There's something wonderful about a trip away camping and fishing with mates. Cold beer round a camp fire after a day treading the streams, a few trout under your belt, a good feed to keep you warm and a night under the stars to remember past trips and talk about those to come.
It's been years since Nick and I had done just that. Life had gotten in the way; businesses had been started from scratch and interstate moves happened (for me), girlfriends proposed to, subsequently married and kids soon followed along with several career changes (for Nick).
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| Nick casts to a nice piece of water upstream of the junction with Middle Creek. |
But a call from Nick a few weeks back saw a very loose plan put together to catch up round a camp fire for a few days near Omeo. Trout would be our main agenda but camp life was to be an important part of the trip too. We both needed to unwind.
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| Typical of the nuggety Browns we encountered |
So for the past few days we've been camped at Anglers Rest on the Cobungra River just near the Blue Duck Inn. However the Cobungra wasn't to be the reason for the visit. Just a little further along the Omeo Highway the road starts to run alongside the Mitta Mitta River (Big River). Where exactly the name change occurs is lost to me but the important thing is that the river offers some classic stream fishing for plump trout and for a few days we made the most of it.
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| Searching for the next fish. |
The river was at a nice fishable level and a quick check on the BOM website when I got back had the level at the Hinnomunjie bridge (a bit downstream of where we were fishing but still a handy reference) at .9m and the level at Joker Creek (right amongst where we were fishing) at 1.2m. The water at this level was very wadable and offered lots of very fishy water along with plenty of fish.
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| Some of the tools of the trade. (read toys) |
While many will know that I'm an avid fly fisherman for this trip I decided to stick with the spin gear and let Nick fish ahead of me prospecting the away with the fly. This worked well with Nick picking up his fish on a pair of nymphs fished below an indicator and me fishing the water that couldnt be reached with the fly and taking a few fish on a range of bladed spinners and hard bodied lures.
There were a couple of fish kept for the table and these were chock full of stick caddis. That said none of the fly caught fish took a stick caddis imitation and obviously the lures used imitate small baitfish.
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| The Rapala X-Rap getting the job done. |
While the fishing was good it certainly wasn't great and we had plenty of campfire based discussions as to what may have been the cause. There were a heap of rafters/kayakers on the river and them constantly drifting overhead may have had the trout a little skittish. Also being early in the season with the weather still rather cool may not have helped (water in a bucket iced up over night). In the end it doesn't really matter. The trip was great, we both unwound and had a great time in the scrub and we both caught enough trout to scratch the itch for a little while at least.
Now thats a fishing story, back to the basics of lure and fly casting on a river with a mate with nothing but the fish to distract you, made me want to go back to the fresh....... for at least one second.
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