Coral Coast 2016

Vessel Name: Bay Dolphin
Vessel Make/Model: Seawind 1000
Hailing Port: Brisbane
Crew: Darren, Leanne, James , Zoe
About: Australian family exploring the coral coast
12 June 2016 | Scraggy Point, Hinchinbrook Island
12 June 2016 | Scraggy Point, Hinchinbrook Island
09 June 2016 | Townsville Marine
09 June 2016 | in transit to somewhere
09 June 2016 | NE Bay, Great Palm Island
09 June 2016 | NE Bay, Great Palm Island
07 June 2016 | NE Bay Great Palm Island
07 June 2016 | On route to Great Palm Island
04 June 2016 | Magnetic Island
02 June 2016 | Wallaby Reef
02 June 2016 | Nara Inlet - Hook Island
18 May 2016 | Keswick Island
18 May 2016 | Middle Percy Island
11 May 2016 | Middle Percy Island
10 May 2016 | Middle Percy Island
02 May 2016 | Great Keppel Island
01 May 2016 | tranist to Lady Elliot
30 April 2016 | South Percy Island
Recent Blog Posts
12 June 2016 | Scraggy Point, Hinchinbrook Island

Scraggy Point Fish Traps

Hinchinbrook Island - Scraggy Point fish traps

12 June 2016 | Scraggy Point, Hinchinbrook Island

Scraggy Point Fish Traps

Off shore from Scraggy Point there are some indigenous fish traps made by the Bandjin people, named the traps 'Ngaragubbi'. Sraggy Point is part of the Hinchinbrook Island which is located of the coast of Cardwell which is a town in between Townsville and Cairns. Since the construction of the fish traps the water level has risen so you can't see all of the originally built traps (there is white marker by GRMPA out further). The traps are built to the right of a fresh water stream (looking east from Cardwell). Oysters glue the rocks together. The traps extend over an area of two hectares. We think that the stream is significant to the success of the traps. We observed oysters gluing the rocks together and they must have done there job well to be standing today (including the category 5 cyclone Yasi that hit in 2011). How the traps work is as the tide covers up the traps the fish move with the tide and as the tide goes out the fish get caught up with the 40cm high walls. The walls need to have small holes in them or the water would gush over the walls and the fish would follow. The traps consist of many other connecting walls to make a network of traps.

09 June 2016 | Townsville Marine

There was once a dinghy on the back of a boat

There once was a dinghy on the back of a boat

09 June 2016 | in transit to somewhere

Keep on Walking - Keep on Putting

Darren has used his not recently celebrated macramé skills to repurposed a whisky bottle into our backup fuel container for the dinghy. Carrick knots all round. We have now doubled our capacity!

09 June 2016 | NE Bay, Great Palm Island

Success!

We have left Townsville with some new gear, a spear gun for dad and a hand spear for me. I am looking forward to have a go with my new spear ever since I set eyes on it. We are at great palm island and I are going to try out my new spear today. Dad and Zoe are going line fishing so I get my 5ml wet suit [...]

09 June 2016 | NE Bay, Great Palm Island

Freezing Fresh Water

When we anchored at Great Palm Island we thought that we would not stay long but we ended up staying 2 nights. It was paradise it had lots of coconut trees, a two kilometre long beach, a fresh water stream, a water fall, great fishing/spearfishing and some coral. The first thing that we did was we went [...]

Scraggy Point Fish Traps

12 June 2016 | Scraggy Point, Hinchinbrook Island
Zoe Pearson
Hinchinbrook Island - Scraggy Point fish traps

We visited Scraggy Point on the way to Cardwell to drop a friend of and to do some shopping. We visited the Aboriginal Fish Traps there and here are some of my observations and research. - The fish traps are made of rocks [the Bandjin people call them Ngaragubbi] [1] - The traps were used for catching fish [2] - If there were to many fish they would keep them alive in the trap so they would last longer [2] - At high tide the tide comes in and over the rock wall, then the tide goes out and the water runs through the holes in the rocks leaving the fish trapped

Observations: - The rocks had oysters on them [to stick them together] - They are in the vicinity of a small fresh water stream and mangroves, we think that it has some affect on how many fish are in the area - The height of the rock walls we observed were about 40cm high - Placed in a network - We think that they were for tidal use - We were there at low tide and it was one metre above the low tide mark, it was a 1.2 metre tide

References:

[1] Cruising the Coral Coast by Alan Lucas [2] Wikipedia

Scraggy Point Fish Traps

12 June 2016 | Scraggy Point, Hinchinbrook Island
James Pearson
Off shore from Scraggy Point there are some indigenous fish traps made by the Bandjin people, named the traps 'Ngaragubbi'. Sraggy Point is part of the Hinchinbrook Island which is located of the coast of Cardwell which is a town in between Townsville and Cairns. Since the construction of the fish traps the water level has risen so you can't see all of the originally built traps (there is white marker by GRMPA out further). The traps are built to the right of a fresh water stream (looking east from Cardwell). Oysters glue the rocks together. The traps extend over an area of two hectares. We think that the stream is significant to the success of the traps. We observed oysters gluing the rocks together and they must have done there job well to be standing today (including the category 5 cyclone Yasi that hit in 2011). How the traps work is as the tide covers up the traps the fish move with the tide and as the tide goes out the fish get caught up with the 40cm high walls. The walls need to have small holes in them or the water would gush over the walls and the fish would follow. The traps consist of many other connecting walls to make a network of traps.

