Scouting, learning....

As I sit at my office desk I can't help but observe the flags on the harbour bridge drooping flaccidly.  Its calm and oppressively hot. Its the day after the holiday weekend. I'd spent Sunday morning on the land's largest harbour - and oh how different the weather had been then. The tides on neither coast had been ideal for me, so I'd chosen this mission as the preferable of 2 options. It hadn't started all that well with both batteries canning out before I'd left the river (despite meticulously charging them. Seems they both reached their life expectancy simultaneously), and continued to be less than ideal. Running this harbour with extensive flats and banks without a nav system (there are no channel markers) is ok on high water but it was halfway through a waning tidal flow so when I saw a ruffle ahead I realised that I was heading into a bank at ~20 kts. I had to lift the motor to float over the lip into the channel. I'd rounded the small headland at the river mouth to encounter a fresh Westerly right on the nose. This wasn't a 3 kt zephyr predicted; it was a fresh 15 kts at least. And... clouds obscured the sun from time to time.

Still, I got to the flat and rigged. I'd changed out the SA Sonar tip line which I find pretty dumpy for the Rio Flats Pro (overall a nice enough line but I find he running line to be diabolical to manage) int tip. A few practice shots showed it as quick to pick up and shoot on the Salt HD. Cool. The breeze continued. Over the next couple hours I scanned, ate my sandwiches, applied sun screen, scanned, drank water copiously, scanned... to no avail. Occasionally a mullet would broach. A group of dipping, screaming terns worked  deeper channel. I moved the boat over but the birds dispersed. A few casts. Not with much confidence. When the line shot through my fingers I missed the set. The fish was gone. Needing respite from the constant breeze I anchored in a few inches of water and lay on the deck listening to waves slapping the hull.

The logical option now was to follow the flooding tide up the harbour. In the distance I spied a jet black object - black ray surely? Bearing down with line laid out and fly ready the black object revealed itself as a mussel or oyster buoy. Stand down. At least I was now bothering the occasional eagle ray. Why aren't the big black kingi holding rays in this harbour?

But still. It would be churlish to complain; time on the water is infinitely preferable to being stuck indoors. And I took away some affirmations:

• Refresh the battery supply at least once every 2 years (one of those batteries had given 10 years service)
• Any wind with West in it sucks on this harbour; vis is effectively killed
• No forecasting service is 100% trustworthy

Not sure if I'll be back on the local flats this season. With an impending GT/bonefish trip and then debilitating surgery following that, I may be done for this season.