Steep point report from last week Sunday 19/5 - fri 24/5

Took 3 boats from Denham to steep point camping at shelter bay ( Blackies 1 camp site) early last sunday morning with 6 fisho's and 2 cars in on the track. Ive never done the drive in before and the track is bad (corrugations and deep boggy potholes). Some guys ahead of us towed a boat in and sure enough the trailer got destroyed and blocked everybody coming in behind them until they could get it out the way (took ages - why the F%$K you would try tow a boat in there i'll never know. Finally set up camp and hit the water at 1pm. My first drop in 73m hooked up a beautiful fish straight away, pulling it up - sharked! Was using 80lb braid with 5metres of 100lb mono PR'd on to it then the rig. The sharks tend to just sit there rather than go for a long run so you cant break them off easily. I had to lock up the drag and plain him up, was surprised how easily it came up and was a big bastard. Got all the braid back then onto the mono and it decides to take off under the boat. Before we could cut the line SNAP! there goes my 24-37kg Bluewater Strudwick jigging rod that I absolutly loved broken in half on the first drop - I was FAARRKKN pissed off. Had a spare 24kg rod so kept moving around fishing. Over the rest of the afternoon we smashed big Rankin, pinkies, pearl pearch, coral trout, red emperor and lots of small pinkies, red throats and other small reefies. We got our bag of five each but to get your 5 you pretty much end up feeding 6 or 7 more really good fish to sharks its out of control up there, the sharks are in plague proportions. Monday tuesday and wednesday weather was great and we all pretty much did the same thing, just catching great fish, feeding them to sharks and loosing a shit load of sinkers and hooks to eventually get your bag. Hooked my first cobia and fought it all the way to the surface till it flicked its head and spat the hook. Only got one spaniard in return for a shit load of trolling. Thursday and friday the wind was shit so we just trolled inside the mouth in front of where they ballon - no mackies. No ballooners on the rocks either so we wondered if we were out of mackie season. So for 5 and a half possible days of fishing we only got 3 and a half days fishing due to strong wind and waves and came home with 67kg of quality fillets all vacuum packed in the deep freezer. Cant complain about that too much i guess its just a real damn shame that we probably lost 2-3 times that much to sharks. The sharks seemed to be fussy too, they only took the good fish cause we landed small fish almost always. On the way out on the track there was 1 car and boat bogged to the axles and 2 other boats with broken trailers along the track blocking people in and out of steep point so took ages to get back to Denham (pisses you off when you just want to get home). Thanks for reading and good luck to you if your heading up that way (dont tow a boat in!! )


Faulkner Family's picture

Posts: 17835

Date Joined: 11/03/08

 sounds like a great trip

Mon, 2019-05-27 12:16

 sounds like a great trip despite the sharks. pity about the rod on the frst day. 

them sharks do know the right fish to go for. 2 weeks in coral bay and only lost about 8 fish to sharks and all were reds. 

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RUSS and SANDY. A family that fishes together stays together

The Saint's picture

Posts: 453

Date Joined: 30/01/13

I've just come back from

Mon, 2019-05-27 12:41

I've just come back from Shark Bay and yes, the sharks really are out of control !

 

Makes you wonder about the logic behind this:

www.sharkarkproject.com/shark-bay-shark-sanctuary/

carnarvonite's picture

Posts: 8622

Date Joined: 24/07/07

Crap

Mon, 2019-05-27 13:54

 It's all crap the bloke behind it runs a kayak tour and tries to show people sharks on the tour. He is against those who target big tigers etc for a quick photo then release saying they will ruin it for everyone. 

I pointed out on his website, that professional shark fishing from Steep Point to NW Cape has been banned for about 25 years and the northern shark fishery has been shut down for the last 15 years and my entry was deleted about 5 minutes after it went on. Seemed to hit a nerve that he didn't want others to know a bit of the truth and history behind the closures.

avatinni's picture

Posts: 141

Date Joined: 06/06/10

 Mate I am wondering what

Wed, 2019-05-29 07:19

 Mate I am wondering what size was the boats that were getting towed in to shelter bay& getting bogged. 

Posts: 5981

Date Joined: 17/06/10

Thanks for the report

Wed, 2019-05-29 19:52

Before you set out for places that have reports about the road conditions not being to good a real good check over of the trailer would be a wise thing to save a lot of bother in an isolated place