Sherbs and I decided it was time to give a late night fishing session a go in the hope that we might find some nice sized mulloway.

The plan was that we would arrive at the spot at about 10 pm and fish for a few hours, then crawl into Sherbs van for a quick kip, before getting up just before daylight to prepare for the expected arrival of the tailor.

We headed out to one of our better spots in Sherbs van, which was loaded to the gunnels with enough stuff to last us for a month - and arrived to find that the wind had dropped right off and the conditions were looking pretty nice.

After starting of a burley trail in a likely looking spot on the beach we hurriedly threw out baits out with great anticipation - only to have our excitment turn to great disappointment when our lines were quickly covered in kilos of seaweed.

This was definately not what we had hoped for.

Sherbs decided he would investigate the nearby rocky area to see if the water in front of it was a bit clearer and a few exploratory casts later he gave me the tumbs up that our fishing adventure was still on.

We were soon joined by a young Nepalese lad, who told us he had been in Australia for a few years, but had never been to the beach before and never watched anyone fish before either.

He was really happy to sit on the rocks nearby and watch us in action,particularly when Sherbs landed a Snook/Pike and I then landed a small shovelnose shark.

Sherbs, being the generous chap he is, then suggested the young guy have a try at fishing and he handed him his bigger outfit after casting out a rig baited with some of the Snook.

Sherbs had warned the young bloke not to wind in his line until he was sure he had a fish on as he was worrioed the young bloke would continue to get snagged up on the rocks near the waterline.

The young bloke must have taken him very seriously, because we looked up to see him with a very concerned look on his face as the rod was bending double and the drag on the reel was screaming.
"I think I have a fish, should I wind," the concerned young Nepalese lad asked Sherbs. "YES", Sherbs replied.

With a lot of help from Sherbs the young bloke managed to bring a quite sizeable stingray to the beach, only to have it snap the line just as we were moving into grab it. The young bloke was devastated, but personally I think Sherbs and I were pretty happy that we didn't have to wrestle with a big stingray in the shallows at midnight.

Excited by his adventure, the young bloke soon bade us farewell and headed off to tell his mates of his massive fishing capture.

The battle with the ray had also rejuvinated Sherbs and I, and we decided to keep on fishing for awhile longer.

We continued to get a few hits and a few hook ups which resulted in another shovelnose for Sherbs and an Eagle ray and a pretty sizeable Port jackson shark for myself - along with a few more snook.
These were definately not the type of fish we were after, but they did manage to keep us awake long enough for us to decide that it wasn't going to be worthwhile hitting the sack as it was only an hour to sunrise.

Not long afterwards, Vince (Uncut Trigger), arrived at the location and soon joined us on the rocks as we waited the early morning arrival of the tailor.

And sure enough, a very short period after sun-up the first tailor bites came and we were all soon onto good fish. Sherbs was the star with a few very nice tailor, while Vince and I also landed some real solid tailor. They were all very good quality tailor and of a quite good length, with the biggest well over the 45 cm mark.

But as can be the case with tailor, they soon went off the bite, and that was the last we saw of them.

The other anglers who began turning up after that had unfortunately missed the boat, and had to then focus on catching the many herring that had turned up.

Vince headed off around 6am to do some chores and Sherbs and I decided to keep on for awhile in the hope that the tailor might come back. Sherbs kept himself busy catching a few nice herring, while I just kept trying to keep my eyes open.

Eventually after close to 10 hours standing and sitting on that rock we decided we had better hit the road before we fell asleep on our feet - and maybe fell into the water.

While we didn't catch the mulloway we had hoped for, it was a great evening and a lot of fun, especially watching the look of joy and excitement on the young Nepalese guy's face.

Sorry, I don't have any pics at the moment as I was bit suss about taking my digital slr out on the rocks in the dark, though Sherbs did snap a few pics with his phone camera that we might be able to load on at some stage.

All the best, Colin