Bag a Barra — 20 March 2026

It's time now to head to the Top End and Bagabara with Glenn Watty Watt, thanks to Barefoot Fishing Safaris and Uniden, for the best in UHF communications, explore the extract series at uniDen.com.au. And, of course, what he is our man, from the Northern Territory, in particular, the Top End, Barefoot Fishing Safaris, if you want to go fishing in the Top End. He's your man. Watty.

Is there any way you're staying dry out there? What's doing? She used to be going forever, the wet, the big wet up there. I see flooding everywhere.

The rivers are bulging at the seams and overflowing and breaking the banks. I saw Catherine copped the big flood and there's a cyclone making its way across from Queensland and the water seems heading your way. Yeah, we do not need any more rain, mate. I can tell you that.

Every other year. We're always sort of begging for rain, but this year we've we've had enough. It all started in November, of course, with Cyclone Phoenix, so yeah, it just keeps the wet season that keeps on giving, isn't it? It is, it is a big wet.

A huge wet, which, which, you know, fuel prices and fuel crisis aside, will have an effect on some of these trips that people are taking around the country, but even up in the Top End when, you know, people want to get into those waterholes for a swim and the like, they can't do that until the rangers have been through and cleaned out the big lizards out of the water there. It could have a bit of a, you know, there's going to be water in all those places. There'd be crocs moving everywhere, wouldn't they? Yeah, yeah, there definitely is.

We're not seeing too many of them in the river at the moment, and that's usually a sign that they're still all out and about. Oh, there goes a snake swimming across the river over there. Um, but yeah, no, the, the crocs are all spread out, mate. And actually, someone asked an interesting question the other day about if they, they wondered if the croc's nests would have been high enough to be away from the water or if it would have, these big floods might have drowned a few croc nests too.

So that'll be interesting to see. Um, but yeah, I mean, the, the big problems that, uh, gonna come once the water does go away is that the massive cleanup in places like Daly River where every single caravan park is all underwater at the moment. They've had to postpone all the fishing comps down there and then, of course, it's going to take them a month to clean everything up. So, yeah, hopefully everyone can get up to the Top End later on in the year and support all these businesses have been affected because they're struggling a bit at the moment.

Yeah, absolutely. And that's a question that I was asked through the week. Would you feel guilty, fuelling up your vehicle and cans, and then I say, yeah, jerry cans, not to store fuel, but in a lot of, you know, a lot of places. It's a fair distance between point A and point B and you fuel up a couple of jerries to make sure you get to point B.

Would you feel guilty filling up in local surveys? And I said, no, because they're up there supporting these towns. I mean, and that's what needs to happen. We need to.

I know this is a real problem, but we need to somehow continue to travel and support these regions, don't we? And northern territory is no different. Yeah, that's right. It's a good point and I think it's important to be aware, especially those small locally owned servos, the mum and dad type businesses.

They're, they're the ones that... Yeah, they need the business and you can be pretty certain that they're not going to be doing any price gouging and their prices will probably be a bit lower than the big fuel companies, mate. I talked to Pete at Crobery Park Tavern the other day on the way out here and he was saying that he's keeping it as low as he possibly can. But he said, you know, fuel up now because the next truckload's coming in is going to be an extra ¢20 a litre deer or whatever. So, but yeah, at the same time, of course, people are going to reduce the amount of fuel that they do use.

So, um it's not as if those guys are going to be getting wealthy out of this. In fact I'll probably lose money because there's just less activity. That's right. Less activity.

And as you say, oh mate, they're corroborate. He's trying to keep it low and it'll probably reduce it at his own expense to make sure he still gets at least some sort of custom going. Yeah, that's right. I mean, those little local servos, especially if you've got a relationship with them, they'll openly tell you that they'd rather keep the fuel prices low and and get you get everyone to stop in there and then they're going to buy a bottle of drink or an ice cream or something and then that's where they make their money on the retail stuff, not so much the fuel.

So, you've got to, Yeah, make sure you support all those little local servos, I think, is important at the moment. Yeah, absolutely. And you are right.

He going to have no choice, but pay through the nose when he gets it, when the big tankers turn up. Anyway, we just got to hope that we've got fuel turning up. That's the big thing. And I know that there's a bit of a fear out there of people thinking they may get stranded. And let's hope let's just hope that people smarter than us can get this sorted out.

Oh, I'm not going, I'm not blowing. I went off on a bit of a rant earlier, Watty. I've just had enough. I've had enough.

I've had enough of, you know, I mean, I'm talking about over the years. I mean, you know, politicians, fair income, it suits up there telling us what to do and making decisions. They forget the fact that they're there to represent us, not dictate to us. It's our money.

They spend ours. It's unbelievable. But if you gave me money and I just blew it on nothing, would you be dirty on me? But I'm supposed to be spending it back on when I'm supposed to be spending it back on you in some form.

Yeah, well, that's right. I mean, yeah, that old thing is... It's our money. on beer than it is from oil and gas exports. It's a bit of a joke, isn't it? It's our money, mate.

That's our money. Hello? anyway. All right.

Well, we'll try and encourage people to travel and get up around your parts and obviously all this water will have an effect on the fishing and like you're out there, you're out right now, are you? I'm on the boat right now, mate. Yeah, and it is making it pretty tough. God, these modies are bad in here too. And um, yeah, just because it's so flooded.

The top of the south is probably a metre and a half or 2 metres high than it was this time last year and these same fellas were up and we had amazing fishing last year, but this year we've really struggled. We're back to sort of less than 10 a day most days, so, yeah, we're, we're, we're banking on a week of sunny weather with no rain, but it doesn't seem like that's going to happen. All right. Well, right, just straight back to the bottle, eh?

Talk to you next week. Right, yeah, good on you. See you, mate. There he is.

Glenn, what do you, what? Barefoot Fishing Safaris. What do you say there? A snake swimming past.

I mean, only on this show, okay? Where the real deal here is in particular, what are you up there in the Top End? Barefoot Fishing Safaris.