Saturday, January 23, 2016

The final Phuket Lake Trip...of this holiday!!

 John Bellamy, Ray Barron  and Russell Shaw took themselves off to the Phuket Fishing Park on Friday for their final lake fishing session of this holiday.

Ray was determined to 'sort the fishing' out with different and better rigs in order to cut down the bite-offs and losses.

Well...it worked. 22 Paku in the 3kg to 7kg range to Ray sets a new Pacu 'House Record'.

 In addition to the Pacu there were a few catfish.
 This season, thoough, has been extra special with these beautifully marked Hovens Carp turning up. We have never caught these before but this year one or two have been landed. Yesterday, Ray landed 7 of them in the 6kg to 10kg range. Spectacular fish to take his day's total to 31 fish landed.

John Bellamy (still awaiting his pictures!!) landed 28 fish with five Siamese Carp up to 20kg, 12 Pacu, three Hovens and 8 mekong catfish.

 Having been to the park many times I know where the redtail catfish 'live'. If an angler wishes to fish for these he has to pay extra for the stronger tackle and chicken or fish baits. Ray figured it all out for himself and was able to place in bait in exactly the correct place to take one of these extremely hard fighting fish. Many lake anglers believe these to be the hardest fighter of all the species although fish like the massive Mekong Catfish or Arapaima will take consideraby longer to land because of their weight. Ray is in favour of the Arapaima taking the title of best fighting fish. Ray totalled 31 fish yesterday...which he reckoned was well in excess of 300lb of steroid fuelled fury brought to the net.

Russell regards Pacu as being far too easy to catch and prefers to consider the merits of drop-kicking them back into the lake.  He likes to concentrate on the Siamese Carp and landed three to 40lb inbetween trying, unsuccessfully to avoid the Paku landing 12 of them as a byecatch! (Politically loaded buzzword that). Russell is a keen carp angler 'back home' and enjoys trips to France in the pursuit of carp so this has been a real treat for him especially as every fish here in sunny Thailand fights like it is possessed.


 Here's Russell with one of his three carp...










And here' s another of them. We are very worried about the condition of these fish. After fishing EFT a number of times this year and seeing how carefully the fish are looked after, it is depressing to see the state of these carp. We are regularly participating in heated exchanges with other anglers about their mistreatment of their fish and watched on this occasion a German angler drop his carp four times hard onto the ground from a considerable height whilst posing for his picture.



Sadly, the park is in a very bad state with rubbish everywhere. The Australian owner, Chris, has been off work for some time now and without him there to manage the workforce it is all falling rapidly into a mess. We collected rubbish around the lake and tried to explain to the Thai guides but they look at you as if you are mad and casually throw the next empty bottle of beer over their shoulder into the undergrowth. This is, in so many ways, a deeply confusing and fraustrating country.  Thais are meticulously hygenienic yet don' t appear to give a toss about their beautiful country and think nothing of throwing rubbish everywhere and anywhere. Very strange. In fact the Phuket Park is looking remarkably like Weymouth Town Centre does every Saturday, Sunday and Monday morning.



This is the final trip to the lake for the lads as they leave for UK tomorrow. The fishing has been really amazing but with Ray John and Russell here it all took a massive leap forward with improved terminal rigs and the undoubted skills that the lads brought to the lake. Our Grauvell fixed spool reels, miles better than the gear provided by the lake, are srtruggling to cope and we have destroyed three of them. We really need good quality Shimano baitrunners to cope with these fish but the reels are in excess of £120 each....so, donations please!!


 So...why are we fanatical sea anglers concentrating on the lake fishing rather thn the sea? Well....here we are with the results. Yesterday John and Ray went to Rawai Pier whilst Russell and I joined Jenny Arnold (PADI Instructor and daughter of Martin Arnold, well-known gentlemen fishmonger and good Offshore Rebel customer) to go offshore for a three dive day at Racha Yai and Racha Noi. (Pictures of dive day to follow...)
 These are the size of the fish you can expect to catch from the shore. The lads went down to size 12 freshwater hooks and presented tiny slithers of squid on two hook running legers to take about a dozen fish of different species between them. And, although the fish were tiny, a local Thai family were delighted to be given them to take home for tea. Very little from the sea gets returned over here....we watched in dismay as a pick-up truck roared past us the other day with three sailfish in the back of it.
 Dinky little sea fish....you can just see the hook...it is only a size 12 hook!

We have tried to find a location where we might catch some bigger fish...but so far we have failed. If anyone has been to Phuket and found some good shore fishing PLEASE let me know! When we are diving from the shore we see millions of little fish and a few good sized puffer fish and sometimes a bit titan triggerfish or a colourful parrot fish but these are rare sights. A couple of shore dives ago, and for the first time ever for me, I was confronted by two Giant Trevelly which must have been in the 20lb range..so I guess anything is possible.

Anyhow...after the conclusion of the fishing....it was appropriate to go to The Big Buddha (which is still no-where near finished even though loads has been done to the site) to give thanks for a brilliant two weeks of fun, laughter, fish and diving.

Ray has certainly made his mark here. The Eastern Culture is a complete opposite to our Western Culture in so many ways. The Thai ladies and the guides at the lakes think Ray is the funniest Englishman they have ever met and they love him to bits....Jennie, our English Diving Insructor friend, describes Ray as a 'Lecherous Drunkard'.

I leave you, Dear Reader, to make your own mind up about this...and, although I have a good deal of photographic evidence to influence the discussion, I will not submit any on this occasion but leave it all up to your imaginations.....

No comments:

Post a Comment