THE NEW YEAR TRIP

If Paris was made to be seen in April, and New England in the Fall, then Geelong is a place to visit once in a blue moon, perhaps at the end of a month of Sundays sometime in 1973. I’m not saying that it doesn’t have a certain charm but generally I try to stay on the east side of the Westgate, not owning a plaid shirt or a pair of moccasins. I was once in a coffee shop with my wife in Geelong and we both ordered a Flat White and got Lattes. I can’t begin to tell you how distressing my wife found it.
Hairy is an old mate from way back. We went to university together and it is pure coincidence that we are both in Australia. I’m surprised he managed to get a visa after the incident when he did a ram-raid on a video store, then took photos of himself with of all the TV sets. These he then sent to his mates in jail to “show them how well he was doing.” Anyway we have for a long time decided to go down the surf coast together for a few days fishing.
I talked it over with my wife and she seemed to think it was a good idea. She even arranged for her mother to spend the week at our house to get the kids to and from school. The kids hate being picked up by her. I tend to stay in the car and wait by the gate, she marches into the playground yelling, “Cuckoo Darling.” Some days she even makes them walk home, and sing songs from the Sound of Music on the way.
When I told Penni I was going away for a while she was lying under the rear of a Nissan Patrol. All I could see were her boots. Her feet remained silent. I told her again and she asked where, and when. She seemed reluctant to come out and hold this conversation, as if afraid I, like Venus, was about to leave her for good.
“Just for the week, the week after next week that is, maybe a bit less than a week, we’ll see how it goes, B’s coming too so I can’t change it now I’d be letting the boy’s down.”
The explanation seemed good enough and slowly she emerged like a chick reversing from its shell.
“I could come too?” It was a question not a statement.
I knew that from a practical point of view it wasn’t a good idea as she was having trouble making ends meet. Since Venus had left she had been running a car repair and service business in her back yard. It was, of course, against every council planning regulation but we weren’t about to complain, and she didn’t rev engines in the middle of the night or anything. At the same time I knew that having her come along would be great fun, and we’d be able to spend some time together. She could sense that I was trapped in a dilemma and added, “if you want me too.” Which of course now made it impossible for me to say no.
Guys have rules, I think #5 is never take your wife on a fishing trip. It comes just before #6 which states never cheat on your wife. But what exactly constitutes cheating these days? According to Hairy it's not cheating you're in a different area code, better still a different state, and he should know he’s been divorced three times, twice from the same person. As he once pointed out “anytime you pass up sex, you're cheating on yourself.” Hairy’s parents were a couple of old hippies, all “free love” and “bean curd.” Unlike Hairy my upbringing wasn’t as liberal so I have all sorts of hang-ups over this kind of thing. I knew Penni shouldn’t come with us, but couldn’t think of a way out of it, so a planning meeting was held and arrangements made. Suddenly instead of three guys and a tent it became a military operation.
An old friend of Hairy, Ben, is always called simply, B. This comes from his school days where his brother Alvin was “Collin’s A” and he became “Collin’s B”. B tells a story that when asked by his school careers advisor what he wanted to be when he grew up he told her “a swagman.” Since then he had become a queens scout, a solider (involved in a number of peacekeeping ‘incidents’ that he doesn’t want to talk about so don’t even ask) and finally an outback tour guide. On the day of departure Hairy arrived at my house about lunchtime in B’s converted old ‘greyhound’ bus. B had just returned from a week in the Simpson Desert and everything on the rattler was covered in a layer of red dust. This was perhaps for the best as it disguised the rust. On the buses back window read a sign “in case of emergency exit through window.” Unfortunately the sign was on the wrong way so could be read from outside but not inside. This somehow made perfect sense, “In case of emergency outside in the real world escape on a fishing trip.”
The bus’ great advantage over our normal car is space. This can be a disadvantage too. Our equipment didn’t even take up half of the luggage storage so we just had to take a couple of spare rods, some extra fly tying stuff, those old waders with the leak in the knee (in case we feel the need to repair them), and the whole catastrophe. And it still left us with the whole bus, the rear half of which had been converted: four triple bunks, a kitchen, and a chemical toilet. It was just like Cliff Richard’s Summer Holiday if you smoked a really good joint.
We picked up B from the Newsagents where he was negotiating the purchase of the annual tobacco production of a small central American nation.
Penni had driven over to Hairy’s apartment earlier so that we didn’t have to arrive or depart together. Hairy’s lives in a flat above a pharmacist’s shop. Apparently the Chemist is so keen to have the place lived in at night that the rent is dirt-cheap. Little does he know that any would be drug thief would be better advised to raid Hairy’s flat than the shop below.
There was a loud cheer as I greeted Penni with a kiss. When I returned with her to the bus Hairy and B had hung a sign up over the door, “Just Eloped.” I could see it was going to be a fun week.
It was another half-hour before we were all together and ready to roll. B had spent the time going through a long checklist of what to do before leaving.
 Turn off all lights - check
 Make sure there isn’t anything that might go off in the fridge - check
 Set the video to record the X files – check
 Over feed the goldfish so they will last the week – surely that doesn’t work – and check
 Drape a piece of toilet paper over the bath to help the spiders climb out - check.
Within a hundred yards of his door B yelled out, “Stop the bus.” He was running before the air brakes hissed and it slowly ground to a halt.
Two minutes later he returned with a pet rat in a cage. “He’s called Archie.” He said as if this explained everything we needed to know, which it did.
The first evening we decided to stop off at a karaoke pub populated only by a party on a hens’ night strip show to the accompanying cry of “get ya kegs off.” B and Hairy obliged. I decided that with Penni present to be a bit more restrained. I later discovered that she was the one who originally started the shouting.
After their show B and Hairy went back to the bus for the night. Penni and I checked into a nearby motel. There has been a trend over the last few years to name hotels and restaurants after places in films or television shows. Fawlty Towers, and the Pie in the Sky have gained the appearance of a chain. The Bate’s Motel was however not such a good idea. Needless to say the place was deserted.
I decided not to have a shower.
The next day the drive from along the coast took about four hours. There were two reasons for this, firstly we decided to try and go the long way the second reason was because Hairy spent the morning being ill in a way the chemical toilet wasn’t designed to cope with. The smallest room on the bus had long since given up under the strain.
On the way we played petrol station lotto. Everyone on the bus picks a petrol price for the day and as we pass stations the nearest guess wins a point. This is a game that is best played in Australia where there is a “free, open and competitive” fuel market.
The other on board activity during the trip was, of course, cards. Most groups of men together soon develop their own variant on poker, bizarre and illogical rules to trick the unwary: two’s are wild, you can’t double the ante until after the draw, or three of a kind beats a straight if they are the beast’s hand (666). We played Old Maid. Much to her disgust Penni lost and became the officially designated the bus’ Old Maid.
B suggested that we play craps.
“I don’t know how you play, what are the rules?”
“Well we all lay a turd, and the one with the longest wins.”
We played old maid again.
When we had set up camp and strung up. It was then I realised that Penni was going to cut into my fishing time.
The river we were camped by is coastal and only fishable for a few kilometres from the sea up to a waterfall. It isn’t even what you’d call attractive in the traditional trout stream sense running through flat farmland. It’s claim to fame however are the sea trout that run up to the pool below the waterfall, where they discover they can’t go any further. Big angry fish all muscle and attitude. We were there at the wrong time of year, but then again there were no crowds so perhaps it was the right time.
There were fish, but they weren’t the big ones. There were hatches – but nothing to get excited about. Compared with most trips there was a lot of down time. Penni was happy to potter around camp or read a book: Chocolat – Joanne Harris (she only ever reads books when she’s already seen the film so she “knows what the characters look like.”)
One day we fished the estuarine part of the river, just to see if we had a chance with the sea trout down there. None of us had done that kind of fishing before so we didn’t expect much to go right, which as it happens is just as well. I’d done some research before the trip and couldn’t find anything about flies or techniques in the Australian press (Note to self – learn how to catch them and then write one yourself.) The three of us all took different approaches to fly selection. B went the highland gentleman route with traditional Scottish sea trout patterns (Teal Blue & Silver and Soldier Palmers) all beautifully tied (i.e. bought - because B can’t tie his shoe laces) I went for a more exotic approach going for some patterns I found in a US magazine and recommended by Capt. John Kumiski (a salt water fly fishing guide from Florida). They were big heavy flies (hard to cast on my gear) and looked great in the pictures only I had a bit of difficulty with the unfamiliar materials. You can see Capt. John’s flies tied properly at http://www.spottedtail.com/SexyFliesHome.htm, and no that’s not an advert I’ve never met the man. Hairy took the anarchist approach to life, no planning or preparation for the trip, so just fished something he normally has in his box anyway, (in this case a Black Woolly Buggers.) Needless to say he was the only one of us to catch a fish, well a trout. B caught a couple of flathead (after adding some shot to his line which is not the act of a highland gentleman.) All three of us normally catch and release but catch and release of the flathead given our lack of fresh provisions didn’t seem such a good idea so we ate them, just grilled on the campfire, and they were bloody good.
That evening back at camp B invented a new way of playing chase the ace, a variant on tag involving “the ace” running round the camp humming the theme music to the dam busters, using his underpants as goggles while trying to igniting his own farts. Penni and I decided to go off for a moonlight walk leaving while the others still had their dignity intact.
To cut a long story short Penni and I had a great time on the road together. There were all the disasters you could imagine, and some you couldn’t but we laughed them all off. At last we were together, and didn’t have the weight of the world on our shoulders. Penni even tried her hand at fishing, I took time off during the mid-day lull. It shouldn’t have worked but did. The only thing that disturbed me was a strange feeling that Archie wasn’t the only rat who had made the trip.

