“Shall we pack it in then?” I asked.

“Let’s just have one last cast before we leave,” answered our fishing mad friend Roland from Brisbane.

“Righteo,” I agreed cheerfully, “but I think I’ll revert to the chicken giblets, even if they are a bit old now. At least they stay on.” (Well sometimes they do!)

When you’re staying with a fisher-person, and you enjoy fishing yourself, you simply have to make the most of fishing opportunities, which is what happened this morning. We agreed to make an early start and leave around seven in order to beat the heavy traffic heading for the city. I was ready at half-past six but we set off at about ten past seven. Being a tad later than planned made no difference at all – we still met the heavy traffic (which peaks between the hours of five to nine in the morning these days). It took an hour – twice as long as the non-peak time between nine and two o’clock – to reach my brother Bill’s place at Tingalpa.

“I don’t think you’ll catch anything at Wynnum,” commented my older brother with a smile. “I’ve never heard of anyone catching anything from the jetty.”

“We might be the exception,” I suggested and Roland acquiesced.

Out of curiosity Bill went down to the jetty with us and helped us carry the bait and tackle box.

“There’s not much water,” Bill observed, ” no more than six inches, I’d say.”

“Maybe there’s more at the end,” I offered and walked to the end.

I looked beyond the barnacles and oysters enjoying the fresh air from below the steps and was heartened to see that there was a little more water past the rugged rocks.

At last, after thirty minutes or so of pleasant banter but fruitless fishing we decided to pack up and try somewhere else.

“It might not be so windy at Gumdale Creek,” suggested Bill.

And it wasn’t. The tide was out but at least it wasn’t windy, and there was shade under the roofs of the specially designed fishing decks at the creek. The first, and best deck (owing to the cutting table and tap), was already taken by three fishermen so we had to make do with the less desirable one.

A couple of hours passed and there were cries of jubilation from the first deck. I looked across and thought I saw them landing a huge lobster…

“Is it a lobster?” I asked.

“No, it’s a tree,” one of the fisherman called back, “but it’s the first thing I’ve ever caught here!”

They were good-natured chaps – fisherfolk are usually nice friendly people – however, I suspected that they had lost heart. My suspicions were confirmed when they left a few minutes later. Roland and I seized the opportunity and dashed over to the prized first fishing deck with the big silver table for dissecting both bait and catches.

We dissected a few raw prawns, once fresh but now twice frozen and thawed; and some chicken giblets, long since fresh and frozen and thawed thrice; and some diced raw chicken breast (age unknown to me). We kept on sending out the bait into the middle of the creek, where it appeared deepest, and the water rose steadily, but still there were no catches. The lines tugged and the bait dissappeared yet no fish were tempted to take a good bite… not on small hooks, medium sized hooks, whale hooks or sneaky double hooks.

The sun burned through the sun screen cream on my arms and I was getting hungry when we became convinced that the creek was home to several gigantic and clever old mud crabs who were experienced at denuding any sized hooks of any old bait. And that’s when we were going to “pack it in”…

A moment later we heard some people coming along the bush track and a teenage boy appeared.

“You’re welcome to come here,” Roland beckoned with his hands outstretched to show our deck had a desirable big table, “we’re just about to leave.”

The boy was followed by another lad, a man and woman, and a stroppy girl.

“You’re welcome to come here because we’re going,” Roland said again, this time to the adults.

Before long pilchards were chopped on the table and three rods were cast out. The friendly adults were teachers from Darling Point Special School and the three teenagers were in their last year of school – they were on a school outing. In no time at all the teacher reeled in a Moses Perch, small but feisty, and the boy Matthew was rewarded with a bonny (and perhaps bony) bream just minutes later.

“Would you like to try our pilchards?” asked the kindly teacher.

“I was hoping you’d offer,” I laughed.

The same fat old crabs in the middle of the creek stole our fresh pilchard heads. Roland and I left before becoming any more frazzled. Sadly for us, we can’t say that there were no fish today. Actually, we were pretty chuffed that the kids were having such fun and success. On our way back to the car we looked at each other and said in unison, “Next time we’ll bring pilchards!”

And did you know there was a song called “No Fish Today”?

Kid Creole & The Coconuts – No Fish Today (Live) – YouTube

▶ 4:35

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ECX1I2xx8gQ

Aug 28, 2011 – Uploaded by parkhill62

Kid