Wow, where to start.
Boats were fighting for access to the boat ramp by 0700 hrs and there was a steady stream of boats being floated right through till about 1000 hrs. The parking place for trailers was jam packed and with very little space left.
Not much happened in the morning as most contestants were on boats rather than shore fishing. We saw about half a dozen or so shore fisherman spread out over the length of the beach.
Anyway we did our walk and watched some of the contestants and also a few tourists that had turned up and then we read until about mid afternoon when the Master of Ceremonies started to use the speaker system. The event had been organised by the combined Lions Club of Kaitaia, Mangonui and another town we can’t remember, possibly Whangaroa.
So off we went at about
Some of the boats have interesting names as well, some are not publishable at all.
The fish weigh-in was to finish by 
However, the fish auction was the first thing to happen and we were very surprised at the amount of fish that had been caught with the largest red snapper weighing in at around 12 kilos. This large snapper was sold for around NZ 50.00 (about £19.00) but you could feed half the Chinese army with this fish. Even after cleaning you would end up with at least 8 kilos of eatable fish and more if you liked the head.
The auctioneers were also very good and fast and certainly not amateurs.
The auction went on for about ninety minutes again and there was also a place where they would clean and filet your purchased fish for a mere NZ 3.00 (£ 1.50) per fish. There was a large queue for this service as some people had purchased huge quantities of fish either for restaurants or private use. To watch the guys do the fish was an interesting experience.
The amount of fish caught by the roughly 50 contestants was truly amazing. As mentioned earlier the time the auction took to finish was considerable when you consider that sometimes they sold three fish at once and even basket loads of Kawai. They were also well organised so that people used salt ice for storing the fish in their boats and then immediately after weighing the fish were repacked in large boxes, again in ice, and then held in a cold chiller van until the auction.
There were tents and stalls selling food and drink and also t-shirts, hats and similar and of course the fully licence bar selling beer and wine, all chilled down.
The sun was beating down and it was quite hot, you could get burnt very easily but the crowds came prepared with umbrellas, chairs and chilly bins to sit on while they downed cold beer and then they were ready for the prize giving and raffle.
The prizes were excellent with the top one being for $ 5000.00 cash and also there were TV’s and
Of course all the prizes had been donated by the various companies in the area. The children’s prizes were always very good with new fishing rods and associated equipment, wet suits and also life jackets. Some kids struggled to carry all the prizes they had won.
One poor girl of about 10 won a prize supplied by the local battery supplier of a ‘Leisure battery’ which must have miffed her a little compared to what the other kids won but I guess she will negotiate with her Dad to swop it for something else.
One of the other star prizes was a black ‘Lazyboy’ recliner which many children had tested during the day whilst holding their hot dogs and onions with tomato ketchup and so god knows what state this was in by the time it was presented.
As
And so a pleasant day was had by all and as tomorrow is a Bank Holiday we shall take it easy. We had arranged to collect our new tent on Monday but the shop phoned on Saturday to remind us they would be closed on Monday and would Tuesday be OK. Sure is.
Quite appropriately, I thought, they were showing the very old original ‘Jaws’ film tonight.
All the photos for the day are on the following link
http://albums.phanfare.com/5194780/2944783_3621493#imageID=59234742