CURE FOR COMMON COLD!

The alarm clock is a wonderful invention. It helps me get up, reminds me it’s time to get the kids from school and even assists in the boiling of an egg. I’ve got a small travel alarm that makes a ring like a telephone. Confusing yes, but it's also sometimes invaluable. What makes it even better is the fact that it actually is a telephone. It’s one of those notepad computers as well and a multi-language translator, all pocket-sized and hi tech. A tree fell down in the night the other day and pulled down all the telephone wiring. Without my phone-alarm thing I’d be like some medieval hermit unable to speak to the outside world, unable to get the call from the agency, unable to get work. Maybe I’ll turn it off.
Other that my alarm-phone-translator thing I’m a pretty low tech guy.
I was bought an electric coffee grinder as a Christmas present by my in laws because after a good meal I disappear into the kitchen for five minutes manual grinding. 
I like turning the handle and hearing the beans crack, instead of the soulless whirl of an electric
 motor. For a while the new one sat still in it’s box, used only when the in laws come round, which by a strange chance is also normally the time I most want to spend five minutes in the kitchen. Now I’ve moved it out of the house to my shed where it sits on my fly tying table ready to blend together two colours of possum fur into a fine dubbing. It actually works rather well at this, a task that’s easy enough by hand but I feel I owe it to my in-laws to automate.
I wish I had kept the instructions for my phone alarm thing so I could give each function a different ringing tone. Whenever I boil an egg - and the phone noise goes to tell me if my yolk is still runny - I expect it to be my wife threatening to come home early and catch me with Penni. Whatever the ring-tone noise setting is on the telephone-alarm thing the sound of a guilty conscience always rings true.
I was making coffee when my wife phoned from work and asked me to make doctors appointment for her. I’m not sure why she did just phone the doctor. Anyway she had decided it was that time of year for her flu jab.
A couple of years ago I was made aware of a piece of academic research that suggested that frequent sex boosts antibody production, resulting in less illness. The researcher speculated that even the common cold could become a thing of the past if only people were having sex twice a week.
I never examined the full research methodology but I’m sure it was a research grant well spent. I can imagine students who wouldn’t otherwise have much of a chance signing up to be part of the trials. They, no doubt, were the first ones asked to abstain as a control group. Life can be so unfair, but at least they could take comfort in the knowledge that they were being celibate for science. I wonder if it is possible to have placebo sex.
Armed with this knowledge my wife’s request for a flu jab had therefore the kind of secondary meaning normally reserved only for a cabaret drag queen, “Just a little prick, you’ll hardly feel a thing.”
The down side of the research was a strong warning. Too much sex actually has the reverse effect. People having sex four or more times a week are no better off than those not having sex at all, other than the fact they have a big grin on their faces of course.
This could be why homeopathic practitioners have been telling us for years that a happy, well sexed individual is always going to live longer and be healthier than Christopher Skasse, although not necessarily have better super.
Presumably the Government have also know this for years which is why each time the hospitals ask for more funds the Government tells them to go and get screwed.
All this was going through my mind when the phone rang again. It was Penni from next door asking if I wanted to pop round. The invitation had the same effect as a bell used to for one of Pavlov’s dogs.
As soon as I walked in through the back door, (the front door at chez Penni hasn’t been opened to anyone for years, no Julian Clearyisms intended), I could tell something was wrong.
“Is something wrong ?” I asked perceptively.
In return she handed me a letter. It was headed, “Demand for Payment” and came from “The Caring Bank.”
“Looks like you're in Queer Street.” I ventured
“Venus hasn’t been giving me her share of the mortgage so I’ve been falling further and further behind.”
“Well what are you going to do ?” I already knew the answer.
“Sell up, get out, move into a box under the railway bridge.”
We discussed possibilities for a while, even managing to joke about different sorts of cardboard and which bridge would be the quietest for a good nights sleep. We weren’t really getting anywhere, I thought Penni really just wanted a hug.
Penni pulled away and looked at me. “The thing is what’s happening with us.”
“Don’t ask me,” I answered, “there aren’t enough hours in the day to sort some things out are there ?”
“If I’m not here will I still see you ?”
“Look Penni I’m not here because you’re only next door, I’m here because I love you.”
And that’s how it happened, how I said it for the first time. What surprised me, as much as it did her, was that I said it because it was true. I had slept with her, and that had all seemed good and natural/(if somewhat confusing and wrong at the same time,) but somehow without opening my mouth and saying it I hadn’t figured it all out. We kissed.
Just at that moment my phone thing went. With great timing it was my wife about her doctors appointment. I told her that I hadn’t been able to make an appointment for today but that I’d got her the first one for her tomorrow morning. She could have the flu jab and catch a late train.
She agreed it that would be fine and added “Is everything alright there ?”
“Yeah, couldn’t be better.”
“You sound sort of flustered.”
“I think I may be coming down with something.”
For the common cold sex may be a better cure than Panadol but it’s far from being a panacea for your problems.
When I got home there was a note on the doormat. It read, “The telephone repair man came today and found you out.”

