Fishing South Australia

Hog Wash Bend is a free camping and fishing area on the Murray River located behind the Caudo Vineyard near Cadell South Australia. The journey from north Adelaide is approximately 150km, with a stop off at Blanche town gas station for a re-fuel, took us 1 hour 30 minutes to arrive.

Chairs were set up under the brolly so that we could keep out of the sun and the rods prepared and cast out at 80m range over the sand bar into the deeper water.

Its a beautiful place, clean and tidy with waste bins at the back of the site for rubbish. It is very popular place with the campers during the summer months, so it can be very difficult to get a camping space especially at weekends. Access to the water is easy with the gentle slope and sandy banks.

The fishing action was surprisingly slow, with fish a being caught every couple of hours or so and the sizes were quite small, probably due to the shallow water. Here's Agy with a typical size fish.

This was one of the larger fish caught in the deeper water at 140m. Larger fish could be seen near the other side of the river out of range.

Despite the low weight of the fish (empty belly's), there is still some power in those big fins and big tail. A good fight was had by most, except this one:-

This has to be the smallest fish ive ever seen caught on a size 6 hook - well done Agy.

The wildlife was also impressive with lots of freindly birds and wildlife.

But the best thing about the trip was my new friend, - a kookaburra.

He really liked my bait.

Very gentle, even when he misses the bait and bites your finger.

One last fish to finish the trip.

Despite the beautiful scenery and easy/free camping, the water here isn't deep enough to hold the larger specimens of fish that we are after, so it's another place to cross off the list.

Hope you enjoyed the trip, see you on the bank :)