Following ‘mark up day’ ( where you put a claim tag on your shooting spot) and the problems I had in firing up the 25/30hp Yamaha………..I decided to make life easier for myself and went and bought a new 30hp electric start 2 stroke Tohatsu. Instead of yanking my shoulder half out of its socket trying to start the old motor, It’s a lot easier pushing a button.
When I told Bloodhound what I had done, he immediately came back with…...”You will have to run it in…….and wont be able to use full throttle!!...........Guess I am in with a chance to beat you in our annual race”
Yeah…Right. ( Aint going to happen) Once again I came up with a plan so cunning you could put a tail on it and call it a weasel.
I knew he was going out of town for 3 days to do a big plumbing job……so after he left, I loaded the boat up with 2 tanks of gas and headed up to the harbour without telling him. Launched the boat into the river and spent 6 hrs running it up and down the river and out into the harbour going up and down the rev range with double the amount of oil in the 2 stoke mix. On my last run, I gave it a 5 minute run at full throttle and clocked it on my GPS at just on 35knots. That thing is a beast!!!
At full throttle with a light load, there is only about 3 feet of boat in the water and its very tender on the steering. Almost had a ‘Hold my beer and watch this’ moment.
Hmmm. Thought to myself that it really needs an electric trim and tilt unit…….
Found a company that imports an aftermarket trim and tilt bracket and ordered one……….but It wouldn’t arrive until after opening weekend damnit. Oh well, will just have to be careful ………..
So after packing the boats the day before opening we headed up to launch and get set up on the Friday. Get the boats in the water, Bh then spends 2 minutes stressing his shoulder and using sailors language to coax his 25hp motor into life, finally gets it going and idles past me…..
“ That looked like hard work” says I trying to commiserate with him
More sailors language directed towards me…….so I just pressed the button, fired up the new motor and put it in gear………..and quite frankly, I think it would be physically impossible to do what he then suggested I do with my new outboard…..
We then idled down the river to warm the motors up….and as we got onto the long straight we looked at each other and opened the throttles.
I matched him speed for speed until he was at full throttle then decided to put him out of his misery and gave the Tohatsu its head……..It was no contest at all…..even fully laden I had 8 0r 9 knots over him.
When we stopped to cut mangroves for camo he pulled up alongside and proceeded to tell me that my motor wouldn’t last as I wasn’t following the manufacturers guide for running it in.
When I told him what I had done while he was away…..he admitted total defeat. To soften the blow I gave him a flask of 100yr old port to make him feel better. With the relationship back on an even keel ( no pun intended) we headed out into the harbour. One last stop to set up a radio sched etc and we headed to our respective places.
After setting my decoys I camoed up the boat and settled back to wait the 18hrs left to opening time.
Sitting on the mud with nothing to do gave me time to reflect on past years, the successes and failures, the memories of those who had passed and a lot of things that had allowed me to be out in the same place where my duck shooting had commenced 65yrs earlier.
The sun slowly went down and after a quick dinner I set up my bed and laid back . The night was still clear and calm so I didn’t set up the cover and decided to sleep under the stars.
It was a full moon so I took some pics through the canopy of mangroves of the stars and moon...
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Just after 2am I fell out of my bunk as the boat settled onto one side.. It gave me an excuse to fire up the jetboil and make coffee….and I sat watching the stars and listening to the sounds the harbour makes.. 5am I cleared the bunk away, made breakfast of bacon eggs and hash browns and with an insulated mug of fresh coffee waited for first light.
The magic time arrived ( 6.30am) and after loading the 1187 I stepped out of the boat into the mud and waited for the first birds to arrive.
Here is a pic of the decoy setup
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I made up for it with the next drake which flew straight into me and almost took my head off as he fell in the boat.
Threw my waders on to go retrieve the birds on the mud as I could see the tide creeping across the mud……..…. Managed to get three of them in mud up to my knees…couldn’t get to the 4th as it was about 50metres out in very soft mud so I headed back to the boat as it was too dangerous to retrieve.
Tide came in and the current took it into the creek where it disappeared into the mangroves. I had to wait another hour before the boat floated and then I picked up the decoys and moved around the point 50 m away to a spot where I had the sun at my back and was in the shade of the mangroves.
Couldn’t find the lost bird so I set up again.
Pic of the second setup
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Called Bh and found out that he was 5 short of his limit. Told him to come over as I had ducks swimming in the dekes but he declined. Spent the rest of the day practicing calling and had up to 10 birds in the decoys at times…….
When the tide had dropped leaving the boat on the mud, I started playing games with the crabs. There were hundreds of them, each with their own hole in the mud. By rolling small balls of mud I would wait till a crab was away from his hole, then drop a ball and block his hole. Then I would smack the side of the boat and they would all run for cover……the ones who had blocked holes would panic and run down the nearest unblocked hole…..then the occupier would push him out. They would fight and the winner would claim the hole leaving the loser to go try another hole. Some of the fights were epic!!
While chewing on a chocolate bar I would drop small pieces next to the crabs. They were like kids in a lolly store and made quick work of the chocolate crumbs.
Crab eating turkish delight chocolate
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Dinner....
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? Glad the boat set up is working out, tell BH to upgrade to a V8 and some hydrofoils, should make the arms race interesting next year 