So Covid 19 lockdown has finally ended(ish) and we can go fishing again. I was as confused as anybody about the actual time that we could hit the rocks and ended up jumping the gun, and going a day early in my eagerness to breathe some salty air. I went for a spinning session off one of my favourite rocky points, along with a keen, young angler, Kei Giraudeau.

Kei Giraudeau spinning from the rocks

It was still dark when we arrived, with the usual light ,offshore winter breeze. We were surprised to find the rocks already populated with fishermen and even a couple of families setting up for the day.

 

We cast a variety of lures; spoons, bucktail jigs, plugs and some stickbaits, but had no joy. A few small pockets of sardines showed a couple of hundred metres out, just dark patches of ripples on the surface. As we stood watching them a drone flew out from behind us, carrying a daisy chain of small plastic squids with a large crankbait dangling from the end. It was dropped at the sardine shoal and the angler started reeling in. After a few winds he went tight and we watched him bring in and land a queen mackerel.

 

I sat on the rocks and thought about how fishing is changing. It seems that technology has definitely shifted the way that we catch fish. While nobody can argue that using a drone is an effective way of getting bait or lures to fish that would normally only be possible to catch from a boat, there is the question of personal preference. Everybody fishes for their own reasons though, so it is not up to us to judge one another. One good thing to come out of it, was that it proved that there were fish around. If it hadn’t been for that drone catch we may well have gone home thinking that there had been nothing around at all that morning.

 

The following day the Government Gazette told us that we could indeed go fishing legally. I managed to get a spot on a friend’s boat for the first legal day and quickly prepared my offshore gear.

The break of dawn next morning found us on the beach in our lifejackets and covid face masks, ready to launch through the winter surf. We had filled out special forms as well as the usual launch register, and had our temperatures taken, so we were in compliance with the Government requirements.

At backline we quickly loaded up with live mackerel, some maasbankers and red eyes, then headed off to the grounds that we wanted to fish. After slow trolling live mackerels for a while we had a double strike and had two fish on. Before had landed them a third rod went and the three of us each had a fish on. We ended up landing three king mackerel, between four and six kilos. Normally I release my fish, but I had long ago eaten the last of my home caught fish, so these king mackerel were dispatched into the fish hatch. I spent the rest of the day planning to cook a fresh fish fry up that evening. The lockdown craving was real!

Bryant Beukes checking over the “bamboo forest”

It was a calm day, with beautiful sea conditions. The ocean was alive, with shoals of sardines popping up all over the place. There were humpback whales breaching from time to time and plenty of sea birds in the form of albatrosses, petrels and terns.

It felt so good to be out on the water again, after almost three months of lockdown. The ocean was somehow more alive than usual, as if it too had benefitted from the break and we were all much more appreciative than normal, of how privileged we are to have this wonderful playground on our doorstep.