Terengganu Fly Fishing Festival:
An Experience of Tranquility in Malaysia
Nic Chew FFI CCI
Every time when we talk about fly fishing, the first thought of it is commonly trout fishing in the western countries with beautiful scenery and decent size of fish as seen from Facebook or Youtube. On the other hand when we mention fly fishing in Malaysia, the first thing that came to my mind was those adrenaline rushing and challenging saltwater fish like Sailfish, GTs, Milkfish… or some powerful packed predatory species like Toman and Haruan(Snake head families), Sebarau and Peacock bass, then the rest are pay ponds of variety species. Never once that the image of “western trout fishing scene” pops up in my mind. While Malaysia does have its fair share of nature that could even transcend and comparable to other countries, but the places we go fishing are just not up to par yet, either not having a beautiful scenery or just simply not having decent size and quantity. I believe it is the dream of many fly fishermen in Malaysia to be able to ‘trout fly fish’ in Malaysia.
However, my opinion about not having a good ‘trout fly fishing’ spot was immediately slapped and changed when I experienced it first hand in Terengganu. It was just couple months ago, when we came across a poster from facebook on TFFF, Terengganu Fly Fishing Festival. The main aim of this event is to promote Sungai Berang as an eco-tourism destination for all locals and foreign fishermen and nature preservation and conservation. Seeing this as a great opportunity to promote Malaysia water and fly fishing to more Malaysian, we decided to sign up and help out. Though fishing was included in the event, it was never really in our list as we were quite skeptical about it, we thought that it can never be compared to places like in the states, Borneo or Mongolia.
Then here comes 28th February 2020, the day of the event. At the dawn of the day, excitedly as ever, we first met up with Mr Brandon and departed together at 4a.m. then later met up with Mr Dron, Mr Ben, Mr Eddie & his wife, Mr Quek, Mr Chris and Mr Ong, all well-known individuals in the fishing industries. All of our cars were stopping beside the highway and we were deciding where to go for a breakfast before we continued to our 5 hours long journey. As the discussion came to a conclusion, all of us went back to our own vehicles and headed to our next destination, Karak for breakfast. Everything was going as plan until later when we realised, we actually got the wrong information and went to the wrong place. It was supposed to be Karak City but we went to Karak. After a short while, we all agreed to have our breakfast at different areas and to meet later on. Disappointed, we continued our journey and looked for a place to eat. And that’s how we stumbled across a hidden gem.
We stopped by at Temerloh RnR to have our breakfast. To our surprise, all the stalls were selling Patin cooked in tempoyak. Daring we were, we ordered 2 bowls of the patin along with some common Malaysia breakfast staple, nasi lemak and teh tarik and coffee. Still feeling doubtful on the taste, we slowly scooped a spoon full of the gravy and tasted it. “Wah” was the first word that we heard, why? It’s delicious of course. Spoon after spoon, we continue to gobble our meal to the point where you can hear the sound of metal spoon scrapping against the plastic bowl. What a great way to fill our famish belly and prepare for our journey.
At 10.30a.m., after the long and exhausting ride 6 hours ride, we finally arrived in Terengganu and met up with the rest of the gang, but before we proceed to the venue of the event, we went to check in to our hotel room. Following by that was our lunch. Another scrumptious meal we had, nasi dagang Kak Zah. For those who plan to fish in Terengganu, this is the place that you can’t miss, just take a detour to come here for a quick meal before going for your fishing trip, you won’t regret it. For the taste and smell of it, I will leave the photos to show you and your imagination to satisfy your craving for it.
Filling another round of starving belly, we were finally ready to head to the event. The drive from the restaurant was an eye opening 45 minutes ride, though the road is narrow, it was complemented with a magnificent scenery, a field of lush green palm oil plantation, truly stunning. The serenity would just simply take all your problems away, leaving you feeling relax and carefree throughout the journey. The moment we arrived at the hall of the event, we were blessed with the sight of a decent sized Sikang which was just freshly caught by a fellow fly fisherman earlier ago. Why the sight of a Sikang would considered a blessing, some have asked. It is because it is considered one of the most challenging fish to catch despite being quite predatory and they are rare too. After gazing upon its gracefulness, we carried on to prepare for the day, setting up booth and shop to promote this unique sport of fly fishing along with others too like Dron and Brandon from FlyTyingNation Asia Distribution, Ben, Quek and Boon Cheng from Fenwick, Paul Arden from Sexy Loop and many more.