ROUTINE AGAIN!

Every morning I follow the same routine. In fact a routine is essential when you work from home, or as I do work on a haphazard basis. Without one you could just stay in bed all day. I get up, get my breakfast, and my wife’s. She gets ready for work, and I drive her to the station. It’s a precision operation timed to the last minute, which is unfortunately more than can be said of the train service. Sometimes I think I could make the tea and toast still in my sleep. I normally then I wake up and find I have.
So the other day we’re getting in the car and I pull out to find the streets full of people. To put this in perspective where we live the term “go and play in the road” still has a literal meaning. The street, although unsealed, is the nearest thing round here to a basketball court and cricket pitch. When Ron and Gelatti were having there Tudor cottage built it coincided with the Commonwealth Games. The builders sand at the side of the road meant they could have their own Street Olympics complete with long-jump pit. The kids asked Ron if he’d get some more sand so they could make a beach volley ball court. So bearing that in mind a street full of cars left me somewhat curious, so on my return from Belgrave station I decided to see what was happening.
The centre of the activity was Mrs Kaye’s house. Her granddaughter’s car was in the drive, as were two others I didn’t recognise and a police car. The Policeman, Barry, has a daughter who goes to school with my daughter. Last year at sports day, he and I were the only two runners in the Dad’s race, until some footballer from the Saints showed up. The funny thing being that both of us beat him. So I saw Barry, the policeman, and asked him what was going on and he tells me Mrs Kaye’s died, perhaps a couple of days ago. I told him that wasn’t true, I’d seen her yesterday afternoon. To be more accurate she’d collared me when I’d been taking the dogs for their routine lunchtime walk and given me a bag of bones. She’d asked me to post a letter for her because she didn’t want to go into the village. I’d heard her again later calling for her cat, perhaps around four.
Barry rushed off to tell the doctor leaving me on the doorstep unsure what to do. Mrs. Kaye's granddaughter we call M’lady. She has this air about her as if she expects everyone to call her “Marm,” and say “Yes M’lady.” I felt that I should offer my condolences, so I went inside.
Mrs. Kayes' house smelt of cabbage boiled for years in Vicks Vapour Rub. For some reason I found myself stooping despite the high ceiling. Everything in the room seemed to have a frill or a tassel. Above the fireplace the mantel was covered with an exquisite Victorian cloth which somehow wove together frills and tassels. The furniture was also from another age, a time when cabinetmakers and craftsmen were still members of guilds. The room was strangely populated by standard lamps of all sized and shapes. Some were beautiful cut glass oil lamps, I never doubted for a second that if called upon each would work perfectly. Disappointingly there was no sign of a chalk outline on the floor.
M’lady was standing next to the far wall holding a tape measure. The other end was being stretched out by an estate agent who was commenting on the quiet cul-de-sac.
“Do you think we can get a quick sale.”
I wasn’t sure if M’lady was using the royal we, a practice usually reserved for the Queen and sports stars. “We were going along nicely until lap sixteen when someone hit us.”
“Oh I should think so,” I interrupted, “I heard people would kill for a good location, location, location.”
It was my second least tactful remark of the day, I’d already told my wife not to wear her blue dress to work because blue made her look fat.
M’lady seemed not to notice, so I gave my condolences to her back as she held the tape against the window and I left.
Later that day Penni came round. It was the first time I’d seen her since our walk in the woods so potentially a very awkward moment.
“About the other day,” I started, but before I could finish she held up one finger to stop me talking and walked up and kissed me.
“Just checking,” she said and then proceeded to make a cup of tea in my kitchen in a manner that can only be described as very familiar.
“I’m not sure about this ?” I said.
“Yes you are, not sures don’t kiss that well. Now where’s the sugar ?”
There was no more discussion needed. We were both sure. Sure we shouldn’t, sure we would.
I decided to change to conversation and told her about Mrs Kaye.
“I once told Mrs Kaye I was a lesbian.” she said. “She said she used to be on the stage too. I tried to tell her ‘not a thespian’ but I think she had something wrong with her hearing aid.”
“I think you’ll find her hearing was pretty good.” I told her. “So how does this lesbian thing work then.”
I had in this one sentence broken all previous records of tactlessness. I had set a new tactless personal best. I could be un-diplomatic for Australia. I could start wars.
Penni just gave a playful smile and promised to show me later. Penni has never broken a promise.
By the time I went to pick my wife up I had showered three times and brushed my teeth down to the gums.
By that evening a "for sale" sign had already gone up. I told my wife about Mrs Kaye.
“I wonder who will buy it.”
“Well it needs a lot of work,” I pointed out.
“I hope it will be young people with kids to play with our lot, not like Penni and Venus. Maybe Penni will move too now that Venus isn’t around anymore. She can’t have much fun here by herself all day.”
“It’s nice here during the day.” I informed her.
“Why what happened to you today then?”
“Oh nothing much today, you know, just routine.”

MEATPIES, BIRDSONG AND OTHER STUFF TO MESS YOUR LIFE UP.

