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| A reminder that we have had plenty of great weather this year, it didn't rain our whole first year. Here Johnno is playing a beautiful Spango that we eat for dinner. |
We had an open slate to do what ever we wanted, we were open and ready for new and exciting adventures.
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| My only goal when arriving in Exmouth was to have Cocktails on the Beach for my birthday. It was a few months later, but my work mates finally made it happen for me. We slept on the beach that night!! |
Our one and only goal, whole point of moving to Exmouth, was and still is...
FISHING, who guessed that?
Exmouth had an unusual winter, with a lot more wind and rain then most years, so the fishing was limited on a few weekends.
Johnno started working around the same time the weather turned crappy, so we were no longer able to choose from the good days. It did feel for a while there that we had not moved to the best fishing location after all. But after every rainy stage the sun aways shines again (if not where you live then you should consider moving to WA!), so lets not focus on those grey months, actually lets forget about them altogether, and instead remember the good times and sunny days when we did catch good fish.
Like: When we very first moved here My Birthday fish 2015
Or Johnno's first big Queenie on Fly:
I could go on to list all the wonderful fish we have caught in the last year, or I could just mention mine! hahahaha, Writer of Blog wins over Driver of boat!
Karen's Queenie
OR My biggest Exmouth fish so far, this beautiful Golden Tervalley:
The waters, fish and fishing techniques in Exmouth are all so different than what we have been used to over the last 10 years of living in Derby. We knew we had a lot to learn and were hungry to do so. Thankfully we had two amazing opportunities arise in the last year. Firstly the LOOP Saltwater Fly Fishing Festival. Five days of learning from the best fly fisherman in Australia!! Each day they had talks on all things Fly Fishing related, tying, casting, techniques, fish behaviour. I learnt so much everyday, and Johnno finally got to hang out with other Fly Fisherman (there aren't many to learn from in Derby). After 15+ years of Johnno Fly Fishing on his own, and myself always giving up because it's too hard, we learnt that we aren't so bad at it after all. But we also learnt we aren't really cut out for competition fishing, we will stick to fishing for the fun of it!
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| Seems we are not serious competition fisherman. |
I did start to take the whole competition fishing a lot more seriously when I got my second big learning opportunity. Four days of fishing in an all girls sailfish team, with very serious girls I have been reading about for many years. I put the beers down (for a little while) and listened and learnt. Once again I was beaten by this years unusual weather (which is starting to feel very normal to me), with 3 days of rough seas and the worst tagging rate for this comp on record!! Three out of the 4 days fishing together we didn't even see a Billfish, but I would do it all again. I learnt so much from the team, I feel confident when my times comes (very soon please universe) I will be ready and able to land my sailfish that I have been dreaming about all year. We had team on line chats and evening knot, line and tackle lessons. On practice day I got to see how it should be done. I watched in awe as Jeni drove the boat, watched to birds, found the fish, talked us through what to do and then tagged the sailfish, all at once without any stress or hesitation. My goal is to be as calm and cool as these girls when playing fish, no more panic attacks 'get the net, get the camera'. I'm now going to be Miss Cool and Calm, just like Deb was when she cast in, hooked up and played the sailfish to the boat without any stress.
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| Smiles all round as the girls tag a sailfish on practice day: First Sailfish I have seen tagged! |
Strangely enough the last year hasn't all been about fishing, there had to be a bit of fitness talk in here somewhere! This time last year I was struggling with the extra 10kg I had put on while sitting on the beach doing nothing (but fishing and eating). I was just trying to get myself back into some kind of regular fitness routine when I found out the women running boot camps here in town was leaving. I played with the idea of doing Positive Steps Boot Camps for a day or two, na just kidding, as soon as I started thinking about the idea I knew I would do it. With no original intension of doing my own business here, we moved here for the relaxed fishing, beach life-style, then within weeks it was all planned and going ahead!
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| Positive Steps in Exmouth OPENED in September this year! |
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| Humpback Whale season was amazing! So many Whales in the Gulf, I was in heaven! |
- Renovated washhouse and spare bedroom.
- Learnt to cook the best Pork Belly (all those rainy afternoons).
- Karen stayed in the same job for ONE WHOLE YEAR!! (yes staying for another as well)
- Drove to Perth for Xmas, reminded why we live in the country!
- Published in Magazine
- Swum with a Whale Shark!
- A million wonderful wild life encounters and photos: Dugongs, Whales, Dolphins, Turtles, Sharks, so many Osprey but all other birds of prey, down to tiny little wrens, Lizards and snakes. I feel a wildlife blogs coming on!
- Karen did 100 Burpees a day for 100 days challenge Again... NEVER AGAIN!
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