to do, “ahhhh catch a barra” I said and so we headed up the Liverpool River. The first impression you get is that it is bloody huge, and not just a river but the whole place is a network of billabongs draining into drains, creeks and the river itself.

The Liverpool River

We stopped at a likely looking spot that Sean said should be good for a barra or twenty and they proved to be prophetic words. The spot was a textbook barra spot, everything I’d ever read about, a small creek full of bait running out of water to swim in as the out going tide carried them out into the river past some snags and heaps of hungry barra. It didn’t take long before one of them smashed my lure on a cast Sean called for, “that’s a barra” as soon as it hit the water. He did this several times during the day with a success rate most psychics would kill for only missing one or two.

Boy do they hit hard, kinda bass or GT like they way they smash it, you see line go taught and out of the corner of your eye you see the explosion of water as a beautiful barra launches itself skyward, it’s silver sides flashing in the sun as it shakes its head. Yeah I guess I can see the attraction. A short time later a beautiful 72cm barra slid into the net and finally I had my first barra baby!

My first barra

Being born in 72’ I thought this was kinda cool and after the obligatory photos Sean suggested that we put it straight on ice as the resident chef Mark had asked him to keep a few for tea. The small significance of this was lost on me in the moment but I realised later how much more enjoyable this made the whole experience when we were sitting around the lodge after a long day on the water, a few drinks, good company and conversation all while eating your first ever barra prepared by a chef with the river valley below as a backdrop. If you are going to keep one barra, I can highly recommend that you make it your first legal sized one, it’s a meal you will never forget.

One of the lodge guides, Sean

Sean hails from Harvey Bay and is typical of most pro guides in that he has saltwater in his veins, his knowledge of barra and the areas we fished you couldn’t fault and his attention to detail was a credit to himself. On one more than one occasion I watched him thread and re-thread my plastic several times until it was on perfectly straight. After EVERY hit he rechecked the rig and even the plastics got some tuning love and I picked up some good tips for making plastics swim better, like snipping the tail wrist with scissors to give it more action. It was one of the most enjoyable days I have ever had on the water and not just for the scenery of the fishing but also for the stories, laughs and knowledge provided by Sean.

Sean gave me one of the best days I've ever had on the water

We also fished with Robbo, a Broome based guide and since we got good numbers of barra the day before his priority was to get me an upgrade on my current PB which was only 76cm at this stage. “All right boys, we are going for a run” he said as we left the boat ramp. We took a long run and covered about 130k’s on the water that day going to some spots Robbo was confidant would hold some bigger ones. True to form he was right and after tying a few spots quickly I landed an 83cm barra after a sketchy fight back into the snag and then out near the anchor rope, all while a croc cruised over to see what the fuss was about. We got a few more 60’s and Robbo pulled an 86cm off the same lay down snag before a southerly change came through later in the day, which did slow the bite somewhat. However with about 25-30 barra in five or so hours fishing I had to laugh at the “shut down”  the guides were talking about.



Robbo with a nice barra



Chirs at work in the outdoor office

 

I'm not sure how many times you see this before you get used to it


 Before we knew it three days at the lodge was over and we flew back to Darwin for a few days with the last day on the water to be out at the famous Corroboree Billabong. If there was a barra rivers hall of fame this place would be on it and anyone who has read much about barra would have heard of Corroboree. It is a land locked section of river with about forty something kilometres of river, backwaters, creeks and drains to explore. Reading the paper one morning while eating breakfast we realised that the person taking us for a fish out there, Roger Sinclair, just won the Corroboree Fly Fishing Tournament the weekend before! 


A stretch of lily pads in Corroboree Billabong

  

2011 Corroboree Fly Champion Angler Roger Sinclair

Fishing the lily pads is something I’ve always wanted to do and Corroboree didn’t disappoint. It is as pretty as a picture and the wildlife is amazing, it’s the kind of place that even non bird lovers are left in awe of the bird life and the crocs, mate, we thought we saw some out at Arnhem Land but the ones in here are used to boats and we saw and got close to quite a few big ones. I have to say seeing these creatures in the wild, realising how big they are and seeing how they move gives you a whole new respect for them and seeing them on TV just doesn’t give you that little feeling that I can only describe as a cross between slightly exciting and, I think I’m about to poo myself.