Unfortunately among my all too few talents I am unable to list the ability to see into the future. To illustrate this my only foray into the share market, other than Telstra of course where the Government apparently sold my publicly held shares to their city mates, was during the Gulf War when I bought into an American arms contractor just before Saddam “the coward” Hussain surrendered. Let me tell you every silver lining has a cloud. I quickly reasserted my previous pacifist and socialist credentials by renewing my membership to the union bar. This inability at second sight I have been informed is genetic on my father’s side. I have been reliably told, he died when I was still quite small, that lying on his death bed his last words were, “don’t fuzz I’ll get up in a minute.” It isn’t clear if he said this to reassure those around him or an example prophetic hindsight. Last week I almost spoke my own final words when overtaking on the Burwood Highway. “Can’t this idiot go faster,” wouldn’t make a brilliant epitaph.
My wife has invented a word: seeit, as in: “I will believe it when I seeit.” Or “I’ll seeit if it happens.” I only have to say something like, ”I’ll fix that bathroom light at the weekend,” for her to seeit.
For example the other day I was walking down the road enjoying the ten minutes that pass as twilight during this time of the year. Suddenly when I was outside the video store I saw a ghost. Not the shadow of a tree moving in a strangely unworldly way but a spectre, a shade, a spook, a real 100% Technicolor ghost. It’s not the sort of thing you expect without the aid of a major hallucinogen. Unfortunately I hadn’t taken anything so it scared me shit less. He, the ghost was a boy, or an ugly girl with a haircut like a lavatory brush, looked at me accusingly and then faded like a cheap b-movie special effect. The whole apparition lasted less than a minute but was very real and very unnerving. Above everything it gave me a feeling that something somewhere was very wrong, or something was about to happen that shouldn’t. Call it a portent perhaps. When I got home I told my wife and she said she’d seenit too.
There are those who will tell you that when a butterfly flaps it’s wings in Central Park, whoosh !, a cyclone rips Darwin to pieces. To which I reply, “never trust a bloody American.” The point is that the scientific laws of cause and effect aren’t as simple as they at first appear.
So one day I’m sitting on my veranda with my stream side fly tying kit, trying to match a little bug in a jar that I’d collected the day before, when Penni pops round to see if I want a piece of cheese cake.
“I didn’t know you baked?” I asked
“I don’t but I thought we could go to the deli, and you could buy me some.”
I’m always a bit dubious about shop bought cheesecake because my mother, who would be sainted if she wasn’t Jewish, was such an expert at it. She couldn’t cook anything else in the world that was even vaguely edible so every day we’d ask, “have you make a cheese cake mum?” Most of the time she’d say something like, ”no I’ve make lochshen pudding,” and our hearts, not to mention or stomachs, would drop.
I decided not to go to the Deli in case Ron was there. Since Gelatti had left him he had been eating there so regularly that Margaret, the owner, had stopped charging him service, and started charging him rent. There was even a rumour she was going to name a dish after him. It had got to the stage that at least once a week she took the day off and he did the cooking.
So Penni and I went to the Olde Maide Tea Room, ordered a Devonshire tea, and decided to see who could put the most whipped cream on a scone. It still seemed like a good idea when we were standing on the pavement outside having been asked to leave. We won’t be going back there again, apparently. So we bought a pie each from the post office and while they were heating up in the microwave passed the time by sticking some suggestions in the suggestions box on the counter. “Never wash colours and whites together on a warm wash,” “at the supermarket pay for each item that will be rounded down separately, not only will you save money but you’ll get a chance to really get to know the cashier.” Then pies in hand we went for a walk in the woods.
In England the birds sing, in America they warble, in China they are silent afraid that if someone sees them their feet will become a local delicacy. Australian birds squawk, and those that don’t squawk laugh. While walking with Penni I discovered a third type of Australian birds, the stuka birds. These fly past silently and dive-bomb shit on your head while their friends squawk and laugh. Penni told me that it was a sign of good luck, a logic that escaped me. She told me the luck was that she had a tissue. I bent my head forward and she wiped my scalp clean, then somehow as we were standing close we kissed. Just like that. She tasted of meat pie.
Little causes can have big effects, and you can’t always seeit coming.