In order to make this event a success, the organiser had even closed the whole stretch of river for 3-4 months just to ensure the fish have time to feed and reproduce without any hindrance so participants have a higher opportunity to catch this mystical fish, kudos to them who made the arrangement. They had also managed to gathered the support of over 100 fly fishermen from the locals and even UK, US and Philippine to participate in this event and some of them even purposely flew in just for this event. Most importantly, we on behalf of all paricipants and as a fellow angler would like to express our gratitude to the programme coordinator, Christopher Mcilravy who made it all possible for this event to run smoothly without any issue and the Terengganu Fly Fishing Club committee Cikgu Hisyamuddin, Cikgu Saifur and Cikgu Razak. Just so you know, besides coordinating TFFF, they had also gathered the locals communities and organised a sports day for all the children and parents in the village. Now you definitely have to give them not just a cookie but something more! What do you guys reckon? But one thing I can be sure is that you will never find another man as passionate and caring as him for the local communities, you go Chris!
The event was filled with lots of different educational programme ranging from i) fly tying by Master Tyer Dron Lee and Brandon Ho, ii) fly casting from Fly Casting Instructors, Ben Foo, Paul Arden and Clevin Kham, iii) stores sales from FlyTieCast (FTC), Fenwick, Jenoba Outdoor, TB and much more, allowing all the beginners to experience and take up fly fishing and for the veteran to further enhance their craft too.
Dron was tying and teaching a new pattern of yellow butterfly that the locals had been looking for, using a unique umbrella hook and Japanese wing as you can see from the photos. On the other side, Ben was demonstrating the proper way of fly casting throughout the event and Paul Arden had even held a fly casting game emphasizing on distance and accuracy, which are both essential pieces in a good fly casting no matter which part of the world you are. If you think this event was overwhelming, you have not seen the end of it. The event had got a huge amount of lucky draws from all the sponsorship of big brands in the market for almost all the participants there. There were in total of 1 Fishing package In Rompin, Malaysia, 8 sets of fly fishing rods from Fenwick, SAGE, TFO, Garage Rod Builder, 1 full set of top outfit from Vision Fly fishing and I believe over 50packs (it’s just rough estimation, there were too many to the point that I lost count) of Fly Tying Materials and Hooks given out from FTN, FTC, Sempefli, Ahrex, Wapsi and much more. You definitely won’t leave this event empty handed, even I got lucky and got some materials too. If you have missed this event, no worries, there will always be the next!
Not forgetting the most important topic in every conversation of fly fishermen, the fishing! As mentioned, Sikang was one of the reason why many came over from different parts of the world due to its rarity. When the bar was lifted on the second day, lots of participants proceeded to swarm the whole stretch of the few kilometers of Sungai Berang, with 13 labelled spots for them to choose. While all participants went to try out their luck to land the rare beast, we had decided to stay back at the hall to continue educating the next generation of fly fishermen. There were many young kids who had missed the chance to join in the tying and casting session as it was too crowded on the first day so we rigged up our fly tying vice and tools and showed them some simple pattern that can be used in their water. From what we knew, many of the kids were very interested in fishing but they did not know how, so some of them actually came over and asked us to tie them a few flies that can be used in their river. We then tied some dry flies and gave it to them, hoping they could catch a big one.
In the evening, one by one the participants was coming back from the river, the feedbacks that we heard from them were fairly good. Many people actually caught their first Sikang from this event and but many more who didn’t manage to land one and had planned to take their revenge on the next day. Do mind you, there were easily more than 50 participants on the same river, having almost all of them having a bite was a pretty positive. After hearing their tales, who doesn’t actually get fire up. It got us excited despite being skeptical about it.
The hall was full with the chatters and laughter of all fly fishermen until suddenly when everyone was interrupted by the arrival of Ajil State assemblyman Maliaman Kassim and along with him were Terengganu Tourism Department Director Ab Rasid Jusoh, Hulu Terengganu District Assistant Chief of Staff, Normah Nik nd Terengganu Fly Fishing Club Chairman Norhisyamuddin Abd Ghani. They officiated the introduction of the river as an Eco-tourism destination and was very happy and positive that this kind of programme will benefits the local village in terms of economy and development. After that everyone was invited to have dinner in the hall and was free to roam around. And that’s the end of day 2.