Bad boys, bad boys, what ya gonna do when they come for you...



See if you can spot the two crocs in this photo. We watched them stalk the bird
for about ten mins or so. The bird was onto it but and flew off once they got closer.

The “cold snap” was now making the papers and the news at night because it was getting down to 28 during the day and it did slow the billabong down compared to the week before. However the dozen or so barra we got to 60cm along with some beautiful saratogas and tarpon more than made my day and it was a gem of a day on the water.

It's hard to go past Saratoga for a good looking fish. Roger got this beauty on fly.



A nice billabong barra

Locals


So what was catching barra like? Well its sort of like breamin on steroids, they seem to like the same sort of structure bream do, they reward accurate casts and of course they pull much harder. Spots produced anything from a few up to twenty or more barra out of one snag and the action was pretty consistent all day with the barra only taking a small break on the change of tide to give us some respite. We fished 30lb braid with the drag set just a few clicks back from fully locked up and while you could catch them on lighter gear the 30lb gets them in as quick as possible in good condition to swim off again and most of the time croc free. I was amazed at how many times I had to put serious hurt on a fish that nailed the lure in a snag and they still pull line at will, you get it to the boat and its like 55cm.
 
Barra don’t have the stamina of say a big GT but hey what does and the ones in the 70’s and 80’s don’t just come to the boat and the truly big ones must be a real challenge to land. Nothing beats a fish that jumps and some of the ariel displays were truly memorable. I guess I landed about 90 to 100 barra for the trip, which was “average” fishing according to the locals, not bad hey.

I’ve done lots of fishing trips but I have to think back a while for one that was this enjoyable, it was that good. The weather, fishing and service were second to none and it’s a photographers dream. It’s not a matter of if, but when I get back up there as I only just scratched the surface on this trip and you know what they say about the barra bug, once you’ve been bitten….

Many thanks to Alex Julius, Roger Sinclair, Arnhem Land Barra Lodge, Air North, The Quality Frontier Hotel, Tourism NT, Crocasaurus Cove and Aquascene Fish Feeding for making this trip possible…

PS: I will have some video to post of the trip in a week or so be sure to check back soon…

Stop The Press!

*Special offer from the Arnhem Land Barra Lodge!

Book a two-night two day fishing tour and receive one extra nights accommodation and one extra days fishing absolutely free!

Up to two days free fishing at the lodge!

 
Or book a three night three day fishing tour during one of our special designated periods and receive two extra nights accommodation and two extra days fishing absolutely free!

*Tour Dates available

27 June – 3 July 2011

5 July – 11 July 2011

15 – 21 July 2011

Contact Roger On 08 8983 1544 or by email roger@nafa.com.au

 

Conditions: Offer is only available for fishing tours taken in the nominated periods

above, subject to availability. This special discounted fishing tour offer cannot be

taken in conjunction with any other special offer, incentive or special giveaway.

Discount does not include Air North Air fares and Aboriginal Land Permit fees.

New Video Added Below!

A quick video below of my first barra. I'll try to post a few more teasers as we edit the footage...

Tasmania

It’s on every semi serious bream anglers bucket list, Tasmania, the home of the horse bream and while its taken me a while, I finally got around to it doing it. I would have gone earlier but circumstance for whatever reason hasn’t allowed for it but recently long time mate & fellow breamer Don Johnston upped tools, sold his truck and house in Perth and hit the frog & toad in search of the endless life experiences that are out there to be had. I should really introduce Don on here as we do lots of fishing together and so you will be reading about him plenty in the future.

