Things were devilishly slow, no weed but bait coming back mostly intact for 2+ hours.
A few gents up the beach were pulling in Tope and kindly gave me a fresh Joey they caught on the beach a few minutes before. I had fished for tope a couple of weeks back and had a fresh trace in the box and a reel loaded with 100lb leader so said why not give it a go (never caught one before
)Went to my tackle box and discovered I had forgot to put in my Knife and bait elastic
Things were not looking good! Thankfully bait was fresh enough that It would hold firm without loosing it on the my only cast out and my car keys came in handy to get the belly open of the joey 
Bait was out for 1,5 hours and I was soaked from the rain but just as I was deciding the pack up, the reel started to scream and I was onto one! A solid fight and help from a fellow angler landed me my first tope estimated at 23-24lb.
Over the moon and one of those trips I will never ever forget.