There was once a dinghy on the back of a boat

09 June 2016 | Townsville Marine
Nena Tisdall
There once was a dinghy on the back of a boat
That leaked and leaked and would not float
It was taken apart
To fix from the start
And now its crew are all a gloat!

Nena

Keep on Walking - Keep on Putting

09 June 2016 | in transit to somewhere
Leanne Pearson
Darren has used his not recently celebrated macramé skills to repurposed a whisky bottle into our backup fuel container for the dinghy. Carrick knots all round. We have now doubled our capacity!

With a little guidance (and improvement I am advised) from Marlinspike Sailors Knots and Crafts - not available in any bookshops I suspect. Found in the gem of a chandlery shop in Townsville.

Success!

09 June 2016 | NE Bay, Great Palm Island
James Pearson
We have left Townsville with some new gear, a spear gun for dad and a hand spear for me. I am looking forward to have a go with my new spear ever since I set eyes on it. We are at great palm island and I are going to try out my new spear today. Dad and Zoe are going line fishing so I get my 5ml wet suit on and get in the dinghy. Well not just the dinghy it was the newly repaired dinghy which before consisted of water gushing in the sides, but our amazing dad repaired it all by him self in Townsville as well as the ripped spinnaker (a huge sail used for light wind sailing).

We arrive at the place where I am going to spear fish after falling off the dinghy twice. So dad lowers the anchor and I get in the water with my spear. I have only speared 5 fish in my life time and that was with a blunt spear so the fish wriggled free but today I'm going to get a fish on the table. The first thing I see is a nice bommie with fish swimming in and out so I load my spear (which consists of getting the rubber line on the back of the spear and holding on to it while grabbing near the head of the spear then all you have to then is let go of the spear and woosh! Make sure you grab the rubber before the spear shoots off in to the distance). I focus my aim on an unwary slatey bream. I let go and I hit the bream but unfortunately it gets wedged in between some stag coral so it comes free. I shake that off and have ago at another bream, yes I hit it and it doesn't come free so I kick my fins and plough towards the dinghy.
So after dad got the slatey off the spear I get back in the water and look around and see another slatey bream and turn my aim towards it. I shoot and miss but I do hit something that was under a ledge but the struggling stops and all I see is stirred up sand. So I do a circuit around the bommie and come back to the same spot and see a rock cod with its nose sticking out of the rock, I fire and a successful shot brings the cod back to the boat.
Dad and Zoe have had nothing but snags. We move to another spot and I get in. This bommie is much deeper than the other one so it's a bit harder than before. After a long time of missing fish I shoot one and bring it back to the dinghy. I worn dad that it has spines and look back in the water to see a school of grey mackerel (pity I didn't have the spear). We move again hoping to get some fish on the lines.

At our third and final spot. I shoot nothing and get in the boat cause the sun was sinking behind the mountains of great palm Island. Dad says he is going to have one more cast before we go. As soon as dad casts out I notice the anchor rope is no more taught but drifting the other way the tide must of changed dad realised this as well but his mind was shortly turned to the tugging on his rod and pulls in a poisonous chinaman fish.

Dad has another cast and the rod gets tugged again and he brings up a bigger chinaman fish. Thinking there must be more than chinaman fish out there he has another cast and lands a fish that we can eat it is a huge grass sweetlip. Getting excited dad casts again and hauls a just legal hussar. Another cast for dad brings in the biggest of the lot it is a red-throat emperor. But it was to good to be true the thing that stopped dad's roll was his rod snapping at the tip. That episode stopped our fishing spree so we start the motor, weigh anchor and go off to a nice fish diner.

That dinner was the hussar, slatey, cod, and half the grassy emperor (we filleted the fish). We left the spiney tarwine and red throat with half a grassy emperor for tomorrow night. Dad gets straight on to the broken rod tip. He first cuts a old stainless steel hook and slides it in the hollow fibre glass rod. After that dad whips the tip back on with some twine and finished off with some electrical tape. The sad thing was the tip was broken twice so dad broke it again

Freezing Fresh Water

09 June 2016 | NE Bay, Great Palm Island
Zoe Pearson
When we anchored at Great Palm Island we thought that we would not stay long but we ended up staying 2 nights. It was paradise it had lots of coconut trees, a two kilometre long beach, a fresh water stream, a water fall, great fishing/spearfishing and some coral. The first thing that we did was we went for a walk and collected some shells. Then we putted up in the dinghy to the fresh water stream it was at the far end of the beach. It was heaven in the ice cold water the scenery was amazing it had lots of rocks and a big paper bark tree surrounding a little pool. There was a water fall flowing into the little pool, the little pool had a little stream leading off to another smaller water fall that drained into the ocean. A tree had fallen creating a bridge between the two sides of the stream. And the great thing about all of this was that it was all made by mother nature.
On the second day we did some fishing and James did some spear fishing, James speared a Slatey Bream and a Cod. Dad caught two Chinaman Fish [they are poisonous], a huge Grassy Emperor, a husser and a huge Red Troat Emperor.
Bay Dolphin's Photos - That Huge Trout
Photos 1 to 5 of 5 | Main
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Fish Frame: Andy can definitely fillet
The Trout: Now that is a a fish
Andy the fishing master: The alvey rig and the fish
Fish on Cutting Board: We need a bigger bait board
fillet: One fillet to feed a family
 
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