THE HEMINGWAY HATCH

I just received the annual Christmas note from a distant relative’s husband, late as always. It’s all about the wonderful holidays they have had this year, “Africa 2007 was much better than 2004,” and “this year we lost the last of the Grandparents generation but we still managed to get away skiing at Easter to St. Moritz.” He also tells us constantly how well the practice is doing, so I guess he must be a doctor or a solicitor, maybe if I read the letters more carefully I’d know. His children: Tristan and Isolde, are both studying for their bar exams, I think they are 12 and 10 respectively. He describes himself in the letter as having had a good year as a sportsman, telling us as evidence of salmon on the Dee, jumping sailfish off the African coast, tuna in the Caribbean and a 1200lb shark caught from Hemingway’s own boat. I suppose in a little jealous of those fishing opportunities although what Hemingway had to do with it I wasn’t really sure. There was even a driven grouse shooting story detailing numbers of brace shot and how his son also “acquitted himself well.” I couldn’t help thinking poor grouse, they should be tracked on foot for miles over the moors, stalked, EARNED. They should never be treated as accessories in some up market coconut shy. I’ve always likened driven grouse shoots as similar to fly fishing at a trout farm, you could do it but well why? My main feeling was how good I felt that I had emigrated to Australia where the words sporting and gentleman rarely appear in conjunction. Sure he may work really hard for his money, and good luck to him with that, but I can’t get my head round that mentality. However it got me thinking about a lot of stuff. For example: if I was going to write back with my fishing stories what was the most memorable trip of the year?
Before any trip I like to look at my fly boxes, hatch charts and old note books and check if I’ve got the right flies. This makes practical sense for a number of reasons. Firstly I’m not a great stream side tier, my best results are quietly at my bench at home in good light. I tie styles more than patterns, and use a few dead specimens in jars I’ve collected over the years, but mainly now I use digital images as references for the actual insects. When I’m by a river I like to fish, not fly tie. The other reason I like to get everything ready is that it’s sort of a ritual that helps builds the trip up as something special, something that needs special preparation, something to really look forward to.
Well the trip in question was to be to a new stretch of water to me, and I asked around but couldn’t find anyone who admitted to have fished it. A farmer I spoke to said, “some used to get fish from the lower creek near there, but there’s a tiger (snake) behind every tussock.” Thank Kate. I’ve been known to tell people that just after I’ve let them know about a favourite spot -just to double check their character.
I don’t own a four wheel drive; as a result I’ve ruined the shocks on my car and have to park up as soon as the track gets hairy. And let me tell you that is not very near the river at all. The trek up the track and into the bush takes most of the day. At one point I discover my compass is broken, but the tree cover is quite thin at this altitude so I think I can figure out where I’m going from the glimpses of peak I get once in a while, and a rough guide to direction given by my watch and the sun. Anyway the river’s got to be at the bottom of the valley so as long as I don’t start going up hill I’ll find it. Which I did but not until it’s nearly dark, much longer than I guessed from the map but it doesn’t matter, I’m by myself for a few days so am on my own time. The first thing I do is set up my camp by tying a tarp to a couple of trees as a lean to in case it rains. Then I collect some firewood and have a brew.
The remnants of England still flow in me in the form of a love of football (Plymouth Argyle) and tea. The tea is made Australian “billy tea” style, boiling the leaves in the water and swinging the billy in a big circle to settle them down. I drink it black because I can’t be bothered to carry any milk with me. I don’t think the Queen would recognise it as tea, or serve it at her garden party, but the surroundings are a trifle less manicured and the result is better than drinkable. Billy tea on the banks of a new and potentially great trout stream is one of my favourite drinks. And the water looked indescribably fishy.
I string up slowly and carefully, changing my leader at once from the 12’ one I’ve been using to a 7’ to allow me to cast in the confined overgrown water, and I soon discover that even with the short leader I’m having difficulty.
The rod I’m using is a 7’6” #4. It’s graphite from a leading tackle maker who won’t want me to mention there name for reason’s that will become apparent. I soon realise it’s not a good choice, a #5 or #6 would roll cast better as given the lack of space that would be a big help, still I’m not going back to the car to swap rods. I bought this one so this one it is.
There are a few rises but I can’t see any insects on the water, certainly nothing you could call a hatch, so I tie on a red tag, part attractor and part beetle. It’s a personnel favourite of mine, easy to tie and productive anywhere. I don’t know what it is with trout and peacock herl but it’s a favourite of theirs too.
The red tag floats along beautifully in the slow pools but takes it’s first trout when washed under the surface on a broken run. I learn the lesson and switch to nymph, and take a second fish out of almost the exact spot. It could have been a clone of the first, both browns, both 12”, sadly neither in prime condition, the drought has had a bad effect on a lot of rivers this season and under weight fish seem common this year.
The pool itself was Y shaped with two runs entering it at the top and a section in the middle where the two merge creating very difficult currents to cast into but where the fish seem to be.
It was at that point the hatch started.
If Australia has one iconic mayfly it’s the Kosciusko Dun. The truth appears to be a little more complicated as there appears to be at least two separate species of Leptophlebiidae known locally as Kosciusko Duns, both a sort of sandy terracotta colour, one about a #10 and one a little smaller say #12. There may be more species involved, only DNA analysis will tell us if the CSIRO ever makes entomology a priority for their research grants. The spinner is a little brighter orange colour, the nymph a couple of shades darker brown. For the fisherman it doesn’t really matter as they share a similar natural history, just fish what you see.
The hatch began slowly enough with a no more than a handful of duns floating towards me. I tied on an emerger pattern, more in hope I was missing the early stages of a hatch, and after a few casts to the top of the pool managed to get the drift right and connected.
There followed almost an hour of great match the hatch fishing, followed later in the evening with a heavy spinner fall as the whole river once again came to life prompted by clouds of dancing bugs.
When I eventually waded my way back to my camp, contented, I ate with the hunger reserved for a day spent in the outdoors. Under the stars I soon fell asleep and dreamt I was Ernest Hemingway.
The next morning I woke early to watch the mist rolling along on the top of the stream as I downed my usual quick breakfast of cous cous and dried fruit.
The day’s fishing started slowly, well very slowly. I knew after yesterday’s feast the trout would be a bit harder to fool. I worked upstream but without success. Finally after about an hour I found a shady bubble run tight by the bank I knew must hold a good. I was indicator nymphing at this point and as soon as the little float paused I struck hard. Far too hard, my rod tip hit a branch above me and snapped just below the top guide. Breaking a rod, is expected every now and again but is never a good feeling. The trout was quickly landed and released and I the damage assessed. The nearest replacement rod was a days walk away, but with a bit of trial and error I realised I could flick my fly with a side-on action about 30 feet. Not “presented” so much as “delivered” but because I was there I decided to stay on for a while and see if I could get by.
It was at the next pool that I lost my footing and fell on my rod, snapping it above the handle. Now this was serious. Again I was faced with a dilemma. Should I give up and go home or try and improvise. I had some 20 lb mono in my pocket, the type you use for the butt of your leader, so I proceeded to strap the handle and reel to the bottom section of my rod by the stripping guide. Again with a shortened sideways action I could almost cast.
By now I had lost a large part of the morning and was thinking about heading back to camp when I saw a little back eddy with a trout’s nose poking around. My first thought was “shit – if my rod wasn’t busted up ….” But as I examined the situation I realised I could just about cast there. I didn’t know what the fish was doing, and didn’t want to get any closer in case it spooked so I guessed there were Kossie spinners in the surface film left over from the night before. My friend Mick had shown me how to tie a para-loop spinner pattern, and I had been recently experimenting with different post materials. (Mine aren’t as pretty but somewhat easier to tie.) I was keen to show one to a trout for a true verdict. Fishing eddies is tough especially with a broken rod because it’s almost impossible to mend your line. Luckily my drift can’t have been too bad because on my second attempt the trout lazily swam open mouthed into it. I struck, as well as I could and soon found myself connected to a fighting trout who held all the aces. It was all I could do to stay connected but after a few short runs the fish started to loose ground. Not a trophy fish but a memorable catch none the less.
A couple of days later I was in a favourite tackle shop with my broken rod. The rod, as I have already said, was a “good” make and came complete with a lifetime guarantee. This is something of a novelty for me as nearly all my rods are second hand. I discovered that this meant the manufacturer guaranteed to be able to repair the rod, or replace it. It did not guarantee the costs and I was expected to pay $250 for the repair. As far as I’m concerned that’s false advertising.
Still the rod did acquit itself well and now rests, unrepaired, on my wall to prompt any visitors to ask me about my most fishing trips.

