August is traditionally the windiest month on our calendar. With front after front marching up our coast there are few places where one plans a trip to during that month. Port St Johns is an exception. Not that the wind doesn’t blow there in August. But it is a great place to do a trip to in late winter. Firstly, the river water is clean, making it more lure friendly. Secondly there are a lot of big, adult fish in the river and the nearby surf during this time. The Umzimvubu river and river mouth area is a stop off for migrating fish on their annual spawning run, both on the way up the coast and on the way back.

We were there a week ago, and we stayed at the Spotted Grunter resort right on the banks of the Umzimvubu river, with its own slipway and jetty. The resort has comfortable rooms, with a choice of self catering or full board accommodation ,some with air conditioning. It also has a restaurant, a well-stocked tackle shop and a licensed bar. Owned and run by Vernon and Cindy Malyon, the resort has that neat and well-maintained appearance of an owner-run establishment.

Vernon and Cindy Malyon, owners of The Spotted Grunter Resort

I spent the full first three days fishing the river from my boat. I gave it a full effort, working lures through holes and channels. Fishing the edges of banks, and the drop-offs. I fished from first light, through the day into the evenings. I fished the mouth area and way up above the bridge, looking for some action. It soon became apparent that the fish were not biting. The river water was cold. The Umzimvubu is a long river, originating in the Southern Drakensberg. The recent cold spell, with snow on the mountains meant that the river was being fed by melted snow.

The sea water on the other hand was relatively warm. With all of the South Westerlies that bring the fronts also bringing warm, blue water.

Each day as the high tide filled the river with warm sea water, the river water would warm up to about 20 degrees. On the low tide, the water temperature could be as low at 14.5 degrees. This fluctuation, along with the cold fresh water, was putting fish off the bite throughout the river system.

After three days of dedicated spinning in the river I managed to land a total of two small kob. The only other excitement I had was foul hooking a few Garrick, some of them pretty big, and as nice as it is to have a pull, that isn’t how I want to catch my fish.

Having given the river a good crack, and realizing that it wasn’t going to yield the results that I was hoping for, I decided to change tack. I had been keeping tabs on other fishermen, to see what was going on in the area. Those fishing in the river, regardless of whether they were trolling, spinning, bait fishing or drifting with live baits, were getting no action. The only fish being landed were foul hooked. A Garrick of 18kgs was foul hooked by bait anglers off the jetty at the Spotted Grunter one night. There were some solid Garrick swimming around that river.

There were also some big kob around. There were a number of shoals of big kob seen swimming on the surface of the river a couple of times during our stay. Sadly, those fish were not feeding.

I was hearing that the guys spinning in the surf were having some success. It made sense to change focus and spend some time spinning in the surf near the river mouth.

I had brought surf spinning tackle too. I had my Berkley Venom Taipan 11-foot spinning rod, with a Penn Battle three 4500, loaded with 40lb Berkley Black Velvet braid. I had a selection of bucktail jigs, chisel plugs and paddletails to use.

I put on my cut off gumboots, grabbed a surf spinning bag and my rod and drove to the start of the point.

I made my way along the rocks on the south bank of the river mouth towards the boulders below the Cape Hermes light house. There were a few locals fishing with paddle tails in a few spots. The water looked really good, with plenty of white water around the rocks.

When I arrived at one rock there were a few guys casting paddle tails. I saw a couple of kob in the 12kg size range lying in a pool, and as I was putting my bag down one of the guys went on with a nice fish. A couple of minutes later he had been cut off on the rocks and he had to go and tie on a new lure.

I found myself a spot on the rock and started casting. I had a hard hit on about my third cast, but no hookup. After having had some famine on the river, this was enough to pique my interest and fuel my casting arm for the next hour.

I ended up having a couple of knocks, lost one paddletail in the bricks and then went on with a good fish. I fought the fish for a while, holding it hard to stop it getting into the gnarly reef nearby. I ended up trying to land it on my own in a particularly risky spot and lost it at my feet when the lure came out. I watched it slide back down the slippery rock chute, in the surging white water, not too concerned at the loss and happy to have had the experience.

Later that afternoon I went back to the rocks for another go. There were less anglers around and more good-looking spots available to fish. I made my way to where a local guy had been sitting that morning, on a rock that looked decent to me. The tide was coming in and there was nice churned up water in front, it looked great for kob.

There was a lot of reef in the water and I had to make a decision whether to go with a weedless rigged paddletail, or one rigged on a jig head. The fact that the rock that I was standing on was quite high above the water helped make the decision. I rigged a 5 inch Berkley Powerbait Ripple Shad in the pink shine colour onto a 1.5oz Mad Mullet jig head, with a nice big 6/0 hook.

