When the sun sank behind the high, vertical cliffs on a fairly typical bass fishing afternoon at the Clarence River Gorge, a really pleasant afternoon reached legendary status in an instant. The fishing had been good but now our surface lures were being belted within seconds of plopping onto the water, and it continued to improve as the light faded to night. This was Gorge bass biomass fishing at a level that only occurs when all the stars line up, and better yet, we were the only anglers in sight.
The Clarence River Gorge, west of Grafton, NSW, is described by many as Australia’s premier bass fishery because when environmental conditions are right, the Gorge is a natural bass aggregator on the largest freshwater river on the east coast of Australia. Popularly known as the Mighty Clarence or The Big River, it’s total length of approximately 400km consists of about 320 km of freshwater and without a man-made barrier, fish will congregate along its length according the the height of the water. When the fish can migrate as far upstream as the Gorge, but not over the waterfalls in the Gorge, that’s when cricket scores occur. The place goes off its chops if you are Johnny-on-the-spot.
I’ve fished the Gorge many times over the last
