Kontiki

7th October 2005

..................................Eels and Fishes Ross

Baby kumara looks: 'where the big fishes are'.

I have always liked the idea of fishing using a kontiki, but the first time I ever set one myself was after I talked to some old timers on the beach at Coromandel. The old timers had buses they lived in, and arrived at the beach in convoy. For reasons I don’t understand, people who buy a bus to get away from it all, often do it in a big group.
They had a couple of kontiki’s launched from the middle of the beach. It was around noon on a fine January day, lots of kids playing in the sand. I like to talk to people engaged in activity on the beach, so I resolved to go up and say hello.
They were real friendly people so I assumed they weren’t from my town, Auckland. Over the last five or so years, the culture at our beach and various other holiday spots has been changing as more wealthy Aucklander’s have gobbled up the properties which they could laud and call ‘investments’. I wouldn’t care too much, but they have brought their own manners and expectations with them and some have attempted to convert the beach into another central Auckland suburb. Fences have been erected, as have barriers between people.
I will always say ‘gidday’ to a person on a beach but many of the newcomers can walk by someone on the beach and not even say a word. They will even look away before you pass, under some lousy pretence, so that they don’t have to even make eye contact. I find it irritating and it gnaws at me for a number of reasons, most of them involving the loss of a way of life that I associate strongly with being a ‘kiwi’. If they want to come down here and blight the countryside with their garish new erections they could at least try to be civil to the people who have been here most of their lives.
One day a women was walking her dog and complained about my fishing habits on the foreshore. She had a 'mullet' hairdo and earings from the 80’s, for a second there I thought she was the Sunday Star Times food critic Geraldine Johns (also from the 80's) but she managed to be offensive, without once slagging food.
I say ‘walking her dog’ but the thing was such a fluffy runt she carried it in her arms, in case it was mugged by a crab.
As she walked by, obviously frustrated she had to step over my line, she stood on my marvellous grappling wire rocket sinker.
”What the hell! I could of hurt my foot” she said, by way of introduction.
”you shouldn’t be doing that here!”
My pleasant disposition, nurtured by my time on the seashore dissappeared, and I was forced to resort to suppressed saracasm.
“Where should I be doing it? In my lounge in town?”
The cheek of it. I should have yelled at her for standing on my favourite sinker.
She walked away with her stupid miniature trophy dog, cursing under her breath. She would probably call OSH and try and get me shut down.

The bus oldies were more than happy to have a yarn and were pleased when I asked about the Kontiki.
Even though I understood how the thing worked, I didn’t let on as they patiently explained the principles involved.

”The rope holds the sail up and it is secured by a lolly. The action of the water on the lolly slowly melts it and then the sail goes down. That makes it easy to haul it in”
”As long as the wind is offshore the kontiki can be carried out, beyond the breakers where the big fish are”
’Where the big fish are’ had got my attention cause I like my food, I like my fish, and I - love - my - snapper.
We went home to get the various bits and pieces that make up the kontiki and by the time we returned they were hauling their rigs in. Even though they didn’t catch a fish we wanted to launch our boat anyway, just to surmount the challenge.
On our launch team was my old mate, raconteur Little Ross Hollands and his family. We had a bloody shocker of a launching and we had to go home and get the kayak to complete the task. My poor relationship with the vessel ‘kayak’ is well known and the source of great hilarity - so Mrs K said she would paddle the line out.
Little Ross said “she’s very competent isn’t she mate”
I could embellish the story a little and say that; I clutched my heart, a lone tear running down my cheek and said with impressive gravitas -
"One day, my old friend, that woman will be my wife"
but it wouldn't be true.
I probably said "I'm glad she's doing that. It would bloody bugger me"
After all that effort, when the line was pulled to shore the hooks were bare. No one cared, it had been fun, and I knew we would be back for more.

