Thursday 23 June, Muriwai again

Thursday morning early, 0 degrees C at home, and not much warmer on the coast with a breeze off the land.
6-30 am and dark as ----, apart from a sliver of waning moon and a little light from a street on the cliff top. Plenty of stars, also Venus low in the North sky.
High tide was at 4-45 and less than 1m of swell.
Most people do not like a dropping tide as low tide rarely fishes well, but I have found a few hours especially starting before light can produce a few fish.
Best of all, I often have the place to myself, as this morning. Slow for the first half hour, then for the next half hour, plenty of bites, one Kahawai caught, one dropped half way in and a few missed.
For the next 3 hours, the occasional bite, one caught and released, 2 dropped and a few bites missed. Time for some photos.  



Why it is named Flat Rock

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Looking North



North again near low tide. 30 miles of drivable beach, tide allowing. turning in to the Kaipara Harbour entrance. a few surfers and dog walkers, and 5,  4 by 4s and trailers.



Looking South showing how shallow it gets.



My bucket / seat, 2 rods and a boat returning to the beach, probably been diving for crayfish and black foot paua (abalone), or Kina (sea urchins)



One volunteer for Judy's and the cats tea
After a few days with low swell, the water was clean, not the best for fishing but good to look at.

Great pics Rhod - looks much warmer than it was.

Great stuff, early worm catches the fish!

Great fishing spot and lovely pictures.

Your winter in upside down land Rhod?
That flat rock looks well weathered and polished.

Yes, it can get rather wet on there at times, and with a big swell sand gets washed across. It gets a good coat of slippery weed near the front, though a small swell and sunshine will kill it if it dries out.

Rhod Lloyd wrote:

Yes, it can get rather wet on there at times, and with a big swell sand gets washed across. It gets a good coat of slippery weed near the front, though a small swell and sunshine will kill it if it dries out.

It reminded me of a place I passed through on my way from Torquay to Melbourne (Victoria.)
It was at the entrance to Port Phillip bay where the ships passed into the bay.
When the tide was out,you could walk out for 3/4 of a mile on flat rock covered in pea sized sea weed,right to the deep water.
The Kelp in the deep water looked about 3/4" thick and massive.
Torquay was a favorite haunt of ours for long weekends (Anzac day etc)
Happy days

Just for interest, the kelp here has mostly died off because of exceptionally warm water this last summer. It was getting to be a nuisance when landing fish, losing fish and sinkers.

Well done

Just a translation of Muriwai from Maori, "muri" means end of, and "wai" is water, and refers to the small river that crosses the beach about 1 km north of Muriwai.

Kaipara the harbour and region, "kai" is food and "para" is a type of fern root eaten by early Maori.