Seaspray Beach (Ninety Mile Beach)

Seaspray is a small town sitting directly on Ninety Mile Beach, about 32 km south of Sale, and it is one of the beach's popular fishing towns. The surf club is perched on the dunes with a large viewing deck and ramps to the sand, and the elevated decks along this coast are handy for spotting gutters before setting up. Ninety Mile Beach produces salmon, tailor, snapper, sand whiting, flathead, trevally, mullet and even mulloway, and it is best known for sharks, from gummies and school sharks up. One thing makes Seaspray different from the rest of the beach: Ninety Mile Beach Marine National Park starts just south-west of town.

Fish north-east of the surf club, where the beach is outside the marine national park. Walk or look from the decks for the darker, deeper gutters and set up on one on a rising tide. The surf club deck is the best gutter-reading seat on the beach, and nobody charges for the view. Use a long surf rod and a paternoster dropper rig for distance, and lighter gear with a running sinker in the shallow wash for families, with small squid strips or sandworm and a little berley. Salmon and tailor take metal slugs and pilchards; gummies come after dark on fresh squid or fish fillet.

Australian salmon are the mainstay, with tailor and mullet in the wash and gummy sharks after dark. Flathead, snapper and silver trevally turn up from the gutters. Salmon have a 21 cm minimum and a combined bag of 20 with Australian herring; flathead other than dusky are 27 cm minimum with a combined bag of 20; snapper are 28 cm minimum with a bag of 10, of which no more than three may be 40 cm or longer.

Know the marine national park boundary before you cast. The north-eastern edge of Ninety Mile Beach Marine National Park sits on the beach less than a kilometre south-west of the surf club, toward the Merriman Creek end of town, and all fishing is banned inside it. Fish north-east of the surf club and check Parks Victoria's park map if in doubt. Use the viewing decks to read the gutters. A northerly flattens the sea and helps the cast; an easterly rarely fishes well.

Seaspray is reached from the South Gippsland Highway via Sale. There is a large park with facilities stretching the length of Foreshore Road, a general store, and several beach access points with wooden ramps and staircases over the dunes, including at the surf club. The beach itself is soft sand, so wheelchair access is limited to the viewing areas. It is family-friendly in calm weather. Out of the holidays, Seaspray has more car parks than cars, and the gutters have no queue at all. No fee applies.

Seaspray faces south-east onto Bass Strait and takes the swell directly, so the gutters reshape constantly. A moderate swell carves fishable gutters; a big sea turns the beach to white water. A northerly wind and a rising tide help, while a strong side current or heavy weed make fishing hard. Dawn, dusk and night are the productive windows; the middle of a sunny day mostly produces sunburn.

Ninety Mile Beach is an open surf beach with rips that form in the same gutters that hold fish; do not wade deep to cast and keep watching the water. Big seas dump on the beach and can knock you over. Fish away from swimmers, especially near the surf club in summer. Night sessions need a headlamp and someone who knows where you are. Remember the marine national park immediately south-west of town: fishing inside it is an offence.

Yes, on the beach north-east of the surf club. Ninety Mile Beach Marine National Park begins less than a kilometre south-west of the surf club, toward the Merriman Creek end of town, and fishing is banned inside it. Check Parks Victoria's park map for the boundary.

Salmon, tailor, mullet, flathead, snapper, silver trevally and gummy sharks are all caught along Ninety Mile Beach at Seaspray, and the beach is famous for sharks.

Use a surf rod of at least 12 to 14 ft and a paternoster dropper rig for distance. For families, lighter gear and a running sinker rig with small squid strips or sandworm in the shallow wash works well.

The surf club has a viewing deck and ramps to the beach. Further north-east along Ninety Mile Beach, the small beach settlements of The Honeysuckles, Glomar Beach, Delray Beach and Flamingo Beach have their own wooden ramps or staircases over the dunes.