That night a mate from Dunedin, Sean, arrived and over a few beers we talked about the days failure.
I isolated a couple of problems; We never usually caught fish in the middle of the day and we always caught them closer to the rocks on the southern end of the beach.
The bus people had been nice, but I had something that could give a fisherman a particular advantage - local knowledge.

The next day two hours before sunset we carted the stuff down the beach,
closer to the rocks and set the small yacht adrift. It went out a good 800 metres, right across the point. The theory was, we would intercept the fish as they cruised the coastline with an unavoidable line of delicacies.
‘mmmm squid and bonito cocktail’ they would say ‘ lets eat’
A local woman came along and chatted with us as we pulled the line in.
While sending the Kontiki out is difficult, and can be tricky, the exciting bit is bringing it in. What will be on the line? How many? Where did I leave my beer?
You have to have your shit together too, because as they reach the shallows they can get off the line and escape conspicuous consumption.
As the first hooks appeared we knew we had some fish on them. We all got very excited and I ran down to the shoreline to kill the fish without a knife.
What was I going to do - bore them to death? I could tell them about the lady with the miniature dog, with the ear rings.
There were some snapper on the line and also Gurnard.
Gurnard are absurdly pretty and have rainbow coloured gossamer wings.
“They can fly, gurnard” said the local lady. “some are known as sea robin”

When I went to stick the knife into the damn gurnards head, the wings would come out and then it would start to moan. The more I tried to push the knife in, the more attractive it would become and the louder it would moan.
The local lady came over, pushed me aside and killed the beautiful fish without pretence or ceremony.
In that cold practical manner, that rural people can often speak she said. “Watch the bones on Gurnard”
When we got back to the house I filleted one of the snapper and cooked it in butter in a pan. We ate it on white bread.
It was some of the best fish I had ever eaten and I knew me and the kontiki had started some sort of lifelong love affair.

Last weekend Mrs K and I got the thing out again. Because the wife was pregnant and all, we weren’t going to get too ambitious. But we were going to the beach anyway so I figured while we were idling time away on the sand we might as well chance our arm.
The waves were a bit high so I had to get into the water to get it out past the first set of waves. Just when I thought we were all right, a large freak wave came in and I had to lift the kon tiki high above my head to save it. My sunglasses were knocked off and I was soaked through. I dug my feet into the sand and when the waves had passed I dived under and found the sunglasses. But the boat was underway. By the time I got back to shore Mrs K was already feeding hooks, competently, onto the line.
The tricky part of the launch is to get past the waves.
This launch was almost thwarted when the boat was becalmed in between the first set and the second range of waves. But a stout breeze came up and carried the boat away. After all the hooks were on the line, the wind slowly hauled the rig seaward. We sat down on the sand to do the crossword in the paper but soon a huge gust came up. The paper blew away into the water, and Clue 12 down - 8 letters 'fair description of a reasonable examination' was gone, sadly unanswered.
Tragically, at sea the huge wind had flipped the kontiki end over end.
Even though it wasn’t out far we decided to leave it out while we took in some sun. After a while I was bored with my book .. and thought about pulling the line in.
”it’s still early maybe we should set it again?”
”We don’t have anymore lollies”
”oh yeah”
I went for a walk towards the rocks and before I had gone twenty feet saw a Worthers Original lying on the sand in it’s wrapper. I picked it up, and threw it to Mrs K.
“What are the fucking chances”
Mrs k and I both being superstitious and portentous bastards said as one;
“it’s a sign”

The second launch was a textbook performance and one we could be proud of. The small boat travelled out well but was let down by the Worthers Original, which I had expect to put in a stately, resolute, entirely british performance; like an old reliable grandad, but it dissolved prematurely.
“A soft jube would shit on that thing”
We only got one fish but it was bloody good one. An excellent snapper.
“Fish for dinner, Mrs Kumara” I said.
“Passable” said the wife.
“Passable!! Fresh Snapper” I said, shocked.
“No. The crossword. 12 down, 'fair description of a reasonable examination' ..
”Passable”
Yup, very passable indeed.