After our Southern Queensland trip in April all SMB members were starting to suffer from travel withdrawals so a hasty long weekend trip was arranged. Kerry was keen to revisit an old fishing spot, Sweer's Island in the southern Gulf of Carpentaria.
The island has a fishing resort established by Tex & Lyn Battle and Ray & Salme Atherinos.
The original plan was to leave about lunch time Friday but this quickly changed to an early morning departure to make the most of the daylight and get in some fishing. I was stuck with working Friday morning for a couple of hours so I decided to "cross over to the dark side" and go by fixed wing with Campy. Taking the R22 would mean a couple of extra refuelling stops and would have meant a late afternoon arrival. Campy's Piper Warrior has the legs to get to Sweer's in one jump so we managed to almost catch the rest of the crews as they left Normanton.
Sweer's is a patch of outback Australia surrounded by water. At this time of year it is dry and brown. About half the island is grassy and the other half is covered by low scrubby bush with some patches of eucalypt forest.
Once on the ground we wasted no time in getting out on the water. The resort is set up for fishing. The daily tariff covers all use of boats, fuel, hand-lines, bait, meals and accommodation. (Current price was $210 a day per head Which as far as fishing resorts and camps go is fantastic!) Pay for your bar tab and any extras you buy. But in essence you can arrive with a change of clothes and a toothbrush and have all else provided.
The boats are brilliant! Wide 15ft aluminum catamarans with 40 H.P. motors and fish finder-depth sounders. Very stable and just made to get around the island reefs. All the reefs are close to shore or in the channel between Sweer's and Bentick Island and are rocky rubble. While we mostly bottom fished some of the crews trolled for mackerel. We weren't lucky but a group of guys from Melbourne hooked an 18 kg Spanish Mackerel which was duly turned into a big load of fillets for the trip home. Stored in the purpose made freezer till the day of departure.
The fishing wasn't actually that good for us this weekend, though the photo board showed that plenty of fish get landed at other times. The water is still a bit cold and the fish seemed to be on holiday. Most of us caught 3 to 6 each with a couple of no scorers, and one notable one-fish exception. Acko arrived in his Long Eze on the Saturday, got a spot for the last session of the day and barely got the line wet before hauling in a Flowery Cod of about a metre in length. His fish was the catch of the trip and he then had the hide to complain that the fishing wasn't that flash !!!!!
Fishing there is a fairly civilized affair. Go out after breakfast, back in for lunch. Out again after lunch and back just before sundown. Clean the fish at the cleaning station down on the beach and feed the scraps to the local wildlife. The options are the sea gulls, the huge sea eagle or the even huger groper which swims almost out of the water to get at the scraps. (No pictures of this but if you can find the Australian Geographic Special Edition "Our Favourite Places" there is a great article on Sweer's with a photo of this huge fish partially out of the water getting fed by Tex.)
Then back to the bar for some pre-dinner drinks, tell lots of lies and watch some of the most spectacular sunsets you'll see anywhere. Followed by dinner and "during-dinner" drinks (also washed down with lots of lies) then after-dinner drinks ( and any more lies that were forgotten earlier.) The food is good and there was plenty of it. No prizes for guessing that fish forms a significant part of the menu!
If you don't want to fish the island can be walked around in half a day and there are a few signs of the old settlements to be seen. There is a commemorative plaque at the spot where Matthew Flinders landed on his round Australia voyage in the 1800's. A straggly tree, which seems to be having a tough time surviving, was planted nearby to replace an original old tree that Flinders used as a survey mark. There are lots of birds and small animals for the nature watchers. Curlews and Bustards come into the camp and stroll around. Tex told me there are about four types of snakes on the island though none are poisonous to humans.
Sunday morning saw us having an early breakfast and set course for Normanton for a refuel stop then track back to Cairns. The only problems we had were some difficulty in getting flight plans accepted by radio and then some windy wet weather back on the east coast. As seems to happen a lot on our trips we had 8/8's blue skies till we got back to near Cairns and the rain took over. The winds were pretty strong and the showers passing through in enough density to make getting back a bit uncomfortable. But everyone got back safely.
Planning is now underway for SMB 2003 Cape York and Torres Strait!
