A battle between Fly, Spinning & Baitcasting and bond of an ever lasting friendship

by Nic Chew FFI CCI

It’s the time where a buddy of yours whom you have not met up for a long time called you up, in my mind I was thinking of him trying to pull off his MLM scheme to persuade me to join some shady business. I was all guarded up readied to reject him, however it was just to meet up for a fishing trip. The phone conversation that did not even last for 2 minutes had set 3 of us together again.

When it comes to fishing, the saying early bird catches the worm stands true to us. To catch the prey, we have decided to reach to place as early as we could. At 5.30, I have departed from my house to fetch Ah Tan and Ah Lim and then head to our destination.

An hour and half through the drive to our destination, Tan decided to call the boatman to see whether the tide has risen high enough for us to depart. Unfortunately we won’t be able to head down yet, so we decided to have our breakfast before heading over. During our meal, we found out that all of us were using different gear. It was at that moment, we decided that it was a competition between spinning, baitcasting and fly, and the person who caught the least have to buy dinner for all.

Now THIS IS WAR!

Fly VS Spinning VS Baitcasting!

Here comes 7.30a.m. at the jetty, we quickly unload our gears from the car and loaded them up on the motor boat and off we go to hunt our trophies. Without wasting any time and not wanting to lose, Lim and I quickly set up our gears, not forgetting to tease Tan for not being able to get his gear ready while he was skillfully maneuvering the boat….at first. Then we ran into a tree after that. Never jinx it, all of us almost fell into the water.

When we slowly drift down from a narrow passage to an open water, the scene was unfathomable, there were boilings, tailings and rises everywhere, you can clearly see those tarpons chasing the baitfish as the baitfish leaped up the surface desperately trying to live for another day.

Without any hesitation, Lim and I began frantically casting into all the possible areas we could to try to get the first fish of the day. Then there was Tan, casually lighting and puffing his cigarette while setting up his baitcasting gear.

Unlucky Day?

Luck was really not on our side, 15 minutes into fishing, Lim got his first hook up but lost it when he was reeling in. Then later on Tan got his

too with his mini lures and lost it again when the tarpon jumped and toss it away. It was not looking good for me as I have zero bites so far. After observing the size of their lure and soft plastic, I changed into a smaller size baitfish.

I then proceed to cast into a gap between the mangrove trees and stripped it in fast, suddenly I felt a big tuck on my line and it was a tarpon! Anxiously and excitedly I carefully maintain the tension to ensure I don’t lose the fish as the previous 2 guys had lost theirs. After a 5 minutes of the fish trashing in the mid-air and me reeling in line, the first silver king was tamed and landed. It was a decent sized Tarpon at 45cm, not bad for the first fish of the day. It was now 1 vs 0 vs 0!

Never Jinx it.

As the time passed, the rises had decreased and the result was 3 vs 0 vs 0. I caught another 2 in between and 3 of us lost a couple too, the curse was back, so we thought. We agreed to give drift down for another hour and called it a day. It was all quiet until I recasted fly and allowed it to sink. As the fly was sinking, my line was pulled strongly along with the scream of my reel, it was a take in mid water, knowing that it could be a decent size fish, 2 of my friends repetitively joke about the ‘curse’ and also to cut the line to ease my burden. After a few minutes of tug of war, the fish was finally revealed to us, it was a barramundi! When it was pulled up to the surface, it started jumping madly trying to toss the fly away from its mouth and there was I praying that my 16lb leader can hold it. Finally when you thought that fish was all tired and ready to be taken up for a photo, suddenly when I reeled it beside the boat, this bugger started his second wave of thrashing and broke off the leader. It was then you could hear the echo of my sadness and cursing throughout the stretch of river.

Nonetheless, it was a fun and strange day filled with laughter and disappointment but a good outing with your buddies beats all of the frustration. What’s more I was lucky enough to get a free dinner to end the day too.

Final Verdict

In the end, it was a lucky 3 VS 0 VS 0 with Fly getting first place, does the result stand true for you….?