THE SEPTEMBER TRIP

I HAVE FOUND OUT THAT THERE AIN'T NO SURER WAY TO FIND OUT WHETHER YOU LIKE PEOPLE OR HATE THEM THAN TO TRAVEL WITH THEM. ~MARK TWAIN
I’ve fallen into an annual routine. I’m that old.
Every September, either the week before or the week after my wedding anniversary, I go off for the first fishing trip of the season. Normally I go up to Eildon and camp by the Big River. The campsites all have little bays for a few dozen tents/vans but this time of the year you can pick your own site and it’ll be deserted, or move on until you find one that is. That’s the point of the trip, to get away from everyone after all. The fishing is generally lousy, too much rain at that time of year muddies up the water but the season has opened so it has to be done, because you can.
September here means little insect activity. Your best bets are the black beetles and green midges, but if your luck is in there can be good fishing on Baetid mayflies (little blue/grey ones and olives in #16) and if the weather’s ok the stone flies (black #14) are sometimes out early, tie a few just in case but don’t rely on using them. Most fishermen just stick to using bead head nymphs under an indicator because the trout seem to hug the streambeds. If the fish think they are stoneflies returning after their night hatch to lay their eggs in the stream, or the nymphs themselves getting ready for the night to come isn’t clear, just that they seem to get the job done.
Some of the best fishing I’ve had on these trips has been on a dry parachute style foam-stone pattern (called a Grammy Stone, and first tied by Eildon's own Mick Hall for use on the Rubicon) but I usually spend most of my time with a nymph or flymph (tied “Pete” Hidy style.)
To get the trip right not only do you need the weather to be obliging, so the water doesn’t look like tea, but you have to time the trip right. Stoneflies hatch at night and seem to want the full moon. So you need to be there a couple of days before the full moon when most the stone flies and there nymphs are most active. As you can imagine it doesn’t often work.
This year the only time I could get away included my wedding anniversary. Vicky wasn’t impressed. The day was actually the best dry fly day I’ve ever had in September with fish rising greedily to anything that looked vaguely buggy, but not to anything specific that I could figure out. The “I’m almost a beetle” patterns (based on humpies) and the ubiquitous Adams all worked, a great day. I fished a small tributary of one of the better known rivers that flows into lake Eildon, your have to forgive me for not being specific here it’s just that I don’t think it can handle the fishing pressure of being labelled in print as a great early season dry fly option. The fish were mostly rainbows, possibly still in the stream from late spawning because I’ve noticed that by November there are definitely less of them, especially the big ones. By big I mean big for that water. Anything over 1 ½ pounds will normally be the “fish of the day,” over 2 pounds “fish of the trip.” This year I caught three “fish of the day,” which I’m sure you’ll agree is somewhat confusing. My best from these tributaries in September was over 4 pounds, but that was a few years back and it has probably put on weight with each passing year.
Chris went with me one year, just to see what I did. He’s not a bad fisherman if you tell him what to tie on, although his casting isn’t very good, particularly on the first trip of the season. I told him how difficult it was, that he shouldn’t expect to catch anything and made him practice casting before we went. When we arrived I decided that I would forgo my usual hike into the unknown and fish a stretch near the road. Well first I walked twenty minutes down stream (keeping well away from the water in case we were to fish on the way back). I, not knowing what to tie on, decided to start with a nymph, with a royal wulff/royal coachman varient as an indicator. After a few drifts I pulled out a small rainbow with it’s pretty parr markings. Chris then took over and tied on a straight bead-head nymph. He caught the smallest fish I’ve seen in my life, the nymph was almost as long. What’s more he pretended he couldn’t unhook it so I’d have to come over and acknowledge he’d caught one. I didn’t have the heart to tell him I’ve caught bigger things in a jam jar. Latter he got a nice brown, I never measured the fish but needless to say it was the “fish of the day” in more ways than size.
On my return I had to face Vicky’s full wrath. She even sent me a curt SMS text message on the day of our anniversary, but seeing as there is no mobile phone coverage where we were camping I didn’t get it for a couple of days until I was driving back. It wasn’t as she suggested that I’d forgotten, how could I forget it’s the same day as Bilbo Baggin’s birthday! I just didn’t see that it mattered if I was there or not, and I’d sent her a card timed to arrive on the day anyway. I think that now it has become a forbidden date to be worked around next year. One year I plan to go back on the anniversary itself just to see if it was a fluke. I’m tempted to think that in hindsight it wasn’t a great day on the stream and that just knowing that I can’t go makes it seem better. If I ever divorce and remarry remind me to do it during the closed season.
This year I met an American called Jim from Montana out on the river. I was fishing dry flies up from my camp site and he was fishing beautiful little wet flies down stream from his. He was doing even better than I was but then again his flies were all such attractive ties I almost ate some of them myself. We swapped stories and flies, later at camp whiskey toasts and phone numbers. I’ve always found you meet nicer people in a trout stream than almost anywhere. On his way back to the states he dropped in, as he was flying out of Melbourne after his holiday. He used our shower and spare room for a night. Vicky asked what I knew about him, and I realised I didn’t know anything except the contents of his fly box, which was enough.
I realised from her tone that I’d used up lots of fishing points inviting him and that I’d have to watch the calendar a bit closer next year.

THE TRANSIT OF VENUS

The day that Miranda left Penni came round to see me. When she found me, I was in the garden at Jack’s house helping him move a rusted-in old water tank onto the nature strip, where it remains to this day as the council refuse to take it away. She was all alone because Venus hadn’t returned from finding herself yet. Penni was worried that instead Venus had found someone else. I’m not a very good listener so for anyone to come to me they must be in a bad way.
Jack offered her a beer. Ever since he discovered that she could strip a Falcon V8 she’s been one of the boys to him. She declined and I could see that something was wrong I offered to walk her home. At her gate she started to cry. It was then that she told me about Venus. She’d had a phone call earlier from her saying she wasn’t going to be back for about three months as she was going round Australia with a friend. It seemed that she, like Neil Armstrong before her, needed some space. After that trip she was going to make some decisions.
It was three O’clock by then and I had to go and pick the kids up from school. In haste to get rid of her I suggested that she went to the pub tonight because some friends were playing a gig. You know sometimes as soon as you’ve said something, it’s the wrong thing.
“Which pub’s that then ? What time ? See you later then.”
Suddenly I wasn’t looking forward to the gig so much. The only other time I had been in a pub with Penni it was with Venus and my wife too. Penni had been very quiet and not much fun except when Venus had told us all the story of Penni’s TV appearance. It had been on a game show and Penni while trying to guess the mystery phrase from the letters shown had asked if she could, “buy a vowel please, a B.” Penni was no longer amused by the tale and in truth I wasn’t sure why Venus was telling us it anyway.
By the time my wife had come home and we’d all eaten I was the last one to the pub. The band Hairy, Fats and Little John were setting up the equipment. Little John’s drum kit seemed to take up the entire stage like a giant crashed sputnik. Freddie, Hairy’s mate, was busy equalising sound. They played a spasmodic rendition of 96 Tears as a sound-check while I adjusted the PA trying to look like I knew what slider did what. Then we sat down and commenced with the important task of the night, drinking the rider.
Freddie, although not an official manager, had recently been getting the boys a few professional gigs. Most of them were weddings or similar parties. One was an Irish wake. Freddie told them to pretend that we were Irish. He’d even added an O’ to his name especially, having told them that he was called Freddie O’Greenburg. $800 for fifty minutes of their usual stuff is good money even with Danny Boy thrown in for good measure. Nobody had had the heart to tell him they didn’t want to play for money, and just did it occasionally for a laugh. I have gigged with the boys from time to time although to be honest I’m not actually very good so now I just come along for the ride and fiddle with the desk. Besides I wasn’t really interested for the same reason why I wasn’t interested in being a fishing guide, (although I’ve been offered money to do so on more than one occasion.) It’s great if you love your job, but if by doing what you love as your job until you stop loving it and it becomes work isn’t work it. I mean if fishing’s your hobby, and it becomes your job, what do you do at the weekends to relax. It’s just a theory but I guess you can see why music and fishing are just hobbies.
Sometime before they were due to start Penni appeared dressed in a short chintz number as if she was going to the Governor General’s cocktail party. A stunning effect not even spoilt by the Celtic tattoo on her upper left arm or even her motor cycle boots.
She seemed in a lot better mood and asked about the band. Hairy and Fats were trying to be charming. This involved not picking each other’s noses or wafting there hands around when they farted. Penni was admiring Hairy’s dreadlocks. Fats was trying to sound interesting by putting on a false Jamaican accent and ending every sentence “Heeey maaan.” I’d already told them to be nice to her because she was from Beat magazine, but undercover so as not to mention that they knew. Everything was going better than expected.
The pub we were in was called the Star Inn. It was an old fashioned working mans drinking spot, the sort of place that regards Barcardi and Coke as a cocktail. The back of the room was partitioned off with police incident tape. Apparently the night before someone had been stabbed for taking too long over a game of pool. In front of the stage were twelve tables, only half of which were occupied. At the bar stood what is referred to in pub parlance, if not in a doctor’s surgery, as a healthy crowd.
“Good evening Star Inn, tonight we’re going to play for you some reggae and some blue beat.”
A tidal wave of silence crashed over the room. I looked down at the mixing desk to see if I’d pressed a mute button by mistake. I looked over at Freddie and noticed that he’d put on a bootlace tie. Looking around the room we were the only people not wearing Stetsons.
Much to their credit and like the pro’s they aren’t the boys played Bob Marley’s I shot the Sheriff to a mixed reception. Some of the crowd hated them, and some loathed them. For the first time since Venus had left, Penni was laughing her socks off.

