A short video, post fight, nice big-ish bonefish from the Seychelles. I’d like to go there some day.
The Seychelles on the cheap goes something like this… go to your local beach and start swimming… eventually you’ll either reach the Seychelles or die, and if you die, were good in your life and love bonefish, you may just go to bonefish heaven… the Seychelles. See… cheap.
Browse the web forums, read the magazines, watch the movies… they are most all variations of stories that end happily ever after. I got to wondering… while it is easy to find glowing reports, what are the really bad stories? Looking through several forums and Google searches for “worst trip” I came across the story below. This is from Flyfishing Forum, although I can’t get a direct link to the post, here is the general site. The tale of “thing that can go wrong” is from back in 2006. It is a tale of a honeymoon gone a bit off the rails… however… the author seems made of stern and sunny stuff… the guy has his telescope stuck on the silver lining. Definitely a half-full guy. If your next trip starts to go sideways or pear-shaped, just think of this guy and his disposition.
Well,
We made it back alive!!! Our 2 1/2 week do it yourself belize adventure went off with many a trill a lot of high water and more than a few good cocktails!
On our first day I had the horse I was riding try to roll over on me and durring my quick exit I managed to break my ring finger on my stripping hand (left)After cutting my weddung ring off w/ a rusty hack saw I was able to splint it w/ some clothes pins and get it taped up. It made casting difficult especially the double haul by I learned to cope. Then came the rain every river in the country rose and then flooded so my plan for river Tarpon and snook was shot. To add insult to injury as the rivers entered the ocean it created a 200′ line of brackish muddy water along the whole coast (in Hopkins) so my plan to do some wading and kayaking was scuttled.
The second week we headed for Glovers reef w/ the promise of clearer skies and water unfortunately I contracted some wierd flu and spent the first two days w/ a 102 degree fever shivering in bed. Glovers is increadibly beutiful and the snorkeling was out of this world! The flats were a 3 1/2 mile kayak paddle from our island and after making the trip once I must admit I bairly had the energy to fish (damn flu). the last day one of the owners said they would take me out by boat and pick me up at a latter time. Great!, I could fish the rising tide in the morning this would be my shot!! As we headed for the island we ran over a large green piece of tarp which wraped itself around the prop kicked back the motor and broke the linkage. UGH!!!
Ok it’s been a week maybe those rivers on the mainland have gone down and we’ll just go after snook and tarpon. No such luck, we had to doge trees flowing down the swallon river upon our return. I did get out one morning w/ a local guide and fished the barrier reef. I caught a nice Jack and a permit and missed a bone. Then you guessed it …it started to rain and everything just seemed to shut down. We did manage to find a nice school of bones in deeper water but could not get them to hit.
So there it is not what I had imagined but a great trip all the same mostly because of all the great people we met along the way. Oh and let’s not forget those cocktails while discussing the worst rains in 20 years
I’m off to Alaska in three week I hope the report is a little better!!!!
Wow… how many people would call that a great trip? I don’t know this guy, but I’d buy him a beer for sure.
I’m a West Coaster… so, I’m a little uneasy at the idea of a tournament when it comes to fly fishing… for me that’s still something that bass folks do while trout fly anglers, like myself, go about our business in solitude all River-Runs-Through-It and whatnot. The Marathon International Bonefish Tournament (MIBT) turns 50 this year and starts soonish (Sept. 17-20). It’s a three day tournament, costs $1,000 and the winners get to see Megan Fox naked… ok, I made that last part up. They have long since dropped the Miss Bonefish crown to acknowledge the fact that women are competent anglers in their own rights… so, good on ya MIBT.
MIBT has old timey cred
While tournament play doesn’t really set my reel a cranking, this seems like a pretty interesting event. It’s got the history, it is a no-kill format, allows un-guided teams… doesn’t sound so bad. I have heard there are other tournaments down in the Keys and places beyond and I’ve never paid much attention. I won’t be flying down and plopping down my $1,000, but part of me (specifically, the part without $1,000) will be wishing I was on the deck off a skiff getting skunked with a guide berating me for my incompetence. Instead, I’ll spend the 19th flying from Boston to SFO with my toddler sans my wife. Should be pure joy.
