20 MINUTES TO LAND TROUT

Press, Volume CVI, Issue 31277, 25 January 1967, Page 3

20 MINUTES TO LAND TROUT

(N.Z. Press Association) ROTORUA, Jan. 24. It took Irish student nurse Geraldine McHugh, aged 21, just 20 minutes, plus a 13,000-mile journey to bag a trout on Lake Rotorua this morning. “Very exciting,” said Miss McHugh as she proudly held up a well-conditioned brown trout of about 2 J lb, caught from a line trolled off-shore. Now she had the vital ingre-

dient for her meal of fish and chips—a meal which brought her to New Zealand in the first place. Turned Down Miss McHugh turned down £25 on the English television show “Take Your Pick” and instead chose “Bag 13”—a packet of fish and chips with the fish to be caught on Lake Rotorua.

The trout brought in by Miss McHugh just before 11 a.m. today was hooked by a

Rotorua fishing guide, Mr S. Potts, trolling from an accompanying boat, the Haumoana. Mr A. Olivier, piloting Mr J. P. Davy’s boat Ngata, from which Miss McHugh was fishing, quickly brought his craft alongside and Mr Potts transferred the line to Mr R. D. Forrester, the Tourist and Publicity Department’s fishing and hunting adviser. Within seconds the rod was in Miss McHugh’s hands and, with some professional coach-

ing, she rapidly brought the trout in to the net.

Miss McHugh, paying a fivehour visit to Rotorua in the course of her 10-day trip to New Zealand, carried on fishing. Later she will see a trout steam-cooked in the Whakarewarewa thermal area. A film unit’s exposed film will go back to England with her for screening on the television show on which the Irish girl won her prize.