Mark Berg's Fishing Addiction series has always been at its best when the boat is full of anglers who can hardly believe they are on it. The latest full-length film, shot on Melville Island in the Northern Territory, sends Canadian competition winner Mick and his Aussie host Slug into five days of surface saratoga and tropical bluewater — and neither man has ever held a barramundi in his hands.
Mick was still in shock as the trip was unveiled in the lounge room. "Many people in the world don't get these chances, let alone more than once that I've had," he said. "It's unbelievable. I'm still blown away, man." Berg, watching the reaction, summed it up bluntly: "It makes me so pumped to get guys like this on the show. Mick from Canada, he's just a firecracker. He's so excited."
Day one was a saratoga clinic — and a saratoga humbling. Berg dangled $500 worth of Wilson tackle for the first fish over 75 cm and Mick spent the morning watching toga rocket out from under fallen timber, eat his frog and spit it. "I probably hooked what, 20 that day and I landed maybe half of them," Mick said. "It was humbling, that's for sure. But it was exciting."
The blow-up bites are why anglers fly halfway around the world to Melville Island. "It was so cool to see them come out like that," Mick said. "You'd cast to a fallen tree and you kind of bring your bait away, and all of a sudden this creature comes flying out from under this dead tree." Misses and all, Mick said, the hook-up rush is unique: "It's like your heart kind of skips a couple beats and then it stops for a second and then it starts again when you hook up."
Slug, by his own admission a bait angler, found the constant lure work physically punishing. "It's hard work right across your body. If you're straight on, you're only going straight up and you can't go any further than that," he said. "That's when it's not my type of fishing. I don't flick lures. It's rewarding when you catch something, and especially this sort of trip because it's all new. It's hard work, but it still is relaxing."
Eventually Mick stuck one — a quality 67 cm saratoga, short of the cheque but heavy on the moment. "Welcome to Australia, my friend," Berg said. "Look at that color. Look at that fish."
The day finished with the AFL Grand Final on the lodge TV, Brisbane Lions getting up and Berg counting his blessings. "What more could you ask for? Pretty sensational," he said. "We've still got four more days of fishing in this incredible place. Hopefully we can find the boys a nice big barra."
Day two doubled the stakes. Berg set another Wilson challenge — $500 for any angler who lands a jewfish, a mangrove jack and a barramundi inside one session, the so-called Top End trifecta. For Mick and Slug, who between them had landed zero barra coming in, even one of the three on the right day would be a fish they'll remember for the rest of their lives.