There is a place that is slowly becoming synonymous with really big bonefish. The rumors are of an average size of 7 pounds with double digit fish a regular sight. It seems to be similar to Hawaii in that what the fish have in size, they lack in numbers. Despite being in the middle of nowhere (unless you live there, in which case you are just in the middle of whatever you are doing), the place doesn’t have Christmas Island numbers… but it has size… big ole bones… the tackle busting kind. This place is called New Caledonia.
Closer to Australia than to Hawaii (by a long, long way), New Caledonia sits in the South Pacific and looks to be a pretty interesting place. The lux lodges are not around just yet… as one report said, this is not a place for folks that need hand holding. The action isn’t hot and hectic, it is measured and tense… eyes looking for those truly large fish.
Seems in 2007 a group of anglers that included Charles Rangeley-Wilson (one of our bonefish addict faves) and Peter Morse hit the island in search of some of the giants. They both have write ups about this trip.
The price on offer… big bones.
Peter Morse describes the trip…
As always the weather in New Cal makes it a challenge, this is not the place for anyone who needs to have their hand held, you require a level of experience that at the least means choosing flies, tying knots, and making decisions. The fish aren’t particularly spooky most of the time, but seeing them, and dealing with the wind and cloud becomes a test of patience and skill. This is not a place for Christmas island cricket score numbers, it’s a place for quality, a few very, very, good fish that will really last in your memory.
Certainly sounds like an interesting place, not a place I’m ready for, but something to aspire to. Charles uses a bit more style in his article from Gray’s Sporting Journal…
What little I’d discovered about bonefish in New Caledonia told me only two things: that they are very hard to find, and that if you find one, it will be very, very large. It’s the latter more than the former that dragged me here. There are many species of bonefish worldwide—Morsie gave us an expert tutorial in this—but while the physical differences may be subtle, all bonefish are paranoid, skittish, morphing ghosts that mess with your mind, your eyesight, and your sanity. And in New Caledonia, so the international fish-whispering goes, these fish become truly massive. The biggest rush, the biggest wave.
I found a report at Fishing International that said this of the fish and fish size…
We weighed all our fish using a “Bocagrip”* and we released fish from 6 up to 10 pounds. Both of us saw larger fish that were out of reach. I estimate the largest fish I saw at about 15+ pounds, but it is difficult to be certain. The average size of the fish we released was 6.5 to 7 pounds. It was obvious that there are some very large fish around. How large? Our guide Antoine landed a 9 kgs. (19.80 pounds) fish using bait, the week before we got there. Can you take them with a fly rod? Claude Nickrass’s party from France hooked and lost some of these large fish in December 2000 using a fly rod. The next world record bonefish could certainly be caught in New Caledonia.
OK… that sounds pretty interesting, no? Even if I could catch a 19 pound bonefish in New Caledonia, I won’t be going any time soon. See, a quick look at Kayak.com for flights puts a price tag for a flight from SFO to New Caledonia at about $2,750. The trip there is about 24 hours, the journey back is about 30… 30 hours… like, over a day. Now, I’m not accustomed to travel to Australia or Singapore, so that sort of travel is enough to make me think “Andros has some big bones too… Hawaii has big bones and air conditioning!”
Still… New Caledonia sounds like a fascinating place… a place where “Elk outnumber inhabitants” and 19 pound bonefish have been caught (even if on bait). The next world record just might come from this little chain of islands in the South Pacific. Watch this space!
*Bocagrips are generally discouraged for handling bonefish. Don’t do it.
Found a great little article in The Field (a British sporting mag). The cliff note version of the article is this… cheap bonefish. The author is a Brit, which makes me like him just for the high probability we could talk soccer/football (oh Newcastle, hope you make it back on the bounce). The article is great, the writing is grand and the author seems like a guy you’d like to cast a line with.
