Neil Uys Blog Site

You don’t know whats hot until you have been to the Zambezi in October. 43 Degrees in the shade is the order of the day and you will have to wait until at least 2:30 AM before it starts cooling down.

The trip there was as exciting as the the fishing itself. We, My Dad, Andre, Victor and I, flew to Lusaka in Zambia with South African airways as the first part of the journey. We were received there by a travel agent that helped us through customs and into a 4×4 in minutes. The service was something I have never experienced before. From there we got moved to a domestic airport where we were greated with some beers in hand. Enough time for a smoke and then into another little plane for the next leg of the journey that took about 45 min. to a airstrip right next to the Zambezi river about 10 min drive from our camp Kasaka.

Our days started at day break with a friendly knock-knock at the tent opening ( Since there is no door to knock on our guide just said knock-knock until he got some response from someone inside the tent ).

The tents are permanetly fixed with solid bathroom walls and beautifully furnished with dark wooden furniture.

We did 2 fishing trips a day, one in the morning that finished around 11 and another in the afternoon until just before dark.

The Yellow Shirt competition was won by everyone on the trip at some point in time ( Goes to the one that has caught the biggest fish to date ). Victor won with a 13 Pound Tiger.

We had a few visitors on the camp from time to time – Even got chased out of the pool once.

The last day of fishing we ended with a quick trip back to camp through the game park and ran into a nice pride of lions.

Dad, Vic, Andre – Thanks guys it was awesome !

Lets try agian – last time we got rained out before we even set off. I want to try the camp site out close to Hawksnest Tea Gardens again. As it turns out it will be a public holiday on the 7th of Sep. – No better reason to get out of town.

So we’ll leave on the 6th after work. I have booked 2 powered camp sites for the time being – We can book more – let me know if you are keen ?

http://www.myallshores.com.au/

From Sydney, it is an easy three hour drive north. It is just 20 minutes from the wonderful country townships of Hawks Nest and Tea Gardens, one hour from Taree, and one hour and fifteen minutes from Newcastle.

Follow the signs to Tea Gardens and Hawks Nest. Then take Mungo Brush Rd from Hawks Nest through the magnificent Myall Lakes National Park for 25 kilometres or approximately 20 minutes. The road is fully sealed.

This brings you to the Bombah Point car ferry for the short trip across to Myall Shores Resort. Drive off the Ferry and you have arrived.

The Ferry is maintained by National Parks and runs between the hours of 8.00am and 6.00pm seven days a week. A fee of $4 per vehicle is levied for use of this service.

Some more directions :

If you want to take the ferry – Use the purpe road and then the orange one – If you don’t want to take the ferry simply stay on the purple road.

If you intend to drive the non-ferry way, so up past Tea Gardens to Bulahdelah and then down again to Bombah Point here is a small town map for Bulahdelah. Follow Ann st. and then Lakes Rd all the way to Bombah Point.

It’s been planned for more than a year and finally taking shape. The game plan :

- Anne-Marie and I fly ( all flight plans as listed below ) from SYD to JHB via Mauritius.
- I go and fish with the boys between the 22nd and the 26th in Zambia.
- Lots of cool stuff in and around South Africa like visiting Andre at Botelierskop.
- We fly to Mauritius on the 7th of Oct. and then stay there until we have to go back home on the 15th.

Flight City Date City Arrival Date
MK 943 Syd Sep 18th – 7am JHB Sep 19th – 11:35 am
MK 852 JHB Oct 7th – 12:40 pm MAU Oct 7th – 6:40 pm
MK 942 MAU Oct 15th – 1:45 pm SYD Oct 16th – 6:10 am

This one is going down in history …

We arrived at around 7 pm on Friday night, let me go back a hour or two so that you can appreciate the start to the weekend in all isn’t splendour.

I left work around 4:45 pm to pick Anne-Marie up from work, car loaded with all the usual – surf board and fishing rod on the roof. 10 Minutes after I picked Anne-Marie up I get a call from the office, urgent call – They need my help with something NOW. I explained that I was in transit and would not be available for at least 2 hours. The urgency of the issue in the office resulted in me pulling over and swapping with Anne-Marie, I was now in the passenger seat and Anne is driving. I plugged the laptop in the car cigarette lighter for power and connected my wireless network card. For the next 2 hours I did some work remotely while Anne drove us to Norah Head just outside Wyong – about 2 hours north of Sydney on the coast. I literally finished the work required as we pulled into the campsite where Paul and Flick have already set up their tent and sat relaxing with a nice cold one.

Sean and Lauren arrived at about 10 pm after a few phone calls to explain how to get out of Sydney – Well done guys – I am impressed you made it all the way to Norah Head without a map.

So far so good – We pitch tents and life is better. Next morning was a awesome 36 degree summers day and we started the day off with a nice egg and bacon roll to line the stomach. The rest of the morning and up to around 2 pm was spent on the beach – beautiful day, clear water and a few small waves for the new 7,6 ft surf board.

I head back to the tent site just after 2 to start with the Potjie, lamb shank curry pot – I knew I needed at least 4.5 hours and I wanted to do some fishing in the evening. so that would have put me on the rocks at around 7 or 8 after dinner with a full stomach.

All went well until about 6 ( yes we have not eaten yet ) when a monster of a storm erupted over the whole Wyong area – Our neighbours lost their tents ( broke in pieces ).
We stood our ground and hung onto the little gazebo we used for shade earlier on in the day. It was like a scene from a movie, everyone grabbed a corner and screamed in unison as the gusts of wind tried to rip our home from our hands.

Completely drenched by the rain we had a small reprieve for just long enough to eat the Potjie ( about 45 min. ) and then that storms father arrived and all hell broke loose. It was messy and wet – I don’t remember much detail – I have memories of Paul and I standing in corners of the gazebo with one hand holding down our protection against the storm and the other firmly clinched around a metal camping cup filled with wine. There was an hour or so of huddling around a little gas fire under the gazebo with FM tunes from days gone by and lots of laughter.

So all I can say is – it was by far the hardest camp we have had – there was lots of fun and lots of stress – but we all made it home and it might take a while to dry out all the tents before we can try this again – but I am looking forward to the next one already.

Thanks guys – it was awesome – you all showed courage and determination – I love spending time with people that always look for the bright side in things even when, like Paul said when he had a quick look inside his tent and everything was floating around – ” Houston , we have a water problem ”