You won’t get a ring if you don’t catch a thing
A QUEENSLAND bloke has popped the question to his beginner fisho missus and barracatching virgin on a fishing trip in the Top End – but told his guide he was only going to do so if she caught a barra. There was no Plan B.
In a story that was first told on the ABC Darwin’s hugely popular Tales from the Tinny radio show, Jarrod Godson and Ursula Godson, owners of Reel Screamin’ Barra Fishing charter, hosted Queensland couple Kevin “Pudd” Edwards and his girlfriend Harn Newton out barra fishing at Shady Camp last Saturday.
Pudd had a cunning plan and told Jarrod he was going to propose, but only if she landed her first barra.
As with all good romantic ideas, Pudd said he got the inspiration while lying on the couch.
“She always wanted a romantic proposal, I’m not real romantic … the only romantic thing for me is to sit in 40 knot wind and bounce up and down and catch a barra,” he said.
He said Harn didn’t like fishing when they met three years ago but he brought her around.
“Living in Brisbane, there’s no fish here, so I said to Harn, ‘Book us a trip to Darwin’. We’re going to Darwin. We’re going to catch a barramundi.
“I said to Ursula… ‘If your hubby can catch her a fish, I don’t give a sh**t about the million fish, I will be put a ring on her finger.”
Jarrod said Pudd told him: “If the barra doesn’t happen for the missus, the ring doesn’t go on mate.
“I said, ‘What’s Plan B?’. He said, ‘I don’t have a Plan B: just fish’. Jarrod said Ursula had got him to buy champers and some glasses.
“I’m on the other end of the phone going, “Holy sh*t, pressure’.
The champers was hidden in an Esky but after a barra- less hour-and-a-half fishing at the top of Shady Camp, they tried the mouth.
“And it (the wind) was blowing its head off. It was sh*t house out there. It was rubbish.”
“So, we were like the Titanic, going up and down the waves at Shady Camp but low and behold got the job done,” he said. Pudd takes over the story. “Well, you wouldn’t believe it, Harn goes ‘woah, woah, we’ve got a fish and we stop the boat. And I thought, ‘Well that just cost me $7000’. That’s as romantic as I can ever be.’
“I nearly broke out a tear…I got pretty emotional and she said. ‘ What’s going on with you?’ “She did not have a clue. Not one clue.
“I was very emotional. I think I was more emotional, because I love the woman and for her to do that especially when there are three males on the boat and for her to get the first one.
“I didn’t catch a fish and I still haven’t, I can’t wait to get back up there.
“If she didn’t get the barra the ring was never going. It was never going to happen.
Pudd said the couple would be back in Darwin to marry and Jarrod said the couple should win the Tourism NT’s Top End wedding prize.