Tywyn - Best day yet

[johnh]

Had a cracking day on Sunday down on the reef off Tywyn. My best day yet on the yak. I met up with Spud, Moniar, Bubba and Spongebob.

We launched in Tywyn and paddled up the coast to the reef. According to moniars GPS it was a shade over three miles (against the current).

The fishing was great. Loads of bream. I must have had close to fourty, some really nice size. I kept 12 for the pan. They were on a shrimp rig, baited with tiny bits of mackerel. Moniar and I found one spot close in that was 15 feet deep. It was crazy. As soon as I lowered the rig, the rod tipped was rattling like mad with smaller ones. If you left it down for 10 seconds and then pulled it up they had stripped the bait almost to the hook. It was like lowering meat into a shoal of Piranahs. The bigger ones just thumped it, then fought like hell.

Also had a few mackies and three dogs or huss. Not sure which as they were very dark in colour, almost black.

I also had a bite where the rod bent over slowly and when I struck it just bent right over. I was hooked into big conger. I was only in 8 feet of water and could see it turning in the rocks and weed. At one point I could see the damn things head sticking out. I tried all ways to get it out. In the end I tried hand lining it. I kept steady pressure on it and few times felt it come about about three inches, but then it would thump back in again. I gave it slack for a few minutes, hoping that it would come out, but no joy. In the end it snapped me. Just as well, as I would have probably cut the line when it came up to the yak anyway, horrible bl**dy things. It looked and felt like a big mutha. In hind sight, I should have dropped my spare anchor over and depth charged the bu**er into moving, as it was directly below me.

Bubba and spongebob caught three nice triggers; and spongebob caught a cracking bass of about 7lbs on a plug. The bass were jumping all over the place.

The wind picked up and it got pretty rough; which made the paddle back a long haul. Wind behind, current against. Still we all made it in OK. My shoulders were aching like hell yesterday. But it was a small price to pay for what is without doubt my best days fishing on the yak so far. I will definitely be back to Tywyn again.

Sorry no photos. My son has the water proof camera on his training course. Moniar and Spud took photos and moniar said he would write a report; either on here or Total Fishing (or both), I'm not sure which.

The grin has just about come off my face.
John

[jonnychaos]

:oWOW thats all i can say john that sounds like a dream day out mate If you were in 8 ft of water jumping in and swimming at the thing would have been my trick I would be devastated losing a fish like that but 40 bream make up for it and those other fish do sound like huss to me john although doggies to tend to vary ion colouration it just depends how prominent his spots were ;D

John

[kickingk]

How about one of the meets being down there next year?

[dorado]

We do the tope meet there in late april, early May - late may depending on the weather and the season, sometimes they are a bit earlier, other times a bit later (this keyboard is crap - I am in Sweden doing a story on a 11m RIB with triple 300hp Suzukis.....67 knots today.)

Had little time to myself recently - go 6 or 7 stories to write up as it is.....but that was a brilliant day and with 3 triggers you did really well.

What did the triggers fall too ´same shrimp and mackerel strip for the bream?

[johnh]

I'm not sure what the triggers "went for", but I believe they are "going with" chips. Moniar should be doing the in depth report. Maybe he knows. Sorry.
John

[moniar]

After checking the forecast carefully the low 3 mph NW winds forecast confirmed that it was worth the 2 hour drive down to Tywyn to fish the reef. So early Sunday morning John H and myself joined up on the road just north of Tywyn having driven down from Anglesey and Deganwy, and found Spud, Bubba and Spongebob waiting for us at the entrance to the town.

After a quick deliberation it was agreed that we would launch from the beach and paddle the 1 mile Spud assured us it was from the beach launch to the river entrance and reef - rather than paddling down the river and risking the boulder strewn and rough water of the alternative.

We unloaded near the beach and carried/wheeled the yaks down onto the beach for the launch, with no surf present, although the NW wind was a bit stronger than predicted.

John with his ocean big game yak and the others preparing to launch and John launching:






We paddled up north for Spud's "mile" in the face of a strengthening wind and against the ebb tide - an hour and a half later and we arrived at the south end of the reef. A quick check on my handheld gps confirmed that the mile had actually been 3.14 miles of paddling ata moving average speed of 2 mph and a top speed of 4 mph . Spud and I had a quick look at the river entrance/exit before the tide ebbed much further, whilst the others headed further accross the reef with the fish finders on above around 10ft of water.



