Global Grapevine’s Alex and Ross brave the waters off Cairns for a day’s fishing…

Our Australian travels had brought us to Cairns. Despite not having a nautical bone in either of our bodies, we decided to hire a boat for the day and go fishing. How hard could it be?

Ross had never driven a boat so I was given the task – not that I’d ever driven a boat before either. It wasn’t too difficult, as you turned the throttle the arrow would point at either a tortoise for slow or a rabbit for slightly faster than slow.

We passed the harbour wall and turned up towards the mangroves, coming across more than a few creepy, seemingly abandoned boats and ships. I was interested to get a closer look but also terrified of any potential residents.

I figured anyone who’d chosen to live on a rusty old boat out in the mangroves wasn’t likely a people person. We got some snaps then searched for a quiet spot to go angling. No sign of crocs yet.

Old Ship

Squids in
Bait had been provided with the boat so we got to work on attaching it to the line. This truly was a day of firsts as neither me nor my brother had been fishing before and hadn’t a clue what we were doing.

After a few minutes I felt a tug on the end of the line and decided to see what was going on. There was half a squid dangling from my hook, and I’m pretty sure it was full to start with. I tried again and sure enough, the rest of the squid disappeared without me catching so much as a glimpse of a fish through the muddy waters.

The two of us waited impatiently. Periodically raising a naked hook from the water was how most of our afternoon played out, leading us in desperation to simply take a photo of one of the bait shrimps on the end of the line so at first glance it would appear we’d somehow managed to catch something.

Fishing in Cairns

The phantom menace
Our time was running out and, realising the only bites we were going to get were from the clouds of mosquitoes now descending on us, we set off back to the harbour.

Suddenly I noticed something brown, sprawled across the muddy bank, perfectly camouflaged. I cranked my zoom up to full and took a shot. Zooming into the blurry photo, heart now pumping with excitement, I finally discerned what was too far away for the naked eye to make out.

Not too far from where we’d just been fishing, basking itself in the midday sun was… a log!

Turns out to be a log

We travelled back to Cairns empty-handed but it was great fun exploring the many inlets amongst the mangroves just outside the city. If, however, you’d prefer to bring something home for dinner, I’d suggest joining a guided trip with one of the portside companies. You’ll have more luck than we did…

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