LinkBack URL
About LinkBacks
Zululand Bass Brawl
Zululand Bass Brawl Aug 23
We were very kindly put up at the house by the dam by our man in Eshowe James Braithwaite who organised 3 beds for us... we had an awesome braai on the Friday evening and chatted around the fire with all the new faces we met who were staying with us. Thankfully most of the people there were anxious to get an early night so there wasn’t much debauchery and most of us hit the sack shortly after 9pm because the plan was to wake up at 3am because trying to get 60 odd boats down the slip-weigh was going to be an exercise... Howie was extra psyched because our last visit to the dam had dished him a fat orange vegetable and he was determined to make the dam pay!
3am and sleepy faces started emerging and the kettle was put onto boil for coffee... after 2 cups of coffee and a shower Team ESA Steez were on their way just before 4am... we were right in the front of the queue and waited for half an hour before launching.. it was then we realised the official start at 06:30am wasn’t going to happen... the registration opened on the Ipiva Bank and then we sat and waited while the rest of the field painstakingly negotiated the stinking slip-weigh and made their way across the dam to registration.
Eventually we had the captains meeting and the whistle blew just after 7am... luckily we drew boat number 5 and got to our planned spot which wasn’t far away from the launch and we proceeded to work the rocky cliffs... Howie took his prized double hooked jig he was given recently and sent it in to do its work... right away it got jammed in the rocks and it broke off which made Howie very sad... the excitement of the compo was too much for him to stop and re-tie on another jig so he picked up his shaky head jig with the silly looking Squirrel tail worm on it and sent it into the depths... Fish On came the shout and I grabbed the net... it was a decent fish and the shaky head rod only had 10lb line so Howie worked it carefully... awesome fish just over 3kg’s was landed! We rushed it back to the weigh station because there was a prize of a holiday in the berg for the first fish weighed and seeing it was still in the first 5 minutes of the compo we thought we had a chance... as it turned out we were first back with a fish and we got that prize...
We headed straight back to our spot and Howie carried on with his 10lb line, shaky head jig and squirrel tail worm... a short while later I heard fish on again and grabbed the net... this time the fish gave Howie even more of a work out than the previous one... but ever so carefully Howie nursed it back to the boat with his 10lb line until it was within reach of the net and an awesome fish was boated... our initial reaction was it was a 5kg fish! But it appears that it had already dropped its eggs and weighed in at 4,28kg’s!
The rest of the day was very tough and we tried to stay out of the wind because we hate wind... and all we could manage was an additional two keepers... the 5th fish eluded us and we fished right till the end... I guess a lot of people went home crying with a bagel because less than half the field pitched up at the weigh in and prize giving.
First up to the podium was Team ESA Steez for weighing the first fish!
A short while later Team ESA Steez went back to the podium for the prize for the biggest fish of the compo!
And then a short while later Team ESA Steez returned to the podium for 6th place! This is our best finish yet and it was nice to get some cash for our trouble! Howie was in the zone and carried his partner in a big way and he had promised to make the dam pay and pay it did!
Carl Gutzeit won the compo with an insane bag of nearly 15kg’s!
We caught all our action on camera and it will be on ESA Bass in the not too distant future!
| | | | |
| | | | |
Reply With Quote
Originally Posted by bunduguy 
Can't wait to get onto that lake soon