Now, it was finally the day for my turn to catch my first ever Sikang. We woke up at around 7.30, had our usual at Kak Zah again, then immediately off we go to the river. There is this saying that goes like this “the early bird catches the worm” similarly “the early fisherman catches the fish”, we were nowhere close to following that. Our initial plan was to start fishing at around 7 or 8a.m. before the sun fully rose, but by the time we reached the river it was already 9.00a.m. Well what can I say, it proved that the hotel bed was simply just too seductive. Nonetheless, catching Sikang was still the main mission. When we reached our destination at spot number 2, we immediately hopped off the van and started gearing up. You know you are getting on age when you need to spend around 10 minutes just to tie the bloody 2 pound tippet to your size 14 dry flies. Funnily enough, I wasn’t the only one facing with that issue, Dron was well prepared so he got off quite quickly, Ben on the other hand was cursing and squinching his eyes to look for the tippet that he thought he had dropped when he was clearly holding it in his hand until Clevin pointed it out for him. The sight of it was hilarious, we were laughing our asses off when Dron had decided to head down the river and started fishing. We stopped fooling around and quickly followed after the rest of the gang.
Along the path to the river was a narrow passage filled with particles of fine sand and body height grass on both sides but what awaited at the end of the path was nothing that I had ever imagined, it was as if I had gone to another country. The scenery was truly shocking and magnificent. I was left speechless. A week has since passed and I still can’t find suitable word that could justify its worth. The first thing that came to my mind was, “You can find this in Malaysia?!” Without wasting any time, I took out my phone and started taking photos and admiring it instead of casting my fly. Not long after that, it was a slap of reality. It definitely paid off to be the early bird, Dron who was the first one to go down into the river got the first fish of the day! Crucial lesson of the day, be prepared and be early or leave with no fish. After a while, we decided to change the spot after receiving a call from Cikgu Hisyamuddin stating that there were a couple of big ones. And guess what, when we arrived, there were actually a few big sikang hovering around the river but just simply weren’t in the mood for feeding, so the call was actually to ask us to come over just for the sake of looking at the fish. Feeling frustrated as we had to give up a very good spot just to look at the fish, we decided to try out luck. Cast after cast and flies after flies, the few fishes didn’t budge at all, it would sometimes try to nibble your fly once and ignore it until you change another, as if it was mocking you. The weather was not helping too, it become hotter and hotter by the second passed. Became annoyed, Ben decided to stop, he put down his Fenwick rod and later borrowed Clevin’s wt3 rod with a #10 gurgler just to try out the rod. There you guess it, as the fly dropped onto the surface of the water with a few strip, the bastard finally decided to whack it. Instantly, the crowd went roaring (there were only 5 of us) and Ben’s scream of happiness filled up the whole peaceful river (we were told by the people in the village that they could hear him too).
Despite its size, that bugger gave one hell of a fight. After taking the gurgler, it instinctively swam downstream very quickly. Suddenly the chance of landing this fish plummeted. Ben was clearly not giving up and didn’t want to lose in this tug of war! He tighten the lines, lifting the rod to stop fish from going further down the rapid stream. This fight had been going on for couple of minutes when Yeim saw the situation and quickly came over to help. The moment the fish got closer, Yeim carefully laid down his net into the water and allowed Ben to direct the fish into it. As the fish was in the net, second round of cheering echoed through the whole river again. It was a spectacular sight and magnificent fish indeed. A 34cm Trophy! Ben could have been in tied with the winner of Sikang fishing competition, Akma Faris bin Razaman with a 34cm too, but then it was caught a day later. Nevertheless, it was still an amazing Sikang fishing experience and catch of a life time for Ben. After taking a few trophy shots of with the fish, it was safely released to the wild to live for another day.
With around half an hour left, the rest of us continued to cast our flies to the fish under the scorching hot sun hoping that the same miracle would happen again. Unfortunately, the fish behaved like a bastard again. Reluctantly we started bagging up our stuff and kept our fly rod the last. As we were trekking back to our car, we did not forget to cast and let it drift for a few rounds, you never know what will happen, deep down we still hope for that one lucky strike. Alas luck was not on our side that day. We then met up and caught up with Cikgu Hisyamuddin at a nearby mamak stall. Within the conversation, there was plan to organise another fly fishing event at Berang again. At that moment, the sudden sinister thought of revenge was lurking in my mind, a chance of redemption! And so to the fish I must say, I will be back!
For those who has never tried catching a Sikang before, this upcoming June event is the one that you should participate in. Many of us longed for the experience to fly fish while being embraced by the beauty of Mother Nature and some even purposely fly to other country to feel it. Now you can get the similar experience in Malaysia, so what is there to lose? With that being said, I will see you guys there.