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Got a fishing story you'd like to share?
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 Catch of a lifetime disappears in secondsFrom: Mike The year was 1992 and I was with my father fishing off the pier at Hervey Bay in Queensland. It was a little after lunchtime when we met up with a man in his late 70s named Alby who was on a trip around Australia for what he described as "one last look". He told us his dream of landing a giant golden trevally and of how he had done it only once before, 40 years earlier, at the very place we were at. About an hour into our chat we started to get a few bites and I subsequently pulled in a black tip shark of about 5 feet. My father and Alby had landed a few smaller queenfish and by about 3-4pm the fish were really on the go. It was about this time that Alby's rod went beserk and he clambered up and just barely got hold of it before it could disappear. He yanked back and drove the hook deep into what he believed was a giant trevally. Alby's dream was about to come true. After a good half hour others had reeled in to make room, and gathered round to watch Alby fight a giant golden trevally all the way into the pier. There seemed to be endless pier gaffs available to help land the monster, and land it they did. I cannot be sure exactly how much it weighed but I was about 6 feet tall at the time and it was bigger than half of me. Alby calmly sat with a smoke in his hand and sweat beading off his brow as I helped him clean his catch. He invited us to his caravan to have dinner and we accepted his offer. What happened next is simply unexplainable but as god is my witness, I swear it to be true. After we had finished cleaning the fish Alby proceeded to tie a rope through its gills and send it down to the water for a wash. He said he simply loved the shine and color that came out against the sunlight. The fish was submerged only for a couple of seconds at the most when Alby felt a huge pull on the rope. Then the rope disappeared from his hands, over the side of the pier, leaving him with a nasty burn. As we raced to the edge and looked over we saw a giant estuary cod the size of a small car with Alby's trevally in its mouth. It was swimming right up on top of the water and seemed to look Alby straight in the eye as it swam off with the giant trevally. It was gone and an old man's dreams had been shattered right before his own eyes. I doubt whether I will ever forget the events of that day or the look on that old man's rugged face as he picked up his gear and trudged off into the distance. We did catch up with Alby later at the caravan park and shared some of our fish with him but he asked us to please not mention what had happened. To him it meant so much, for he knew he may never have the chance again. Old Father Time had caught up to Alby, and his glory had been denied by a freak of nature... I would love to hear from anyone that was there that day in October 1992. Words alone cannot capture the emotion of the day... You just had to be there... (20 May 2003) |
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