DARIUS ERASMUS

I started fishing at the age of 3, catching mud hoppers in the St Lucia estuary.  After avoiding some angry crocs and the odd hippo my dad realised that he had created a monster and felt it was safer to take me deep sea fishing instead!

In those days there were more fish than anglers and it was easy to go out for a few hours and hook a trophy fish on every bait.  By the age of 5 I had a number of crocks (20kg couta) under my belt and before my eleventh birthday I had already landed my first sailfish!  Realising that I had a passion for the sport, my dad decided to enter me into the competitive arena of league angling.  I was one of those “lucky” anglers who could raise a bite in a snow storm.  At the age of 13 I managed to beat a 100kg hammerhead shark on a pen senator 10/o and 80lb tackle and no harness!!! Thereafter, I received a number of invites to take part in the Natal Deep Sea trials, unfortunately I could not afford to at the time.

The next stage in my development was rock and surf angling. This is the ultimate facet of angling and the options are limitless.  Any fish of any size can be caught from the shore including sharks over the 200kg mark - these are often hooked but seldom landed.  As the technology improves, it is opening doors for anglers to catch bigger fish more often.  I forsee that there will be a number of the big shark records falling in the not so distant future.

I have excelled in the competitive arena, representing my province at national level on four occasions, both as an angler & manager.

MARC RUBELLI

My angling career started in 1998 at bats cave in Cape Vidal.  Under the guidance of Tommy Sims, I was armed with a light scratching stick, a coffee grinder and a 1o hook with a small piece of prawn.  It wasn’t too long before a kingfish decided to teach this “engelsman” his first hard lesson in fishing - some you win and others just break all your tackle. . . The competition was on and since then I have been hunting the one that got away.

Darius and myself first met back in 1999 in the Natal Estates angling club. From the start both of us were determined to catch the “Big Ones” and spent every spare moment hunting these fish on the Natal coast.  This passion resulted in a number of epic outings such as a 7 hour fight with a foul hooked Zambezi, swimming (near drowning) after sandsharks In Cape Vidal, camping with leopards at Kwashele and so on. . .

Through the years I have since fished for the St Lucia Angling Club and have achieved my Zululand provincial colours through them.  I am currently a member of the Inland Sharks Angling Club fishing in the Central Gauteng league.