Destinations: Bemm River, Gippsland, Victoria

The pelicans are a big part of the landscape at Bemm River, an idyllic township scattered across the top of Sydenham Inlet where the river meets the sea along Gippsland’s eastern coastline.

It’s also one of Victoria’s best fishing hotspots. Black bream, big dusky flathead and fast-running tailor all abound, with prawns a speciality on the back end of summer.

Bemm River is a lazy 450km run along the Princes Highway, east of Melbourne. Getting there is an adventure as you tick off towns with names including Bairnsdale, Orbost – where the famed Snowy River meets the sea – and Cann River, the NSW-bound Princes Highway winding its way towards Eden, NSW.

The hamlet of Bemm River is a short run off the national highway, the sometimes tight and twisty road passing through the picturesque Cape Conran National Park. In parts, the roadsides bear the scars of the aftermath of the Black Summer fires, the charcoal tree trunks a stark contrast against the bright green regrowth.

Glimpses of the Bemm River occasionally reveal themselves as you wend your way along the access road. The town, once you reach it, forms a T, with one branch of the road heading north along Bobs Bay to the river, and the one heading west to the exotically named Pearl Point and, eventually, Cape Conran State Park.

While accommodation choices abound – everything from camping to cabins to complete houses – there’s not much in the way of services in Bemm.

There’s no fuel, so carry plenty for the boat unless you want to make the long trek back along the highway to fox some.

There’s a pub serving decent meals and a cracking lunchtime burger, a locally sourced bait shop with the ever-helpful Mark behind the counter (it has recently added a coffee machine, so an espresso heart-starter is now on the menu), and another bait shop to the north, also with basic supplies.

The main focus of the town is the caravan park, which at the height of summer is filled with colour and movement as anglers descend on the spot in their thousands.

A boat is the best way to make the most of the inlet. The two-lane boat ramp facilities (a good beach-based kayak-launching spot is available nearby) are fairly new, although car parking is limited, so be prepared to find somewhere out on the road as available space around the ramp fills quickly.

Tinnies, small trailer boats and kayaks are ideal for the vast but shallow Sydenham Inlet. Runoff from recent good rains running into the Combienbar, Errinundra and McKenzie rivers – all tributaries of the Bemm – have filled the inlet so full that if the 100-metre-wide sand bar separating it from Bass Strait was breached, the outflow would be a torrent.

The inlet looks sort of like a doctor’s diagram of a stomach. The deep and wide Bemm River flows in from the north-east, expanding north into Bobs Bay and west to the shallows known as Siberia. Mahogany runs along the southern shoreline, leading up to the channel in the east that connects it with Bass Strait, twisting its way south, then east.

Black bream abound in the brackish sections of the inlet, and we try our luck around Siberia. They’re easy targets, responding well to freshly peeled prawns and even the odd bit of chicken thigh. 

The ones measuring closer to 40cm we put back into the water – they’re typically around 35 years old, and make for good breeding stock for future generations – keeping only a few smaller fish.

Getting around the inlet is easy at the moment, with water levels right up, but watch where the locals go to get a sense of where the water gets too shallow. You can pick the locals; they're the ones turning up and backing straight down the ramp without having to stop first and set up the boat.

As we fish, mullet jump in the mangroves along the shoreline. They respond well to plastics flicked in among them, but their fast hit and even faster run make them difficult to keep on the hook.

A word to the wise; don't leave your catch in a bag in the water. Seals that frequent the inlet are known to try and grab the occasional free lunch, and won't be intimidated.

Late in the day, we head across to the channel to target flathead. There’s supposed to be some good-size duskies here, some up to a metre long, so we’re keen to bag a personal best.

The best option here is beaching the boat and walking along the steep sandbanks, flicking soft plastics and hardbody lures along the dropoff into the metres-deep channel running close to the beach.

Sadly, we’re back in the boat disappointed. The bloke I’m with has caught a 70cm duskie off the seagull and pelican poo-encrusted fishing jetty right beside the boat ramp on a previous trip here, so we know they’re about.

It’s time, then, for an excursion up the Bemm River, sneaking over the shallows at its mouth to the deeper water in the river proper. There are bream here, too, responding well to prawns and lures.

Back at the boat ramp, landlocked anglers sidle up to the cleaning table ringed in a soft collar of accumulated scales, asking how we’ve done. We’ve kept four bream, each about 20 years old judging from their size, for our dinner.

It’s still mid-afternoon when we return to the Bemm River Caravan Park. There’s still time to head down to the Rex Hunt Future Fish Platform and try a few casts to see what’s there.

The platform is built into the riverbank, and both the bush around it and the rushes lining the river have grown thick and tall.

Small schools of what look like pilchards run up and down the bank, rippling the surface of the water. Casting out to the middle of the river, it’s not long until we’re pulling in juvenile bream, hungry for the peeled local prawns we’re using as bait. 

It’s fun, but the sun is beating down on us, and a lack of shade combined with the unseasonably high humidity make standing out in it difficult.

It’s time to call it a day and head back into camp. The bream we caught earlier in the day have cleaned up well, and cook up nicely over the camp stove with a coating of egg wash and panko crumbs, a side salad the only garnish needed.

No late nights for us; first light is still early, Mark is behind the counter of the bait shop from 6am, and we’re keen to get one of his coffees and a final session in before heading home.

Getting there

Bemm River is about a five-hour drive from Melbourne along the Princes Highway via the towns of Traralgon, Bairnsdale and Orbost – all good places to stop and break up the journey.

You need to turn off the Princes Highway at Manorina, driving about 20km along the Sydenham Inlet Road down to the Bemm River township.

Accommodation is widely available, and free campgrounds are available to the west of the inlet, just inside the nearby Cape Conran Coastal Park.

The Bemm River Bait and Tackle store has bait, ice and other essentials, as does Bemm River Holiday Accommodation. The Bemm River Hotel serves up good pub meals and cold beer.

Don’t have a boat? Polycraft boats are available for hire from Bemm River Holiday Accommodation.

No fuel is available, so if you plan on an extended stay, bring jerry cans or plan to make a 120km round trip back to Orbost.