Jack Rogers isn't shy about admitting that he wasn't the first of his party to hit the water at 90 Mile Beach in the wee small hours of Saturday morning.
Some, younger, less experienced and possibly keener, had had their hooks in the water for some time while he was still going through the rigmarole of getting his gear on, but if he was a little slow out of the blocks he still went home with the catch of the day.
Daylight was beginning to break when he hooked what he thought was a shark, but turned out to be an 11.8kg kingfish. Jack, and he was not alone in this, thought it might have been a little heavier than that.
"I thought it was around 15kg," he said, "but I don't suppose digital scales lie."
Keenly aware of his responsibilities under Covid-19 level 3 lockdown rules he had moved his entire bubble up the beach to a spot south of Motupia, where he had had considerable success over the years.