One Big Fishing Story I have been fishing for as long I can remember. Fishing! My mom was a big fisher woman and my grand father was a fisherman and true pioneer. My grandfather, Lionel R Gunter, had a house at Makatana. For those who don’t know; it is a place close to Charters Creek on the shores of Lake St Lucia. I spent many a holiday there catching fish in the lake. There were many big trips for me as a child; right up until after leaving school, the memories of which are still fresh. Of these I recall frequent two week holidays at Kosi Bay. In the early years, it was a day’s trip from Eshowe to Kosi, which borders on Mozambique. A day of heat, refreshments and "padkos". Sometimes breakdowns hampered our progress but there were never breakdowns with our fun, humour and anticipation for the experience of Kosi Bay. The dirt road started in Huluwe an exhilarating trip with the Ubombo Mountains and Makhatini flats being huge challenges in our anxiety. The Peanut Hut and certain Lala Palms were joyous landmarks which untrained pilgrims could have missed. A beer or two, a drizzle in the veld were our celebrations. Our arrival at Kosi was all worth it. Other venues were Cape Vidal, Mapelane, Mtunzini and Amatikulu. I focus on my introduction to freshwater fishing on the farm ‘Dreadnought Peak’, owned by my grandfather and a fisherman’s heaven its dams and rivers and natural bush. My grandfather was the only man in KZN who successfully raised Trout to their “fisherable state” and for harvesting by the wholesalers in Durban who supplied numerous hotels and restaurants. The water was not cold enough for the Trout to breed, and he bought fingerlings from outlets in Drakensberg. This was all before my time. My experience brings me to the period where my uncle, Louis Gunter, was farming Tilapia (Kurper) my grand father having retired to his Makatana Lake side cottage. As kids we would frequent the dams with takkle, pap and a bottle of cold tea, spend the afternoon catching tilapia and braai our spoils on a little rustic fire. We would return home dirty, tired and at peace gleefully. Let me set the scene on how this would work: remember these where the Colonel days. On the farm the staff would get rations of which mealie pap was the staple diet. This was cooked for them in the cook house, where huge cast iron pots fueled by a roaring fire were part of the day, which started long before sunrise. It was always so warm, smelled of wood smoke, fresh mealie pap, fragrances of the earth, cattle and the caramel remains of a burnt cane field. This would tease me and spurned my day. Never doubting the willingness of the chef to give, I would steal hand fulls of pap for my fishing escapades which were oft times undertaken alone. The following day would find, the pots with the fire burnt out, people fed their rations and the dregs all cold and crusty in the bottom of the pot. The chef then scraped the remains and ground it on the same stone that was used to grind the meal. The result was a very sticky pap, ideal for mulching and molding around a hook. He would then roll the mixture into balls about the size of a grapefruit, place them in a packet and deliver them to my grandfather’s house. My grandfather in the meantime had had tea made and poured into empty 1 liter bottles wrapped with news paper to keep the precious contents warm for as long as possible. The caddy would then carry all the equipment down to the dam, deck chair, tea, pap and fishing rods. The dam was about 2 hundred meters from the house down the hill in a valley. The dam was engulfed by a large man made sand wall and was fed by a crystal clean spring. Due to there being large shoals of Carp, the dam the water was not crystal clean, it was discoloured, but not dirty. On the sides of the dam was very well manicured piece of lawn and grandfather would set us up with all his equipment making himself most comfortable and I being a ‘lightie’ would just sit on the grass. The caddy would get a forked stick place in front of my grandfather who would rest his rod thereon after he had casted out would sit waiting for a bite. This would never take long because the tilapia were full up in the dam. Once the pap started to fall off in the area it would act as chum and the fish would be waiting for the pap to land. The surprise now and again would be a carp picking up the pap and we would engage in a good sporting fight because the carp where big and very good at giving a fight. Only when I was a bit older and in high school did I learn the art of “lure bass fishing”. In standard seven I learnt fly fishing and became keen on my own fly tying. A most rewarding and creative past time. Before that we used small tilapia, red tails and scalies that we would catch in the river, as live bait. The dam was heaven for the different fish species and it is now that I realize how fortunate I was to have the opportunities but also how little I knew about fishing. In my fishing solitude I would escape the confines of my immediate life and recall experiences and people who had fed my soul and developed the person I now am. My introduction to fly fishing in this dam was to catch Bass and a few Bluegills. It was such fun because there where a few stumps in the dam and with a boat one would see the submerged stumps and on a really lucky day witness bass “parked” off there making “bass movements”. As a fisherman the thrill of sight fishing was enough to make me forget how to cast and often I would have to remind myself to calm down. When the popper lands on the water, the bass either dashes at it or just slowly moves under it and sucks it in. It is time frozen and the details of which I will always remember. A split second is enough to last you a life time; the whole experience and adrenaline rush would stay with me long after I had released the gasping prize. I think these experiences keep me coming for back for more and why I thoroughly enjoy bass fishing so much. In the top dam (that what it was called) I would often see Carp swimming in the shallows. As I said before, had I known more, I would have tried to “fly fish” for them but what I actually did was to stalk them with my pap and throw it in virtually in their path. It was a guaranteed catch of a good size Carp and Carp do have great fighting strength. For me it was thrilling sport! In high school I took to bass fishing seriously honing my skills and intensifying my joy at the sport. The one real problem was that I lived in Eshowe and my school was in Pietermaritzburg I managed to make a mate who was crazier about fishing then I and we would spend some weekends together fishing some of the waters in the Maritzburg area. Alexis would then visit me on the farm and we would spend the mornings and afternoons going round and round the farm dam pitting our skills against the fish. We got so good at predicting the dam that we new where the bass where going to be. But the thrill never left us and sometimes we would be surprised by the bass as they would be in a totally different spots. A few years later there was a flood changed parts of the dam. It became silted up, however this was no problem as it added new dimensions to the dam with bull rushes growing and new territory was added for the bass in which to hide. But worse, was the drought which dried up the dam totally and it has never been the same since as my uncle graded the bottom of the dam, removed all the stumps plus he chose not to restock the dam with Carp. It now boasts a combination of Bass and Tilapia. The best part is the memories that will remain long after the dam has changed and probably change again. It taught me a lot of what I know about bass fishing. Nothing is ever lost. A older wiser man now, I visit the dam, take my kit and traverse the grass kept walls. Like Allan Silitoe’s hero in the book “The Loneliness of the Long Distance Runner” I am not alone I am wrapped in fabulous memories; the people and events that carved them.
Copyright © 2006 Lantz Mattinson |