THE PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS

NOTHING, LIKE SOMETHING, HAPPENS ANYWHERE (PHILIP LARKIN)
The man in the pizza store the other day asked me what I did. “you know for a living.” I told him I was a gigolo. It was an instinctive answer that Freud would have been proud of. Completely unfazed he said “so you won’t be wanting any garlic bread then.”
The truth is of course somewhat more prosaic, which is perhaps why I’m not even going to go into it here. Sometimes it’s just so much more interesting to lie. When asked “what do you do?” my standard rely is “fish”, not because I don’t my job but I refuse to be defined in sole terms of my employment. I'm much more three dimensional than that.
On the way home I saw Ron, the man from next door, in the shared driveway. He was sitting in his charcoal suit camouflaged on the bonnet of his metallic- grey commodore seemingly trying to blend in unnoticed. His black shirt and tie were making a statement. Unfortunately the statement was that everything this man touches turns to dark neutral. The white of his face reflected enough moonlight to read by. Never, never, ever, say “how’s it going.” because one day some bugger is going to tell you.
That afternoon Ron’s boss had called him into his office day and said, “Ron,” because he had just read his name on a personnel file. “Ron, you know the company has been undergoing a series of reorganisations.”
“Yeah, well that’s only because you keep sacking people…..Oh !”
And so Ron had been retrenched and couldn’t face his beautiful Italian wife, the Magnificent Gelatti.
I told him it would be all right, after all it wasn’t as if anyone had died.
“True.” Ron agreed, “the bastard was still breathing when I left.”
I asked him how he was off for money. I don’t know why it isn’t as if we were mates, and even if we were I haven’t any spare lying around anyway.
“Well I’ve been given all my holiday pay as a lump sum so with my wages I’ve got enough for a couple of months. With that and my wife’s job we’ll be OK thanks.”
I breathed a sigh of relief for both of us.
“I mean if I went to the casino and put it all on lucky seven,” He said. “..and won. Well I’d have enough money to last about eight years.”
It was good to see him being so constructive.
After half an hour I took the cold pizzas inside.
The next day I saw Ron drive off early as if to work. A journey he repeated the following day as well. I bumped into him that afternoon in a coffee shop.
“You’ll have to tell her sometime mate,” I reasoned. He told me that he would just as soon as prevailing climatic conditions in the underworld took a turn for the worse. Thus reassured I decided to mind my own business.
At the weekend Ron and Gelatti had a barbecue, and kindly invited us round. My initial reaction was to decline, my wife’s to accept - so we went.
I didn’t know any of the people there except Ron, Gelatti and Penni, one of the lesbians from next door. Penni was in the same boat, her partner Venus had gone off for a week to meditate. To Penni meditation is what you do in Safeway’s' when you’re trying to choose which soap power to buy. Rather than spend the afternoon discussing home brand laundry products my wife had, like a raspberry stain left in a bucket overnight with a really good pre-wash, completely disappeared. Penni does however have one redeeming quality, she laughs at my jokes. Actually she has two, the other being that she’s a top mechanic, but this was a skill she had been unable to demonstrate all afternoon while cooking meat over burning charcoal.
Ron and Gelatti, in the process of circulating, both arrived together. Penni asked Ron what he did, “you know for a living.” Ron told her he was a gigolo. He was still wearing black but in other areas my influence has been profound. Penni explained that she used to do a bit of that as well, “in St Kilda mostly.” There followed an awkward silence.
At about eleven that night there was an almighty slamming of doors, and screeching of tyres from next door. Ron had just told the Magnificent Gelatti and she had taken it all rather well, having first packed it into a set of executive suitcase to protect it on the journey.
A short while later Ron appeared at the door with a bottle of scotch in one hand and a wedding photo in the other. I could quickly tell that he’d drunk a lot, it wasn’t even his own wedding photo. I gathered that she had left. In fact she had even refused to even tell him where she was going. Between swigs from his bottle he murmured “cut him off dead” over and over. We retired to his living room and had what can only be described as “a quiet drink” if your usual drinking partners are Richard Harris and Robbie Williams. Before I left we’d made rough plans to go off on a road trip together, and one day we might, but at the time I guess merely planning ahead was a start.
While Venus is away Penni has a houseguest, Miranda. Miranda until a week ago was called Michael and is staying there while “she” recovers from some fairly drastic surgery. Apparently Miranda’s wife had originally agreed to the operation, but her support had, like the Magnificent Gelatti, since rather melted away. I learned all this from Penni as she was fixing my clutch. I also learned how to get engine oil off concrete, (Free Tip - with cloudy ammonia.) Anyway in exchange I told her about Ron and the Magnificent Gelatti.
“So he’s not a gigolo then ?”
“No,” I explained. “that was just a joke.”
“Well if you’d said it I would have known it was a joke.”
Compliments can be tricky things.
As we were cleaning up Ron came round to help. He looked terrible but we could tell that he meant business because he was wearing grey overalls. I made us all tea and a square meal, a cheese sandwich.
As I played mum, having first joked that I should invite Miranda round to do so, Penni asked Ron, “So what are you going to do now then ?”
“Get another job.”
“but why ?”
Ron was knocked backwards. Fifteen years in management had left him unable to challenge his own paradigms. By instinct or intuition Penni had seemingly realised this.
I fetched a sheet of paper and we started to play "What Colour is my Parachute", mapping out Ron’s future. Soon we had four lists, what Ron felt he was good at, and bad at, what he liked or wanted and finally what didn’t want or hated. Within fifteen minutes he knew his boss had made a good decision to eliminate him from the team. But above everything he also realised the most important thing to him in his life was Gelatti, wherever she had gone to. Nothing else was as important, she was "The Catch of his Life."  Priority one then - Pursue her and win her back. After all that was what would make him happy not what he did “you know for a living.”

ENDANGERED ANYTHING YET?