I first met Don when I was running the bream tournament circus, I mean circuit, here in WA. He came along to a tournament and was quickly bitten by the bream bug. Don was a few times state sprint car champion and has enough feature wins to fill a room full of trophies so its fair to say he was one of the best sprintcar drivers in Australia. Meeting new breamers it amazes me how many come from a motor racing background, it’s a common theme, loved it but either burnt themselves or their wallets out, looked around for something else to challenge themselves and then somehow meet the black bream, Don was no different. If you don’t fish you probably wont get it but black bream change peoples lives, where they live, their jobs, who they are married to etc. Don’t ask me how but if I had a dollar for every person I’ve seen changed by this stupid fish….. I’d be a rich man. Anyway Don started fishing the tourneys, we met, he invited me out for a flick in his tinny and the rest is history. We have now done countless trips together over many years.

Travelling and fishing lots it is interesting to observe the many varied relationships that anglers on the move have. Fair dinkum some are like married couples the way they carry on but it isn’t always easy to find someone who wants to go to the same places that you do, live like you do, fish like you do and do it all at the same pace as you want to. Don and I have very similar likes in fishing, almost identical really in that we like to travel to hard to get spots and chase the really big bream all over Australia and we love the whole camping out thing. Don started out as a complete rookie but is now the 15th ranked angler on the national bream tourney circuit which attracts thousands and thousand of anglers from every state. He is one of those guys that whatever he does he does well and I reckon he will only improve as he gets more experience.

Back to Tassie….

Flew Virgin all the way over, meh…. Landed at Launceston and climbed aboard the bream bus. Straight to the super market for some supplies where the unique Tassie experience begins immediately. Most small towns have one or two IGA’s, quite often right across the road from each other and most of the time they are converted houses.

Adds character to the place that’s for sure and that’s one other thing I noticed travelling around the state, they have preserved their old buildings a lot better than we have here in WA. Anyway bacon is sold by the kilo only, we couldn’t find any small breakfast 200-300gram packs anywhere, and most IGA’s meat section was dominated up front by the ten kilo bad boy bacon packs that were stacked twenty deep.

We drove out of town headed for the high lakes country and some trout fishing to start off the trip and were meet just out of Launceston by our guide, Greg Woods or “Woodsy” with hot pizza from his misses pizza shop…. legend.

I’m not sure how long you have to know someone before you can start calling them by their nickname but I think you add 24 hours for Tasmanians, I wasn’t sure so I gave it a few days to be safe. Born and bred Tassie Greg runs a tackle wholesale business all over the state carrying some of the leading products in their field. A more genuine guy you couldn’t meet, tells it how it is and doesn’t waste words is the best way I could describe him and his fishing style is simple no bullshit methods that produce the goods. He kindly took pity on us and offered to show us around some of the lakes even opening his fishing shack to our use for a few days.

Set right up on top of the high lake country some 3000 feet above sea level it is a text book trout shack complete with out door long drop dunny, which I discovered by mistake that the only way to use, is with the door open. Walking around the side early one morning I had to quickly advert my eyes when I realised Woodsy was using this method. Surprised at first I quickly realised the man is onto it, I gave it a go and if there is a better dunny view then I’m yet to see it.

With the lakes rising about ten feet in the last week from the big rains that effected the whole east coast the trout fishing wasn’t easy. We fished the Great Lake and Arthur’s and while we did eventfully get into a few I tell you what without a guide we would have been stuffed. His knowledge and advice was the difference and the go to lure ended up being the good old original Tassie devils. We threw all the usual bream lures, both hards and plastics but unless you had $4 wide swinging action of the devils you’d be lucky to get more than one trout a day.

I used to fish them way back when I started trout fishing but these days just throw mainly small hards or plastics and if its slow I bust out some Mepps Celta spinners. Staring down at my box full of spinners in every size and colour you could imagine I had to drop the “couldn’t grab one of them off ya could I mate?” after Woodsy landed his third trout in half an hour on a green and gold Tassie devil.

The lakes are amazing, bloody huge and even though it was summer they were cold days on the water where I was running three layers of clothing, although I did feel less of a wuss when Woodsy had to put his jumper on cause “it was a bit chilly.” Not complaining though and the scenery is just amazing. While we didn’t catch anything huge you do see the hooters cursing or on follows and the ones you do catch are all nice trout you’d be stoked to catch back home in Perth. Once we had scratched the trout itch and a few dumb trout came our way (the smart ones stayed right away from us) we headed off in search of big bream.

