Durban Harbour – Baha Fly Fishing

10Apr 2016 by Warren Prior No Comments

Back To The Harbour

[caption id="attachment_2543" align="alignright" width="225"] Leo with a nice gurnard[/caption] It's been a while since I've fly fished the harbour. In fact, according to this blog, the last time was back in January 2013 when we got some nice pompano and kingies. News was that it was fishing well so Keegan, Leo, Amy and I headed down for a quick flick. Spring lows were at around midday so we arrived at the harbour at 10:30am. The not uncommon first challenge was that Leo forgot his basket. This was (relatively) easily solved by lurking behind the restaurants and hunting down an old beer crate. This combined with a piece of soggy harbour rope made a great stripping basket and we were back in action. We started fishing near the concrete block and I quickly…

26Oct 2015 by Warren Prior No Comments

Another Bait Outing – Grunter Bashing

Bait

Since this is primarily a fly fishing blog, I'm not going to spend too much time describing (or justifying) my bait fishing outing. Suffice to say it was a great day on the water despite tough conditions, mostly due to strong winds. Fishing was tough with only a handful of grunter coming to hand, of which only 1 was of size. This poor fellow was unfortunate enough to make it home to my pan and went down well with chips and a side salad. You really can't beat fresh (mercury filled) fish. [caption id="attachment_2477" align="alignnone" width="1200"] Warren with a spotted grunter caught on bait[/caption]

02Aug 2015 by Warren Prior No Comments

A Rare Bait Outing

Bait

On the odd occasion us Baha Boys down our fly rods and head out instead with a bait stick in hand. Sunday was one such day. Alan had invited me to join him on his trusty vessel to do a little grunter fishing in the harbour. Needing to pump some cracker we got to the harbour shortly after 9am, just as the banks were beginning to expose themselves. I have to admit, I felt a twinge of jealousy as I watched a fly fisherman land a small fish while I was dirtying my hands with the cracker pump. With enough bait in our bucket we climbed back onto the boat and headed for our first spot of the day, nestled under a large container ship. We kitted up a few rods and…

17Feb 2013 by Warren Prior 1 Comment

The Gurneys Are Back!

Salt Water

[caption id="attachment_1059" align="alignleft" width="300"] Simon and Christian releasing fish[/caption] With Nick being up in Mozambique I decided that a trip to the harbour was in order. After all, I didn't want him to get an early lead in 2013. The low tide, which is essential for wading the sand banks, fell at around 1pm. Although this is not ideal for the game fish, the nice thing about the harbour is that there are always some fish around. With that in mind I climbed into my Jeep and headed down to be there at 11:30. Things got off to a ropey start when I came to a stand still on Field's Hill. A taxi had potentially hit another car and had rolled. After not moving for 30 minutes they finally opened…

05Jan 2013 by Warren Prior No Comments

The First Trip Of 2013 – Durban Harbour

Salt Water

[caption id="attachment_938" align="alignleft" width="300"] Warren's First Fish Of 2013, A Southern Pompano[/caption] After Nick's severe mocking of me, post his springer smashing session, it was time for some serious payback. As such I was both excited and nervous as we headed down to the Durban harbour after squash on Saturday afternoon. The plan was too find the springer and to fish into dusk, and even the dark if fishing was good. We arrived at the harbour at around 2pm and were kitted up and on the water by 3pm. This meant we had at least 4 hours of (hopefully good) fishing ahead of us. The only concern, food was limited. After chugging out of the yacht mole we fired up the engine and headed for our favourite springer spot. Sadly a few…

23Dec 2012 by Nick Nortje

Springer Into Action

Salt Water

So after a very successful Midmar trip the Baha Boys decided to give the salt a bash before they parted ways to their various holiday destinations. The location was Durban Harbour. Warren arrived at my place at 04:15, hooked up the boat and we made our way down to the bay. The weather was as humid as hell (even at 4am) but thankfully we had our Columbia Sportswear shirts on to sort that out. [caption id="attachment_917" align="alignleft" width="300"] Nick With A Springer[/caption] Arriving at the bay just before sunrise we eagerly kitted up and launched the boat. After having great success at the Silt Canal we made our way up to it, stopping along the way to fish the drop off at various points and to test out the newly…

30Sep 2012 by Nick Nortje No Comments

Baha/DFT Harbour Outing

Salt Water

[caption id="attachment_565" align="alignright" width="300"] Durban Harbour Fly Fishing Outing[/caption] The 30th of September saw DFT head down to Durban Harbour. No less than 20 fly fishermen congregated in the Café Fish parking lot in eager anticipation to lay claim to the many species that can be caught in the Harbour. We made our way onto the banks at 6:30 to fish the pulling tide. Earlier in the week we had heard reports of a shark sighting, so the boys timidly walked knee deep onto the banks keeping an attentive eye out for this elusive shark. On arriving at the drop off we were greeted by a pod of dolphins smashing the fish we were about to target! All of us stood in awe as we watched them no more than…

25Feb 2012 by Warren Prior No Comments

Durban Harbour Day

Salt Water

[caption id="attachment_407" align="aligncenter" width="900"] Different Species From The Durban Harbour[/caption]Nick and I, never defeated, found ourselves back in the Durban harbour on Saturday morning. Rather than wade the banks (again) we'd opted to fish off of the newly acquired boat in the hope of picking up some pickhandle barracuda in the silt canal. I picked up Nick at around 8:30am after he'd played a little Bakers (now KFC) cricket with his nephew. After a quick stop at the Kingfisher to pick up a rod section we launched the boat at 10am and headed for the silt canal. Immediately there was some excitement with a lot of small kingies smashing bait fish in the shallows. We threw a few flies at them and got hit once or twice, but we were…

19Feb 2012 by Warren Prior No Comments

Harbour Hell

Salt Water

As we all know things very often don't go according to plan when fishing, and this weekend was no exception. A friend of ours from Finland, Simon, was out in South Africa visiting family and doing a little fly fishing in the process. And since he was fishing the harbour on both Saturday and Sunday morning we planned to meet him down there to nail some fish in the bay. On Saturday morning it was just me who braved the drizzle, got into the car, and drove down to a very wet harbour. Simon had decided to give it a miss but there were a few other fly fishermen targeting the banks. I pulled on my booties, waded out to great them, and after a quick chat learned that nobody…

06Mar 2011 by Warren Prior No Comments

Baha Blank

Salt Water

Sadly it was another blank fishing day for me, this time in the harbour. The initial plan was to head down early and fish the pulling tide (yes, a pushing tide is generally better but this would’ve meant fishing closer to midday). Sadly however my plan took a turn for the worse when I turned on the TV and got stuck watching SA bowl out England for 171 in the World Cup. When the last wicket had fallen I grabbed my rod and headed for the car. It was nearing 10am and was far later than I had hoped. The weather at the harbour was hot and sunny with a strong north easterly blowing. This meant I did most of my fishing from behind the big concrete block which was…