There is a spot on the Yarra where I have fished regularly over the years that is close to the centre of Warburton. It’s good fly water with the only drawback being that there is a walking track along bank. This allows easy access to the whole river, resulting in the world and his wife, their pet dog and son on his bike turning up. Still if you avoid sunny weekends and school holidays it can actually be quiet enough to enjoy yourself, and you may for a few minutes be able to fool yourself you are out in the bush. That’s if you don’t get your line snagged on a shopping trolley.
I was there the other day, the water was warm, the midges were everywhere, and tiny trout were jumping into the air trying to catch something, or perhaps just trying to draw my attention. I got only one accusatory “have you caught anything yet?” yelled out to me all day. “Ah! The tranquillity.”
What I did have however was a confrontation when packing up with a strange beaded little woman who accused me of “endangering the fish.” To be more specific the grayling. Anyone who’s seen me fish will tell you I’m not endangering anything, but it did get me asking around about the Yarra’s grayling.
I must put my hand up and confess, I have caught Yarra Grayling (Prototroctes maraena) while fly fishing for trout. They take wet flies and nymphs. They are generally small (a 12” grayling is a full sized fish), silvery blue torpedoes and fight well for their size. They aren’t beautiful with long dorsal fins (like Thymallus thymallus) but are pretty in their own way. I think they would take dry flies too but because they are endangered I’ve never targeted a rising fish I thought was a grayling. In my defence I should also say I’ve always released them if caught by accident.
A retired friend of mine (who for obvious reasons will not be named) said he targeted them years ago and they took small dry flies (#16’s down) but wouldn’t move to take them, you have to cast it onto their nose. He also said that when they are rising on the Yarra it’s normally to balling midges so I guess you could try something like a Griffiths Gnat if you were going to break the law, which I hope you aren’t, there’s plenty of trout in there without resorting to poaching protected species.
From discussions on the riverbank it appears a common experience to catch a grayling or two now and again. Some bait fishermen say they catch them ALL the time, and they tell my they know they are protected and release them too. They don’t seem that rare or endangered from these initial enquiries - perhaps even making something of a comeback. Of course all the documented studies I have found suggest the Grayling are in a bad way but they are funded by the green anti-trout lobby inside the DPI so until there is some real independent work done I’ll believe what I see, and what my own network tells me.
What I was told by people on the riverbank was that they have caught Macquarie Perch out of the Yarra even though they haven’t been stocked since the 1920’s. These fish are supposed to need much warmer water to breed which would make them either over 80 years old or perhaps the experts are wrong about these fish too.
Finally a little story from the news a few weeks back. This year environmental agencies have been culling brumbies (wild horses) in the alpine high country. Their concern is that they are damaging the fragile ecosystem. In fact there are reports that they want all brumbies removed. Up until a few years ago some friends of mine used to have cattle in these very areas. They (the cattle not my friends) were removed, after 150 years, because of similar pressure from environmentalists. The delicate balance, upset by this intervention has caused an explosion in brumbie numbers. The answer is perhaps to just put the cattle back, in a limited and monitored basis. The cattle have the added advantage of keeping the fuel load down, a real safety concern for the rural community. The moral of the tale, for people who can’t figure it out for themselves, is that you can’t take a delicately balanced eco-system that has worked for 150 years and just subtract a species and expect a better result than from adding one. Remember foxes, rabbits and cane toads. It is a lesson that some people haven’t learnt, and the worry is that these seem to include key policy makers. Some people are just blinded by their own evangelical “vegan” zeal but most people are reasonable. These people need reminding that trout eradication isn’t a cure to the perceived grayling decline.
Lets help native fish species through a program of habitat improvement – remove a few weirs and let them run to/ from the sea, clean the river and bay of Port Melbourne’s pollution. Stop cutting down all the shade trees on the banks; if you’re going to remove willows from a section do so slowly over several growing seasons and replant with natives as you go.
If not the real endangered species won’t be the fish it will be us fishermen. .

THE CLOSED SEASON

A few years back I stopped fishing for a whole year. It’s a long story and maybe there’s a book in there somewhere so I won’t tell it now. The end result is that I came to realise that fishing is my “sanity saver.” I need to get away and do it to keep my balance, it’s on doctors orders.
So every winter, when the rivers are closed, I still have to get out and wet my line. Now there are fishermen who will tell you that this is the best fishing of the year. The fish are bigger, and more selective, and harder to hook-up. I nod and let them talk, not sure if they are trying to convince me or themselves. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not the wind and the rain I object to, or the sporadic hatches, and yes the fishing while challenging can be very good, it’s the whole thing. Somehow it doesn’t quite fit into my picture of the perfect fishing day, I’ll do, because I can, and well there isn’t an alternative available. I’ll even enjoy myself, but at the back of my mind there’s a little voice that’s always telling me to wait until the rivers open again.
For me though there are two closed seasons, the official one and the Christmas break with my family. A seasonal self imposed cessation of all fishing related activity, other than the odd blog posting of course, and maybe I might get a few flies tied. In this age of instant "on credit" gratification and 24 hour Christmas shopping I think it’s good to have some self discipline. At Christmas you should just sit back with the kids, bake mince pies and do a jigsaw puzzle. Of course it’s only for a couple of weeks and I do have the luxury as a teacher of having all of January off so if you want to fish on Christmas day itself – well that’s your business isn’t it. I don’t take the same laid back approach in the actual closed season. If you want to fish there are designated lakes where you can – stay out of the rivers period.
So what was the best days fishing I have every had? Well that’s an impossible question to answer but there was this day I felt really low during the closed season and I knew if I didn’t get out I’d blow something up so I drove up to Eildon. One of the typical fly fishing trips in winter here is to Eildon pondage, the drainage lake below the main dam wall. It’s stocked regularly and fishes well during the closed season with woolly buggers, mudeyes and green nymphs. In fact it can fish so well that dozens of fly flickers will line up along the best spots. The main dam (which when full holds more water than Sydney harbour) on the other hand can produce if trolled from a boat but isn’t considered a fly fishing option, certainly not from the bank. I was after fishing, not fish, so headed past the pondage and up to the main lake, where I would be guaranteed some piece and quiet on the grounds than nobody ever catches anything there.
As I wandered down to the shoreline I saw something big in the water, nosing around on some newly flooded ground, then another movement, and then a third and a fourth. Everywhere I looked there were trout, some of then real bruisers, cruising tucked up to the banks in water so shallow that their backs were sometimes out of the water.
I crouched down to avoid spooking the fish, and while I was down there looked at the ground I was  squatting on. There was the odd snail, a beetle, and even a spiders web complete with it’s harvest of tiny midges. I decided to go with a foam backed beetle. Not enough foam to float it but enough to slow it’s sink down so that it effectively just hovers below the surface. Not a masterpiece of fly tying but they have worked for me in the past. A quick flick and the fly and leader were lying in the path of one of the better fish with the fly line itself on the dry ground where it couldn’t be seen. Refusal. I tried a second fish in range. Refusal. Moved the fly, Refusal. Let it sink a bit lower, Refusal. Tried a slow twitchy retrieve, Nothing. Changed down a size with my fly. Same Result. Changed the pattern of fly to a more classic dry beetle. No effect, however I presented or moved it. What was really amazing was that by this stage with all my clumsy casting errors and splashing about the fish remained unmoved, at one point I glanced around the bank suspecting it was an elaborate practical joke and they were really plastic fish being radio controlled from the bushes. During the day I all but threw my fly box at them, snails, midges, a smelt pattern called a “Mick’s Scruffy” nothing made any difference. I don’t think they weren’t actually eating anything anyway, just swimming around with their friends.
Sure I got a few to show some interest, even landed one but I think only when I’d annoyed it, not because it was feeding. I could be wrong, maybe it bit because it felt sorry for me. The point is I didn’t need action anyway, the pace was slow, in the way only a closed season lake can be slow, and somehow that was just right, and before I finally packed up to go home I felt back in balance again.
Sanity Saved