Day 138 – 31st May 2018 – Eighty Mile Beach

We had a quick breakfast then got organised and headed off for another day beach fishing.  Today Col and I managed to catch a variety of fish including small Mulloway, small Trevally, a Catfish and Thread-fin Salmon.  I am happy to report that I did manage to land some today.  Again Col caught a 30cm Salmon so we had enough for a meal with the one he caught yesterday as well.  

Both Col and I managed to hook a really big fish each, but didn’t land it.  Mine took the hook and started swimming pretty fiercely away, the reel was screaming, but it bit off the hook and we are guessing it may have been a shark.  Col was using live bait at one point and the live bait was bitten in half.  Col thinks he hooked a Giant Thread-fin Salmon that was jumping out of the water as he tried to bring it in, but it managed to spit the hook and swim away.  Later we were talking to a man at the fish cleaning table and he said they grown up to a metre and a half in length and the one he had caught that day was 20kg!!  Apparently they swim fairly close to shore as well.

Col Fishing Eighty Mile Beach WA
Col Fishing Eighty Mile Beach WA
Col caught a fish, Eighty Mile Beach WA
Col caught a fish, Eighty Mile Beach WA

At one point Col had a live bait on his line and it was behaving a little strangely.  There was some weight on the line that could have possibly been a fish, but it was moving around fairly slowly.  He reeled it into check and this is what he found.  A ‘Jelly-Fish Fish’.

Jelly-Fish Fish combo, Eighty Mile Beach WA
Jelly-Fish Fish combo, Eighty Mile Beach WA

On the way back to the car Col spotted a beautiful shell and grabbed it to show me.  He quickly started swearing and dropped the shell pretty quickly.  There was a fairly grumpy Hermit Crab with rather large nippers that quickly let Col know that he didn’t appreciate the intrusion, it was pretty funny.

We headed back to camp mid afternoon and Col cleaned and cooked the fish for dinner that night.  It was really lovely tasting fish.

Freshly caught salmon for dinner, Eighty Mile Beach WA
Freshly caught salmon for dinner, Eighty Mile Beach WA

On a side note, Joyce and Jen introduced me to cryptic crosswords while at Giralia.  I have never understood them and they frustrate me no end.  Joyce gave me the name of an app that explains some of the rules and I downloaded it and have been getting my head around them.  I got Col involved and we are both smashing out the cryptic crosswords!  If you like a challenge, get into them.

4 thoughts on “Day 138 – 31st May 2018 – Eighty Mile Beach”

  1. Jelly fish fish now thats a new one ,never heard of that one ,pretty looking though .
    Dinner looks yummo .
    Lol Hermet crab letting you know he IS home hahahah .

    1. Ha ha thanks for liking my joke. I have to put up with Granddad jokes from Col all the time but he thought that one was corny haha. At least I crack myself up.
      Dinner was definitely yummo!
      The hermit crab was very funny. x

    1. I haven’t tried Barra yet but Col agrees with you Andrew. Although he said it makes a big difference if the Barra is caught in the Ocean or in an Estuary. I was definitely impressed with how nice the thread was though.

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