7 WEEKS ON THE ROAD with THE MAD DOG

It’s been a while since I posted anything guys and girls and for that reason I'm sorry. And don't for one second think that I don't know all about it!! The bosses boot print in my backside from being such a slacker lets me know every time I sit down!!!

One thing you will notice (and part of the reason for the lack of written info) is that there are now video Blogs of me doing all sorts of things from skip casting to rigging, so if you haven't you probably should have a look!! (under ROYTERVISION)
Needless to say my life is never dull. Weather its where I go fishing or the trouble I get myself into while I'm there, there‘s always something going on that‘s not your run of the mill, day to day, 9 to 5!!

POST CARD 1
Mozambique is in Africa and all though a third world country still has a lot of jewels left in its crown. One of those jewels is a huge peninsula east by water from Maputo called Santa Maria or to the locals “Hell Gate”.
This is where you'll find a 4 star fishing lodge owned and ran by Earl & Linda Strydom. This truly is god’s country and the fishing is absolutely magic. At some stages of my time there I almost had to slap myself to make sure I wasn't dreaming. Tuna, trevally, mackerel, emperor, queenies, sea bass, cod as big as a car, it had it all and then some!!
All of this good fishing and not another soul in sight with any more than a hand line. We did put together a DVD for Pure Fishing South Africa which was the whole reason I was there! Good fun, great times, fantastic people and more fish than you could jump over even if you where riding a 58 foot kangaroo!! Happy days all round really!

This is a GT I caught off a bomby on 10lb FireLine,
a US Tactic 6-10lb rob and a Card 704 reel. Go the Gulp Grub!

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The Barra Nationals, Daly River NT. Well to tell you the truth there was no real reason for me to be at this event other then to blow off some steam, catch a few barra and maybe see if we can climb up the board in the fishing results. This is a huge event! 5 days fishing from 7am to 5pm non-stop! Throw into this the night life and you end up with a good solid 3 hours sleep a night!! Ouch!!!
With a tournament such as this there are rules. Quite strict rules! For instance - No barbs on any lures. Catch and release only. Only barra count if they are size. And my personal favorite, no beer till you catch a fish!!
It was a great weeks fishing and having spent every night with 160 guys and girls that are all into having a great time. How could you go wrong!
At the end of the day we did manage to climb that very tall ladder and needed up getting Champion Mixed (interstate) Team and came 5th overall out of 60 odd boats. So that's not a bad job considering I can't remember anything on any of the days past 12:00 midday! Hahaha (seriously, what did you expect!!).

One of the average barra that counted on the list of many.

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I had only just gotten home, kissed the misses and kids once or twice and the phone rang......."Royter....yeah what's up Mr Rayner.....get your stuff together where going blue fin tuna fishing". So I unzipped my bag from Darwin and upended into the washer, reloaded with cloths and pretty much walked back out the door (don’t worry about the power point presentation you needed to finish for NZ!! There are heaps of hours in a day....NOT!!).
Myself, Lee and Morns trucked it down to Port Macdonald in South Aust, oblivious to the fact that the weather man had got it all wrong. We speared the 550 EVO straight into the drink and after a hell ride out to the shelf (all 40+km of it in 2 metre seas with a 3 metre swell) we spotted some fish busting bait. We knock up a quick spread of and in about 100 metres of trolling we had 2 fish on and line making its way backwards into the hellish sea. Morns was first up and with some great boat handling by Lee and a swift and precise gaff shot we had our first fish on the deck. 20kg of tail thumping blue fin was quickly dispatched like it was heading to the markets of Tokyo. Next was my fish. Again boat control and patients played a big part in get this fish aboard live so we could tag and release it.
Blue fin tuna fishing........done!!

My first Blue Fin Tuna. Happy days!!!

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Snapper, snapper and more snapper from the land of the long white cloud! New Zealand has got the worlds best snapper fishier bar none!! There are more snapper over there than sheep and that's a bloody lot!!
The first 4 days of my NZ trip consisted of taking people (retailers and media) fishing for snapper with Berkley and ABU products. New Zealand, all though only having Gulp for 3 years, has completely embraced the soft bait idea and now probably do it better then us here in Oz! It so good to see something that‘s earth friendly taking over from something that is not e.g.. Bait fishing (using natural resources) and PVC Plastisol soft baits (crude oil based products, not earth friendly).
Trust me; in the big schema of things it makes a big difference. Ok Royter get off ya soap box now and get back to the story!!!
Having rotated through 22 people in 4 days on the water giving the odd ‘how too‘ it prove once again the fishing with this method is not only productive but is awesome fun.
Everyone caught fish and we all had a great time. Although the weather was against us and there where no real big fish caught (10kg +) we manage to crank in a lot of fish between 2 and 8kg. Which does me just fine!!

One of the other toy you can play with in NZ
when your tyring to catch a snapper!

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Volume 4 of the Berkley DVD series.
I probably should be posting this yet cause the DVD it self is still a couple of months away but what the heck!
This time where taking you north. Tropical north!! Guesty and my good self will be fishing for barra and an assortment of offshore species with a verity of new and proven tackle. So hold no to your hats cause here we come......all sweaty and sand fly bitten and most of the time looking like we just got out of bed....arrrr the beauty of it all!!!!
As well as that I’ll be taking you across to west to fish the Abrolhos Islands group. Goody, goody gumdrops!!!

You'll be seeing more of this bloke. Shane you are GOLD!!

POST CARD 6
Well you know what they say. There’s no time like the present! The day I got home from the shoot in Darwin I was off again to Portland in Victoria to shoot a DVD on catching Blue Fin Tuna. We had a 2 day window so it was now or never! Day one consisted of running around like headless chicken trying to find fish and covering some of the tech stuff we need to put in the can. Day 2 was all about the fish. With a helping hand from Matty Hunt on the direction we head straight out into one hot tuna bite!
To cut a long day short (and to make sure you buy the DVD haha) we caught 22 blue fin ranging in size from 18 to 25+kg on 8, 10 and 15kg line class.
The day ended with us driving off on fish that seemed to be getting more and more on the job!! Arrrrr.....those are the days!!!

One of those little pocket rocket that we love so much.

So that's what I've been up to in the last 7 weeks. It’s an exciting job I have but before you go jumping up and down, waving your arms around helicopter fashion and saying that you want to do that for a living it’s not all bells and whistles.
I practically live at the air port. I’ve got a Qantas kangaroo emblem permanently imbedded on my butt cheeks from so many miles in the sky. My kids really don't know who I am, apart from that strange man who drops in every now and then and try’s to tell us what to do. And to stop the misses from going insane I give her every cent I make when I'm doing it (must find out what all those pool cleaning brochures are I keep seeing on the coffee table. We don't have a pool!!)

So that's me done for now. I promise to keep more in touch on my Blog from now on and keep your eye on the video blog as well. That's really what I like doing the best!!

Good luck out there snapper heads.

Cheer

Mad Dog Royter.