The first ever SWB Challenge held on the Corroboree Billabong was organised back in 2006 by 3 friends and was aptly named S.W.B Challenge (Secret Women’s Business). The idea started following a comment made over dinner one night and has now grown into an ongoing successful event.

The SWB Challenge is a fishing competition organised by women for women without any assistance in boats from men eg: women handle their own boat, rig their own lines and catch and land their own fish. The tournament is open to women aged 16 years and above and teams can have a maximum of four members. As Katherine Hepburn once said as one goes through life one learns that if you don’t paddle your own canoe you don’t move.

2008 DVD

Unfortunately the 2008 DVD is no longer available to view, stay tuned for the 2009 DVD! 

2007 DVD

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The inaugural Challenge attracted 50 fantastic, capable and enthusiastic women just happy to get out and have a good time in what is normally deemed a male orientated world. Since the 2006 event the competition and interest has grown with 100 keen ladies fishing in 2007.

The achievement that has now been created by SWB Challenge is that of a higher interest by women in the Northern Territory to get out and fish with their friends and families. This in turn has also given the ladies who competed, a sense of achievement and competency in taking out either a houseboat or their own boat without any male assistance. A lot of these women would not usually have the support or confidence to do this by themselves if it were not for the SWB Challenge.

The decision to have the competition at Corroboree Billabong was made with a few factors in place including: 

1. Easy access to and from Darwin.
2. Its not tidal and there are no sandbars or difficult rockbars to remember and manoeuvre around.
3. There are houseboats for the ladies who either do not have a boat or are not yet confident enough to drive a boat themselves.
4. Fairly user-friendly boat ramp.
5. Somewhere to camp so no driving after a long day fishing.

The competition is a catch and release competition with the eligible species being Barramundi, Saratoga and Tarpon.

Some comments below from some very happy fisher ladies,

The competition was awesome, it was so much fun catching fish and spending time with friends.

I wish to thank you both for the months of hard work involved in organising the “Secret Women’s Business” at Corroboree last weekend. It was an absolutely brilliant weekend.

We had loads of fun and laughs and just wanted to pass on our thanks for all your hard work organising this fantastic event.

We had a fantastic time and met all seriously wonderful people.

I just wanted to say that we really appreciated the time and effort that you girls put into this, truly amazing and very humbling that you took it out there.

I would like to thank you very much for a fabulous weekend down at Corroboree. I for one am extremely proud of my girls on our team, we successfully set up camp put our boat in and out of the water, caught all our own fish, packed up our camp and had an ABSOLUTE ball, all with out the boys!. Thank you for inviting us!!

The SWB Challenge is held at Corroboree Billabong around September/October each year and is proudly supported by the Palmerston Game Fishing Club. The Palmerston Game Fishing Club provides their years of invaluable experience in assisting the Organisers with making this women’s competition a memorable one.

If you would like to register your interest in fishing the SWB Challenge please click here.