 

Looking back heading up to the lakes and the high country...



Interesting rock wall in The Great Lake



Moths dance in the sunset across the valley from Woodsy's shack

 



Don with a "late arvo" average brown



Woodsy's shack from the outside

Inside

The dunny

Standing timber at Arthur's Lake



Average brown




Hooter brown



Decent rainbow just hanging

Tassie is renowned for the average size of its bream and while the fishing wasn’t as easy as I thought it might be I wasn’t disappointed when my first legal fish went 45cm. You can go three to five years or more in WA without seeing 45’s so that’s some perspective and Miami Vice also cracked a nice 40cm kilo fish to open his account as well.

We crammed as many places into the next week as we could travelling from as far south as you can get a bream boat at South Port where I had to have a beer at the most southern pub in Australia, all the way up the east coast to the sports fishing capital of Tasmania, St Helens in the very NW. Driving around the main things I really noticed was just how much bream water there is, the whole coastline is all virtually bays, islands, rivers and estuaries. It makes you realise how dull the coastline in the SW of WA where I live is.

The drive south from Hobart along the coast is an amazing couple of hours of winding roads, fishing villages and hamlets lined with bays complete with flats that would swallow a hundred Walpoles or whole systems back home no worries. You ask local  breamers about these places and they go “dunno no one fishes there.” But you walk down to the marina and there are big bruiser bream just hanging around the pylons.

Tassie breamers are a funny lot, they think two hundred k’s is along way and they tend to stick to their own patch. I guess why move around when your braining 40’s at home?  I kinda got the impression Tassie would be flogged by now but nothing could be further from the truth. In time this will change of course but I was amazed at how small the places they run their comps are and just how many places there are left that no one fishes. The fisheries booklet alone names 40 something places you can catch bream in so that gives you some idea.

The wind didn’t let up for most of the trip and the weed and small salmon were phenomenal but the amazing free oysters growing everywhere make up for the hundreds of small salmon and flathead every day. Getting lures past them proved to be the challenge. We fished flats, rivers, estuaries, lagoons, oyster racks, weed beds, bridges etc you name it its all there and plenty of big fish all to willing to have a go.

They don’t take lures like WA blacks that’s for sure. You HAVE to fish the pause on both hards & softs and they don’t run much just kinda lay over on their side and pull down like a heavy weight. They still pull line but don’t worry about that and we had our arses handed to us a few times being busted up by unstoppable beasts. I only had one bream on the whole trip that wasn't just lip hooked so you have to go easy on them and we fished 2lb the whole time down to 5lb leaders, they aren't stupid!

All in all an awesome trip and not only for the amazing fishing but culturally its like driving around Perth twenty years ago where you see straight as original Datto 1600’s and RS 2000 Escorts being driving around by old ladies and still used as daily drivers. Brings back some memories that’s for sure.

I’ll be back for sure as locals told me about spots with no roads, where no boat has ever been launched that are walk in or mountain bike only where they don’t even get the camera out unless they are over 50cm. All spoken with a stern face in a serious Tasmanian country accent you just know isn’t bullshit… and all your thinking is, I’m coming back baby…

Parked up in the bream bus at Austin's Ferry, Derwent River, Hobart

Don with a lazy Derwent kilo fish

Artsy shot from Port Huon where Tassel grow out the Atlantic Salmon



Sexy bay somewhere



Oyster racks are in many places, they run all types shallow baskets, trays, deep water trays etc.



A typical Tassie shack, you see them everywhere



Oysters grow naturally and bigger than your hand is the average size.

The also taste amazing, how many dozen do you want?

This is what Tassie breamin is all about, quality...

Almost half of what we caught was well over a kilo...

Bream go good with oysters!

The Lune River at South Port looking past the ramp out to sea

Terrible eh..

Random river somewhere

Sunset at the Swan River near Swansea...



Zippys or similar were the go on the flats




Upper Swan River




Greg Woods fishing St Helens bay



 Big thanks to Don & Greg Woods for making this trip possible, cheers lads! 

Hope you enjoy my pics here & make sure you check out the next

issue of NAFA and BBB#34 for all the best pics from this trip....