We spoke to a local and a visitor who were fly fishing in a small dingy close in, and they reported schoolie bass up to 3lb and advised us to go a little further out for the bream, where the reef drops down to give 20ft of water.

Spud, John and I anchored up in the slightly deeper water whilst Spongebob and Bubba paddled further north in search of deeper holes marked on the charts. We were soon into sporadic mackeral, which was my first species of the day, and promptly borrowed by Spud to go on his tope rig ;D John was soon into the black bream in big numbers and although they were all fairly small they gave great sport on the light rods. I soon joined him after putting mackeral bait down on the boat rod and baited shrimp rig with some fresh rag on the light spinning rod. This was my first ever black bream, soon followed by several more, all of which were returned to grow bigger:





After a pack of whinging jetskiers arrived in the middle of the reef we headed back further inshore to find Bubba/Spongebob had had a large greater weaver on the plug and some larger bream very close in (Yes good groundbaiting does pay off ;D). Before having a go closer in, some of us had a quick pit stop on the shore with the last of the ebb tide ripping over the shallow reef, exposing large boulders and shouting "bass" territory , whilst Spongebob and Bubba headed a lot further out in search of other prey

On my pitstop I stopped to enjoy the view of the reef and spoke to another fly fisherman who had waded out in search of those bass:







As I started off on a long drift right over the reef from north to south, in search of bass on the plug, Spud headed back out to deeper water in search of tope and to see the trigger fish that the others were now reporting back on the vhf radio
John anchored up on the southern part of the reef close in, whilst I had a brief chat with a snorkler who popped up in my drift path in front of his trailing red float, complete with a large spear gun - he boasted about having had three 5lb bass off the reef on the previous Friday - great I thought!

I tried various surface and sub surface plugs and poppers over the reef but didnt get anything, and so I joined up with John on the anchor close in, to find he was getting much larger bream over a slightly deeper hole of about 12 feet of water.



I put down my boat rod with a large rag bait on the bottom, and then the baited shrimp rig on the spinning rod went straight down. I was soon pulling in bream on every drop like John, resulting in the best one of the day for me followed by several other keepable ones which went into the cool box with the mackeral:





The ledger rod ratchet started making noise and I pulled up my third species of the day - not sure if its a small huss or a doggie???



i65.photobucket.com/albums/h225/moniar/hussonsurfaceTywyn9thSep0700111.jpg





I lost count of how many smaller bream, sometimes doouble headers, John and I caught and put back, but it was constant action on every drop.

Then we werre encouraged by this sight, caught on the plug close into the shore on the reef:



That was the signal to me to give up on the bream sport, good though it was and fish for another hour with the plugs again, drifting near the partly covered boulders near the river entrance in the increasing wind to see if any of his brothers or sisters were about.

Sadly the bass eluded me and we all gathered back together for the long paddle back south to the beach at Towyn. Another three miles, against the flooding tide, and with a headache and a slight feeling of sea sickness saw me bringing up the rear. The last adrenaline rush was the beach landing, in a surf which had come up during the day and a side on wind to add to the fun . Some went in forwards some went in backwards, whilst I just looked behind me, saw the big one about to catch me, and paddled like mad for the shore, catching it and catapulted swiftly forward - it tried to turn me sideways and then over, but I was out to protect my loot of nice bream and mackeral, and placed a deft right rudder paddle in to bring me in straight into the wash ;D

We admired the bass, the larger of the trigger fish caught and the larger bream catch on the beach and reflected on what had been a great days fishing despite the long drive and more than predicted wind:









OK so the tope didnt show this time, but we all had a great time, and I am sure that we will all be back down there again before the winter. The scenary is fantastic and the shallow reef discourages the charter and larger fishing boats from getting in too close. As we left a local boat fisherman also tipped us off about some great codling marks too ;D

[bagpuss]

Guys

Can anyone tell me if the rod holder on the front of the green prowler is a homemade one or shop bought?

[SpeciMan]

Looks like a DIY rod holder, using black (or sprayed black) plastic pipes from a plumbers merchant, cut down and angled with bends.

[SpeciMan]

Should be easy to make and shouldn't cost much.

[johnlegg]

Looks like you all had a great trip, I love the fishing there , Next year I will be there again
ohn