This particular angler is Charles Rangeley-Wilson, an angler and writer of some reputation and maybe even a bit of fame over there in England (maybe even other places, as far as I know). Awfully British of him to go by Charles… no Charlie, no Chuck… but Brits are Brits and he even packed chocolate biscuits with him on a shoestring trans-Atlantic bonefish expedition… something here about “you can take the angler out of Briton but you can’t take the Briton out of the angler.”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W8u9bygLV50&hl=en&fs=1&rel=0&color1=0x006699&color2=0x54abd6
Turns out Charles has an addiction I can sympathize with…
All the time-bomb tension of the previous few seconds, the held breath, the frozen body, the eyes straining for information, is suddenly released when a bonefish takes. I doubt there is anything else in sport to rival that uncoiling rush. It’s like a drug and I for one am addicted to it. (from The Field article linked above)
Charles with a bonefish
Charles has made a movie about his obsession called “Bonefish: A Fishing Odyssey.” Now, I’d like to see this movie… I’d like to see it very much. However, still stinging from the American Revolution, the dvd is not yet for sale in an American-friendly dvd format (although this is coming, and coming soon, as I understand it). Keep an eye out for it, or, just check here and I’ll let you know when you too can get your copy.
Belize… a magical land of lots and lots of bonefish and lodges that are all shiny and wonderful. Seems the lodge game is the current approved route, as opposed to DIY. The Ledger.com ran a story about heading down to Belize that was a decent read. Find it here. The way the guide and client are not on the same page about the stripping speed made me think of Shane Kohlbeck‘s article here a couple weeks ago.
Here’s a random guy fishing in Belize. His guide is very different from the guide mentioned in the Ledger.com article. Seems like a cool cat, really.
Yeah… the “catch as many as you want” line got me wondering if A) that were true, and B) if this guy was in the sun too much… or C) A little of column A and a little of column B. Having not fished Belize, I’ll have to wait until I make the journey.
DIY may actually be a possibility, upon a little digging. Bite me Belize offers three different options on a sliding scale from Kayak rental to flats wading to skiff fishing. Check out Bite me Belize and you may just be thinking Belize-me! This looks like a really good option and one that I’m certainly going to be checking into.
This could be your Belize Bonefish ride.
I’m father to a little girl… a beautiful little girl. We aren’t having a second. She’s either going to fish, or she isn’t, but I appreciate every female angler out there who makes this world just a bit less of a boy’s club. I love this video because it will be yet another example to my little girl that women can fish (and even OUT-fish). Yeah, the clip is a Simms product, but it still rocks.
She can ID a trout and a bonefish… sometimes Rooster Fish (she called it a chicken fish tonight) and sometimes tarpon. So proud of my little girl. For Father’s Day my wife bought my little girl a 6′ 2 wt. TFO. It has made its maiden voyage. I intend to raise an angler. If, I end up raising the future star Center Back for the US Women’s National Soccer Team, I’ll have to live with that.
Putting her to work!
Came across a message board posting (see it here) for a trip to South Caicos. This Caicos is part of the Turks and Caicos Islands. Place looks beautiful with just miles and miles of wadable flats with some good looking bonefish.
As with most of these kinds of things, this is not a cheap kind of thrill. The price tag, after airfare and tips is $4,500 or there abouts. This trip is offered by Angling on the Fly. Of course, that trip is about $3,500 too expensive for me at the present time (see, I’m an optimist).
The place is tiny… less than 2000 people live there, which is going to limit your options for DIY in terms of services offered. There is at least one B&B and a few restaurants. There is a general S. Caicos info page here. A search for DIY fishing reports doesn’t turn much up. There is reference to a really large sand flat that’s hard to get to, but beyond that… can’t find much.
Another place for the “That looks fun” file.
S. Caicos Bonefish… yes please.
Chico Fernandez seems like a really cool cat. Sometimes these fly fishing luminaries can be assholes really full of themselves. Chico doesn’t seem to have this particular affliction. Maybe he does in “real life,” but I’ve found him to come across very humble in his writing. Here, in the blog pages of Fly Rod & Reel Magazine, Chico dishes on hunting the Beeg Bones.
Chico with a nice little fishy.
Found this cool little story from the Flatswalker blog brought back from the depths of 2000. Just a little reminder that there is always a beginning to one’s bonefishing life and that there are plenty of lessons we all have to learn. At this point, almost all of the lessons are still lessons I have to learn, which makes me appreciate stories like this.
The Flatswalker blog is the product of Grand Cayman Island bonefish guide and glass sculptor Davin Ebanks. Worth a read, worth a bookmark.
UPDATE: The Flatswalker blog seems to be down at the moment.