The reason for my choice was that I felt that this setup gave me the best chance of getting a solid hookup when I got a bite, with the large gaped, exposed hook. Also, the height at which I was standing meant that if I retrieved the paddletail with my rod at an angle of around 45 degrees, I could lift the nose of the paddletail, and it would come over rocks easily, without snagging up.

It didn’t take too many casts to get a solid hit, it came just as my lure reached the ledge in front of me. I had lifted my rod tip higher and was just speeding up my retrieve to avoid hooking the ledge, when my rod got pulled down flat. The fish pulled strongly and ran off to the side, forcing me to jump boulders with my rod held high, to keep my line clear of the rocks.

There were a few touch and go moments, where my braid got caught up in some redbait and mussels. I had to slack off on the drag and get into a position to flick the line loose. Fortunately the Black Velvet is a tough braid , which is why I chose it, and it handled everything thrown at it with ease.

I moved right across the rocks looking for somewhere where it would be possible to land the fish.

I eventually managed to land it in another dodgy spot, it turned out to be a decent kob. Landing it included running down a rock between waves and grabbing the fish by the gill plate (carefully, so as not to touch the gills themselves), and getting a hand beneath the belly to support the fish’s weight. Then jumping back up to safety.

A couple of quick pics and he was sent back to fight another day, much to the dismay of a local guy who had shown up and was hovering around watching proceedings.

That evening Vernon gave us a real treat at the resort. He laid on a delicious seafood dinner and played his guitar and sang for us. He used to be a professional muso, amongst other things, he is a fantastic entertainer and had us all singing along in no time.

The following morning I headed back to the rocks. As I got near the area that I wanted to fish I passed two guys and a gillie, with five livebaits out on slides, and another being rigged. I saw two decent sized garrick tails sticking out from behind a rock. It was good to know that they were around. I climbed over the next set of rocks puzzling as to why anyone would need so many lines out there, I decided that they were fishing for different reasons to me.

When I got to the spot that I wanted to fish there was an Indian family there ahead of me. The dad had a livebait out and was casting a plug. He had two young sons, the older one of about nine was messing about with a rod rigged with a couple of small hooks and some bait. The mom sat quietly on the rocks watching and keeping the kids content with snacks and drinks.

I asked them if I could fish there and they were happy, as there was plenty of space. I started working paddletails in all the spots that looked like they could be holding a kob and had a bite on the second cast, but no hookup.

The kid with the rod decided to tie on a bucktail jig and throw it out. I watched from the corner of my eye, waiting to see him get hooked up and lose his Dad’s brand new bucktail. It seemed inevitable; his cast only just made it over the ledges in front of us. I glanced away to guide my paddletail safely through the rocks and when I looked up again the kid’s rod was buckling and he was calling his dad. The father had to take the rod, as the fish was way too big for the youngster to manage, especially in such a foul and technical area.

It turned out to be a garrick of around 8kgs that had been foul hooked by the jig. They got it close, and it was right in the wash below them when the line parted (I think it was the youngster’s knot). There was much excitement and bucktail jigs suddenly became the sought-after lure. I put on a chisel plug and cast it for about twenty minutes, then changed back to paddletail to see if I could get another kob.

Just when I was starting to think that the kob must be taking the day off, there was some splashing in the foamy water in front of the ledge and a couple of karanteen came jumping out. The dark backs of a couple of hungry garrick could be seen twisting and turning behind them.

I quickly changed back to plug (I had one in my pocket) and sent a cast right next to where the action had been. A fish appeared behind my dancing, white chisel plug, tracking it a few inches behind the hook. I was running out of water and the fish wasn’t committing, so I tried shaking the rod tip and slowing down my retrieve, that usually does the trick. Sadly, in this case the fish lost interest and disappeared.

I carried on casting, covering more water, searching for the fish. There was an explosion on my plug, but the fish missed. I kept it coming and three seconds later there was another, this time my rod went down and I struck into a solid fish.

Garrick are clean fighters, but in this situation, with other lines in the water, and a lot of foul structure on both sides of us, I decided to pressure the fish as hard as I could. It was a strong fish, and it fought hard, but I soon had it in the foam wash below. I lifted it onto the rocks with the next wave and someone grabbed it for me.

That was my trip made. I had come to Port St Johns hoping for a decent kob and a decent garrick and I felt that it had been a success. It was such a shame that the river had not been fishing well, but I know the potential of that river and it gives me a good excuse to come back to the Spotted Grunter and give it another bash.