We had great pleasure recently of hosting a very memorable Extreme Ocean Adventure safari for a group of keen lads from Victoria. Michael Bleechmore who is owner/director of Melbourne’s Shopfit Solutions set about looking for a week long ultimate boys trip for his son Hayden, great mate Snowy White ( from King Lakes Top Gun Electronics), his son & wingman Zac.
Through some research, Bleechy found us & we put together for the group a trip to remember with a few other extra activities to fill the week & make sure the boys went home happy punters. On day 1, the fellas headed out with a full boat load to go diving with the Great White Sharks. A great day was had but unfortunately no big whites were spotted which is a rarity as there is a 85% success rate of seeing the sharks during this time of the year. The weather was looking rough for later in the week & we had a call from Sceale Bay Bluewater Charters fishing guru, Matt Guidera who suggested that we get up to Sceale Bay to make sure of the next days weather to muscle in some tuna.
That was a much appreciated call from Matt, so we had a change in itineries & much to Zac’s dissapointment, we had a very early start to the 2nd days play ! It was worth the 5am wakeup, as we arrived at Sceales & boarded Matts 7m Markham Dominator right on 8am. The boys had rubbed the sleep out of the eyes & after a brief scenic viewings of the massive limestone cliff faces of the peninsula with ospery nests & beautiful tranquil waters, we headed out for the mighty blue rockets or better known as Southern bluefin tuna.
Sea birds were active on the surface, which meant they were chasing live bait & something else was chasing them.It did’nt take long as we trolled through the area when we had 2 hookups.Snowy & Haydos both hooked up first & the sweat had yet to dry off Snows brow before Bleechy & cannon arm Zaccontinued the frenzy. With high fives all round, back slaps & some side splitting laughter from the Bleechmore commentry team, it was a great start to the day. Yours truly got in the action as well & after another hook up soon after, Matt announced that we had caught the legal boat limit of 6 perfect tuna! We did manage a few more & got to the boat, but luck was with them & they soon sped to the depths below. With that mission completed, we headed into shore & cleaned the tuna up ready for the nights meal. There is nothing better than fresh sushimi followed by hearty tuna steaks & a fresh salad washed down with a few coldies after a days work.Welcome aboard!
After a well deserved rest the boys were pretty keen to tackle some big sand dunes & go sandboarding. Haydos & Zac put in some quality performances & were taking the sport to higher levels & were proving to be naturals in the field. A couple of busters here & there made an interesting spectacle for all.Snowy & Bleechy wer’nt going to be outclassed as they to put in some good displays as well, though I’m tipping that they were enjoying things better on top of the dune, rather than climbing back up these monsters!
The best way to get some unwanted sand off oneself is to go swimming & just not anywhere. Just around the corner was Bairds Bay & once again the dolphins & sealions put on a show for everyone. The dolphins in particular have been in good numbers & are as happy as the humans as they glide in between the group, chattering to each other & seemingly smiling as they interact. It really is amazing & this continues with the sealions. They actually appear clumsy on land but once these play full creatures get into the water, its all go for them & they put on a real performance . With the sand now washed out, we got cleaned up & headed into the Streaky Bay pub for dinner & showed off the full scaled 5m , 1.5 tonne model of a Great White Shark caught off local waters by 15 yr old Dion Gilmore. Its more than impressive !
Day 4 saw us back on deck Sceale Bay Blue Water charters. With the winds howling, it wasn’t possible to go too far & protection was sought against the magnificent limestone cliffs of Cape Blanche. We got some huge King George Whiting,( some others that were a bit short one end), tommy ruff, plenty of silver whiting & also some unwanted reef fish of rock cod. The sheltered waters were very calm & clear so we jumped in for a bit of snorkelling & found ourselves some very nice sized greenlip abolone, just a perfect addition for tonights dinner, which capped off another good mornings fishing. With the unwanted wind around, an afternoons drive was in order so we headed to Talia Caves. The ocean was near at its best, pounding in with some huge waves crashing against the rocks & loudly bellowing through the empty tunnels & the caves itself , showing us all how these caves were originally formed through many years of erosion. With Snowy being a self acclaimed lover of rocks, we couldn’t go past the opportunity to show him the ancient windworn granite inselbergs called Murphys Haystacks. They are a very impressive outcrop of granite boulders purported to be more than 1500 million years old ! After a few days of hunting & gathering, we had our last supper at Sceales; more oysters & sashimi, freshly caught crumbed whiting & vindaloo abolone .
We deaprted Sceales & we made our way back to Pt.Lincoln for our last days play. We had to have 2 stops on the way with the first at the worlds smallest bakery at Colton. ( Colton is inbetween Ellsiton & Venus Bay). An honesty system is used to pay for your purchases & the wood oven bread rolls & fruit buns that we got were something else. And very cheap as well ! We had a quick bite at the Cummings Monument, which gave the boys a vantage point to see miles & miles of uninterrupted clifftops & with the water being so clear, you could nearly see the crayfish crawling around the reefs below.
Our last activity saw us onboard Matt Waller’s Adventure Lady, as we went swimming & feeding the 60 tuna in Matts tuna cage. This is a great experience, especially as we had all caught tuna earlier, so it now gives us a spectacular insight on how the fish attack the bait, how they move & the fight to get to the pilchard before the other tuna. All this without crashing into another companion! It’s amazing. As was Zac & Haydos throwing out handfulls of pilchards virtually on top of their Dads & to see the frenzy of tuna going for the bait & so skillfully manouvering away with the catch was another great highlight. Wouldve looked great from underwater as well ! It was a great way to finish a great trip with some great people. Thanks again for coming on board & we’ll talk during the footy season ! Cheers.
