So you may have noticed the wind picked up along Central Queensland after Christmas. That might have involved the presence of the Dudds around that part of the world.
And when I say, “wind picked up”, you know I mean bloody gales. Locals were astonished at the sudden increase in wind velocity. Being Dudds, we weren’t. We’re used to it now. Intense weather systems seem to follow us around. What we should do is plan a trip to Antarctica and see what happens. Or maybe in the northern hemisphere, the poles are reversed, and we would end up with perfect weather wherever we went. We might even catch fish. Ha, that’s taking things too far.
The other thing I’ve been wondering is whether one of us is that superhero that makes storms appear. Maybe she’s called Storm. Anyway, if one of us is attracting massive weather events, that would explain our Dudds trips. Which makes me wonder which superheroes the rest of us might be. Boobies’ superpower would be the regularity of his pit stop, 2-3 minutes after his first coffee every morning. Stuffer would be his ability to lift heavy things and put them down hard. Skipper would have the ability to tie knots that will not hold under even the slightest tension, and Doughers would have a liver of astronomical size that converts toxic chemicals to safe compounds within seconds of them being ingested. Oh, hang on, he already has that superpower!
So that leaves just me and Pommers to be Stormbringer, or Windjammer if you like. And given Pommers was not present because of a genitourinary complaint, that makes me the one who brings the wind, which is probably appropriate if you ask my wife.
Anyway, the week before we got to CQ, it was all on according to the locals. Eight crabs in each pot, jack and golden snapper smashing lures, livies and even bare hooks, marlin and yellowbelly in Pancake Creek - everyone was cleaning up. Then the Dudds arrived and yep, you guessed it – shut down tighter than a mullet’s bum.
Despite the wind, we fished on because that’s what Dudds do. Stuffer, Boobies, Skipper and I fished on; Doughers interrupted smashing cans with an occasional boat trip. And of course, despite the hundreds of hours put in by us, it’s Doughers that manages to nail the first of only two decent jack for the week. Skipper got the other one, but given that his conversion was one fish from around 40 hits, he doesn’t deserve credit for this jack. It must have been on some serious medication or acting in an SBS miniseries to allow that to happen.
For the rest of us, it was the usual monotony of tying all the right knots, pinning all the right bait with the right tackle and putting it in the right spot. Then waiting, waiting, waiting. Cleaning weed off the line. Waiting. Changing positions. Waiting. Squinting at the sun. Waiting. Checking drag pressure. Waiting. Getting tackle off snags because of the wind flinging the boat around on the anchor like a tethered American Staffie at an Australia Post convention.
Waiting.
And then, going home, which consisted of getting out every ten seconds or so to push the boat through another sandbank before spending the better part of an hour trying to get the boat to match with the rough position of the trailer in 1m high seas at the ramp.
But despite all that, it’s been a good break for us. It’s no use going back to our better halves and trying to describe what a tough week it was. No sympathy there! Besides, if we let them know what we go through to land a feed of fish on the table, they might question why we’ve booked again for next year, which we have done… All we have to do is recruit The Flash, so that Doughers doesn’t end up with another empty can. Come to think of it, that’s when the wind began to blow…
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