Fishing Sweers Island, any advice?

[zulu]

I have a chance to fish Sweers Island in June. I am hoping someone can give me some advice in what to expect regarding, what tackle, rods, lures, etc. are best to take. For those who dont know where Sweers is I have added the link http://www.sweers.com.au/
I appreciate any help cheers,

Cheers Troy.

[whatscracken]

Hey Zulu, I had a mate and his family go to sweers in sept of last year. They said that the lodge was awesome and that they had a great time. My mate isn't an expierenced angler, hes only been fishing a year or two. They often took out the boats and fished the reef with bait only. They caught a truckload of grassies and parrot to around the three kilo mark and said that at a few times it was a legal fish every drop! I guess that they didn't try much in the way of plastics or lures so it limited their catch. They landed three barra off a rocky outcrop one going 90 cms with the help from a guide. All in all he was stoked!

[vermin]

I visited Sweers a few years back. Unfortunately the Pilots / guides (cough cough) were serious tossers and just wanted to piss up the whole time. Their advice was terrible and we wasted valuable fishing time because of them. We didn't catch anything like Sweers reputation until we ditched them ... on the last half day!!! Left a bit of a sour taste but these things will happen sometimes. He's just lucky one of more short tempered guests in our crew didn't job him.

We were the first of the season and they were obviously not ready for guests. Everything was overgrown, the rooms were not ready and the food consisted of sausages for lunch and crumbed sausages for dinner. Worst of all the outboard motors on the boats hadn't been maintained. We had to wait until lunch on our first day for the owner to pull apart the carbies because the fuel had gone stale in their tanks over the off season. Also the snap freezer they advertise didn't work.

Saying all this, I strongly advise you check with the resort first to make sure none of this will happen to you. I think we were just unlucky as I have heard many positive reports from other visitors.

On the more constructive side ... we found the shallow reefs hold legal size trout, sweetlip etc. We got a few pelagics around the point just south of the camp site, there are some big rock structures that the tide runs through. The best fishing was on the other (NE) side of the Island. The water is much deeper around the reefs and the fish population seemed much better. I saw the biggest spaniard I've ever seen, it had to be 8 foot long!!!

I manage a few Barra of the beach in front of the resort which was great. Some pictures at this link

http://www.vermintours.com/gallery/thumbnails.php?album=10

Hope you have a good trip.

Geoff.