The Holy Grail
The Holy Grail
Was just about to retrieve my lure when something caught my eye on the other bank, then bang, a hit, looked back and there’s a massive Barra sitting on the surface, we did the dance for less than 30 seconds, a couple of jumps but a pretty lacklustre fight, I thought I had pressure on him when the lure just fell out of his mouth, even the Barra was unsure as he jumped again to try and throw the lure, then he swam back off into the deep water. Bugger, but a least I’d seen some action.
The Holy Grail
By this time it had started to cloud over making the popper my preferred method of attack. First up was a nice little Sooty, followed by a Jungle Perch, two more Sooty’s then a nice Barramundi, the morning was looking up.
A bit later I jagged a small Mangrove Jack, and to my surprise just after that as I was bringing in my popper on a fast retrieve to get another cast in, and the line started singing, luckily I was in a wide part of the river with no snags as this thing nearly made the other bank, about fifty metres away, you guessed it, a marauding Trevally, after a nervous fight I managed to land it, all the time aware of the light gear I was using.
The Holy Grail
It dawned on me I was one fish short, again, of my Holy Grail. A Barramundi, Jungle Perch, Mangrove Jack, Sooty Grunter and Tarpon, all great sport fishing species. But alas, time was getting on and I decided it was time head home, cruising home I turned a bend a came across a known Tarpon habitat, it can’t hurt to have a few more casts before I head off. A shower of rain came across dampening my enthusiasm as Tarpon tend to lurk in the deeper pools and the lack of light may make a strike considerably less likely.
Anyway, one last hundred metre stretch of river then I was done. Around cast number six I got a flash, yes there’s a chance, peppered that spot for a while with no result. I bagged a Sooty about ten casts later. Then bang, I was on, the Tarpon showed itself and the battle was on. Tarpon are notorious, in my experience, for throwing lures with their aerial acrobatics.
