It was waaay too windy for the kayaks on sunday (its the windy season here) and frankly, after a few hours in the garden, well ok too many hours in the darn garden... I was not much interested in kayaks... Too much effort.
I said to Vicki (head gardener) 'I'm sick of gardening and I've broken the weed eater'. How about we get the ole triumph out and go to a cafe or something?? The head gardener reckoned she didn't fancy a cafe much, she was 'over them' (ie she had already been 400 times that week)...
Drat - I went back to gardening and failed to break anything else so, I mowed and weeded and composted and swept and sweated and planted stuff and tidied and then I said - OK - I'm really sick of this now'. Amazingly, so was Vicki.... (I think she was sick of me moaning)
So we put some coffee in a thermos and went down the beach and Vicki read some magazines about gardening and moaning husbands and I went surfcasting - something that I suck at about as much as fishing off the kayak but... Well I have not even owned a fishing rod for 12 months and apparently there is a skill to this fishing business...
I've been practising so I only really screwed up one cast....
Then, with the sun going down over the ocean, the stiff wind in out face flattening the surf and the tide turning doing the same I managed a beauty cast - woo hoo....
Now all I've caught off the beach has been little dogfish, crabs, tiddlers, weeds, sticks and kelp so I was not hopeful!
The rod went lurch - I went eh? Not quite believing what I was seeing and something started peeling off line like a freight train to the horizon... You beauty! It was an epic battle, I'd gain a bit, loose a bit till eventually I got the gigantic monster into the surf and managed to retrieve line with every wave. Couple of times the monster made a break for it but I kept it in the surf...
Finally, I could get a look at this thing. I had hooked a big old kick arse stingray - an Eagle ray to be precise - what a battle, what fun....
Fun until faced with Mr Stingray (lets call him Ray) in the shallows and he was not a happy camper at all. In fact, he was really pissed and wanted to play Mr Stabby with my legs so I thought - jeeze, thang goodness they are not allowed to carry guns, this fish has an anger problem. He also had my new $5 break out sinker and I wanted it back.
Now everything I know about catching stingrays to this point is from a book.
Apparently, faced with retrieving your tackle, wrap a cotton cloth (towel etc) around the tail and 1 person holds onto that end while the other person attends to the front bit.
I was explaing this to Vicki who had put down her coffee cup and her magazine and wandered over to see what I was yelping about like an excited puppy. She looked at me, she looked at this beast the size of a queen sized mattress with a barb like an IBM and looked back at me with that 'special' look she reserves for idiots, rabid dogs and exasperating morons. She went back to her magazine muttering something about 'I shoulda gone for a ride to a cafe'
Sigh....
I just cut the line as close as I dared and muttered 'just take the stinking sinker ya ungrateful sod'.....
Amazingly, Ray didn't seem grateful at all! Infact had I been standing any deeper I reckon he woulda had a go at me! Sheesh!
Apparently you can eat em but can't see me having dinner with Ray soon.
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. Wonder how long it takes those hooks to rust away
Good read.
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