Outing to “The Origin”– 20th to 22nd August 2021
Six weeks on from our last outing and blog, we once again find ourselves doing a weekend session at The Origin. Subsequently the BoaTman Actor GPS has been upgraded to the Actor Pro2.2 version. What’s the difference you may ask? The GPS kit has been replaced with a Pro2.2 kit which now includes a Sonar, or as commonly known, a FishFinder. What an impressive piece of kit. As with the GPS model, I started out by calibrating the GPS and setting my home point. This time I chose to set a point central to the tips of my two rods.
Using the GPS and Sonar on Friday, in some hectic wind I may add, I was able to do some feature finding and setting up of a couple of waypoints. The sonar showed a very nice drop off on the far margin. It also managed to show some good fish activity. This piece of kit will really take your fishing to the next level.
One downside I did experience is that the standard 5Ah battery did not give me as much time as I would have liked, because of the size of the boat the wind did seem to play a big part in making the motors work harder. Fortunately I had a spare battery and am currently inquiring whether one can recharge it off a PowerBank at the water side.
Actor Sonar
Actor GPS Controller
Using the Sonar to do some feature finding, I set some new GPS points different to the previous session’s. One of these new points paid off handsomely and produced my PB, but more about that later. My Peggie and I managed to land four stunning fish, him two Commons (three if we count his injury time baby Carp) and myself a Common as well as a stunning Mirror.
All Covid protocols were followed and correct social distancing adhered to by my peg mate and myself.
Actor Pro2.2
Actor Pro2.2 Sonar
In our previous blog we showed the GPS remote unit. As you can see we now have a Sonar screen as well, connected to the unit, keeping it a one handed operation.
Friday afternoon was one of those windy Cape Town days, making the recce and setting up of waypoints rather challenging. My Peggie once again decided to do it the strenuous way and use a canoe to do his feature finding and getting his lines in the water. We managed to get lines in by late afternoon and got the rest of our gear organised for the weekend’s session. Fishing was quiet and the barometer was high, so we settled in for a good old South African braai, Karoo lamb chops, boerie on the braai and some Potato and Coleslaw salad, followed by a good cup of “boeretroos” (For those not familiar with the term, a lekka (nice) cup of coffee).
At approximately 2:30am on Saturday morning, in the freezing cold, we were awakened by Ben’s right hand rod screaming off. We managed to net a beautiful Common which turned out to be Ben’s overall Common PB @ 15.82kg (34lb14oz), with his official PB being a Mirror of about 20 kg's (44lb).
Ben with his first of the weekend - 34lb 14oz Common ***** PB
From then on all went quiet. The spot that had previously produced for me was dead quiet, as were Ben’s, so we entered into the do you or don’t you scenario on Saturday morning. Ben suggested that I leave my margin rod as it was and bring in my right hand rod and re position that on to the left hand side, so I swapped over and positioned that one in a bay to the left. Temptation is always there to move rods when nothing is happening, sometimes it pays off to swap or check baits, but mostly not. My margin rod lay until 20 past one on Sunday morning. I was awakened by a drop back. My swinger dropped all the way down onto the deck. I lifted the rod slowly, reeled in the slack and set the hook. No great fight. I found myself wondering whether the fish was on or not however when I got close to landing said beauty, suddenly there was life. The fight was on. I now knew that I had a good fish on. Called for my Peggie to come and net …. Hmmm …. Won’t go into that one lol.
Half an hour later we managed to net another beautiful Common, this was my turn for a PB @ 15.36kg (33lb14oz) of Solid Gold ….. WOW, two PB’s within 24 hours.
Barry with his first of the weekend - 33lb 14oz Common ***** PB
We had just got settled in after netting, treating, weighing and photographing my PB. Ben was already fast asleep by the time I got into my sleeping bag and I was still struggling to get zipped up when that same rod did a screamer. Man did this one get me out of my sleeping bag in a rush. This one was a bit of a scrapper and put up good resistance. I just let it get on with it, taking metres of line when she so wished and I slowly but surely brought her ever closer to be landed.
My Peggie once again netted for me and the same rod produced for a second time in 4 hours, this time an exquisite Mirror weighing in at 9.75kg (21lb8oz). At first glance I thought that I had managed to land a Leather. Close ……..
Barry's second of the weekend - 21 1/2 lb Mirror
Ben had another screaming run at 7 on Sunday morning. This one wasn’t having anything to do with being netted. After quite a bit of backwards and forwards eventually this one was netted …. Another beautiful looking fish weighing in at 14.06kg (31lb flat).
Ben's second of the weekend - 31lb Common
Our prayers had been answered as we had prayed for little sleep and many fish on Saturday night.
See our weekend video here : https://youtu.be/VsKLCPJi36g
Ben’s 31 pounder was our last biggie for the session, however he did get an injury time reel run resulting in an unweighable fish ….. a stunning little Common …. big potential, just look at the shoulders on this one.
We have to wake up to this every morning on the bank. Amidst all the negativity …. Life is good
More about BoaTman ……. Our Actor boats are directly brought in by BoaTmanZA from the factory in Shenzhen in China, a company which was established in 2016. Shenzhen Boatman Technology is a high-tech enterprise specializing in the development and production of intelligent bait boats and sonar fish finders. The goal of the company is to build a world-class bait boat brand and grow it together with global distributors. The aim is to provide high-quality, advanced and diversified bait boats and fish finders for fishermen worldwide.
History of the Shenzhen company
2015 - Team formation, market research, information collection, project feasibility analysis and other data to improve and establish the brand and development direction.
2016 - Boatman brand established, CL & Mini 1A began development and research.
2017 - CL series entered the British market. The stable and intelligent system was loved by global fishermen. Mini 1A was introduced to the market for trial sales.
2018 - CL series & Mini 2A series sales went well at home and abroad. The 2AG, CL4, DL bait boat series as well as SN1 & SN3 fish finder project was established and R&D started.
2019 – The full range of Boatman products was officially launched on the market, establishing domestic and foreign distributor sales channels to better serve end users. The Actor & Fighter series began development and research, Leader series starts upgrade. In the same year, participated in 15 fishing exhibitions, domestic and abroad, to promote the brand worldwide.
2020 - The Actor and Fighter series were launched and achieved success at home as well as abroad. We also started a new R&D project of sea fishing boats. At the same time Surfer, Explorer, Pioneer, Actor-PLUS began development and research.
2021 - Surfer, Explorer, Pioneer, Actor-PLUS began production. May month every year there will be promotional events, which started this year. Flyingfish (used in sea)\net boat\Limited Edition high end bait boat began development and research.
Follow the links below for past Exhibitions and our session video
https://nwzimg.wezhan.hk/contents/sitefiles3603/18018350/images/2156034.png
Actor GPS
Actor Sonar
Actor Pro2.2
The Origin is by no means an easy water to fish and the barometer stayed in the mid to upper 1020’s, making it even more of a challenge. However, the Actor Pro2.2 enabled me to land two very nice fish, my peg mate preferring to once again stick to tried and tested canoeing skills, managed to net his two stunning Commons and a baby. Next outing I am hoping to entice him into using one of our bigger models, the BoaTman Fighter Pro. We’ll see how that goes.
Thank you once again to the management of Winelands Carp Fisheries for making this venue available to all the Platinum and Gold members. Truly a most sought after, scenic, safe and clean water to fish in the Western Cape.
All BoaTman models are available on our website as well as from one of our re sellers, All Out Angling, who can be found in Centurion and Montana in Gauteng Province.