September 12th through to 17th 2010 saw the inaugural Paynesville Bait Shack “Booze Cruise” where 4 of us hired the “Tomcat” from Bulls Cruisers and took off on our adventure on the Gippsland Lakes.

Our mission was to kick back, relax, enjoy a drink or three and our favorite pastime, fishing. Of course.

We picked up the boat from Bulls Cruisers around lunchtime on the Sunday. The service was fantastic - from our initial greeting at reception to the friendly and informative safety briefing we received before departing.

We headed back to the Jetty near the Bait Shack to load up. A couple of bags of groceries, an armory of rods, tackle and bait and a trolley full of the essential beverages and we were off.

Day one saw us head to Barrier Landing. The stereo system on the boat got a great workout as we cruised passed Metung and then arrived at our destination. Fishing soft plastics from the jetty we landed a few leatherjackets and a couple of small tailor. We then ventured over to the surf where we managed just a couple of salmon.

After cooking up a feast on the large barbeque provided on the boat, we had a few nightcaps and called it a night. The wind picked up the next morning, so we decided to head to the Tambo River for a bit of shelter.

We headed up to “the cliffs” and fished a variety of lures and plastics as well as prawns and live yabbies. A few small bream and an estuary perch were landed before we headed back down to the Swan Reach Jetty. The bream got bigger, the eskies got lighter and after a trip to the hotel for a game of pool and a few drinks, darkness had set in, so we turned in.

Day 3 we headed back down the Tambo and after an hour or so fishing near Johnsonville, we had landed several good bream on live yabbies. We then went for a cruise up the Nicholson River where we called in at the Retreat Hotel. A few beers and another round of pool then a top up of the necessities from the bottle shop and again we were off. The destination for the night was the “Back Lake” where we anchored near the campgrounds. The electric anchor on the boat made it a breeze.

We caught a variety of fish, including bream, leatherjacket and a nice 44cm perch. Then we decided to bring out the big rods, and headed to the surf again. We landed several good sized salmon, averaging 1.5kg, and then we landed a 30kg Skate, which finished off the night "just right".

We awoke to some strong westerly winds, so after heading back to Paynesville for some supplies and a bit of fishing, which saw a 1.2kg bream landed on a yabby in the Straits, we then headed to Resides Jetty at the back of Raymond Island for shelter. The pod of dolphins had a lot more luck fishing than we did, but they didn’t get to feast on the fresh mussels we cooked up straight from the jetty pylons.

The winds were still blowing strong the next day so for a change of scenery we headed back to Metung. We tied up at the public jetty in Chinaman’s Creek where we were able to land a few bream and a trevally. We then moved to the public jetty at the Metung Hotel where we had an excellent meal and a relaxing drink and game of pool by the open fire. We turned in for the final night of our adventure.

Friday morning, and time to return to normal life. Whilst I can’t say I returned relaxed (self inflicted), I can say that the days away on the Bulls Cruisers boat was amazing. The boat was brilliant, offering ample room for 4 blokes, all the creature comforts of home, including a full size fridge, (which came in very handy), microwave, TV and DVD player, as well as an awesome stereo system with speakers inside and out and 240v power. All this to name just a few.

Plans are already underway for the second annual Booze Cruise. We'd have no hesitation hiring the same boat again, but, with the team looking to expand considerably, we'll either hire a bigger one of the fleet, or just get two. I can just imagine ...