Sunday, March 18, 2007

Trout at winthertime....

In winthertime trouts are hard to catch, it is really a challenge, but it can be done.

My daughter had spend the weekends with my sister, brother in law and their kids, and I was driving out to them to pick her up. My sister and her family have a house almost one hour drive up north of Bergen city, at a place named Eikangervaag and the coast-area around is knowned for good fishing-spots. Seatrout and Rainbowtrout and dozens of other saltwaterspecies is what you can get here. The streams and lakes have a beautiful Brown Trout also. I packed some gear in the car, my plan was a few casts before I was picking up my daughter.


I started to fish at a narrow strait between a lake and the sea, used my Burkheimer 790 Saltwater, Orvis Battenkill Large Arbour with a intermediate Striper Taper, and a synthetic tied Clouser on a Owner hook. And it worked very well, did not catch the big ones, hooked a big one but lost it and landed a nice small Brown Trout. I could even watch the trouts chasing the fly.



Conditions could not be more bad with temperature below freesing point and low-water, but today it was my day anyway.

Low-water is usually bad for fishing, but the low-water caused a strong stream in the strait that I could use when i was fishing the fly, and in combination with a heavy fly in syntetic material I turned the bad conditions into a good fishingexperience.

Early start on troutfishing for me this year, and a good start:-)

Great!

Chris <;))><

Tuesday, March 13, 2007

FLYFISHING IN SINGAPORE 2007

23 february me and my family started on our second journey to Singapore, we where going on an extended winter-holiday.

In the summer of 2005 we visited Singapore for 3 weeks, and really looking foreward to return to this great country. And like last time we stayed at Oyvind and Sumika`s house.

The biggest adventure during our stay in Singapore was of course Oyvind and Sumika getting married.

My brother in law and sister in law got married saturday 3 of march. And the amazing thing is that it is the same date of wedding as me and my wife. Elisabeth and me got married the 3 of march 2004 at the Norwegian Embassy in Bangkok, Thailand. Amazing! Anyway, it was a beautiful ceremony at the Raffles Hotel, with guests from about 12-13 different countrys. We ended the day with a Singapore Sling at the Long Bar, a great day :-)



The first week I visited Coho Fishing Tackle a few times, really nice to return to this superb tackleshop and gather again with Michael, Henry, Melvin and the others. Michael was just on holiday when I meet him, he is working in China now, he is running a shipyard. He is a man with many qualitys. When he is away his wife Annie and Henry is running the shop.
Melvin and Huns was going up north in Malaysia for a 4 days trip, they are going to start a fishing-lodge there, a nice place with a great lake. I did make an appointment with him that we should gather for a fishingtrip after they had returned the week after.


06.30 AM wednesday morning he picked me up, and we drove up to "the seven trees", a nice fishingspot at one of the reservoirs. Huns was already there, and he had landed 3 Peacock Bass already. Melvin got a nice Peacock bass a half an hour after we started. 07.45 AM I landed my first, a beautiful Peacock Bass with wonderful colours.

After a while we packed our gear and went for a little breakfast. Mel and Huns brought me to a local cafe, and we enjoyed a very nice breakfast, a Malayan dish named Roti Prata.

Great:-)

After breakfast we went to fish at a fishing ground by The Lower Pierce Reservoir, the spot is just opposite to the place called "The White House" where I fished a lot during my last visit in Singapore.

And here I got my second Peacock Bass of the day, and after I had landed my colourful beautiful fish Huns got one also.





It had been a wonderful day with many experiences so far, Huns had to leave us for an appointment so after a while me and Melvin went to a third fishingspot. We went to The Bedok Reservoir.
The fish was not very interrested in our flies here, did not get any real catch, but we had a nice time here. We walked around the whole reservoir, and that is quite a walk. We could observe several Snakeheads and one of them was a real giant. I did cast after it, but I did`nt manage to tempt the great predator.


This had been a fantastic day, I had landed a few Peacock Bass, the flies that I used was Melvins special Wolly Bugger that he gave me, Huns gave me also some of his specialdecievers. Melvin and Huns are fantastic people with a great hospitality, experts in flyfishing and very engaged in nature and the enviroment. Great flyfishos and good good friends!!

The day before our return to Norway I gathered with An Ren and Zi Yi, we went to fish for Snakeheads in some ponds at Marina South.


We startes with poppers, and after fishing a half an hour i hooked a Snakehead, fought it for a little while, but lost it. Damned!
Anyway, it was quite a fun!

We visited several ponds this day, hooked some Talipias, and Zi Yi hooked a Tarpon in a pond that is connected with the sea. He lost the fish, but he had great fun!


I did not get many days of fishing this time, but the fishing I had was just great. I only brought one rod with me to Singapore, and that was the Coho # 4 Rod that I bought last time I was here. The rod worked perfect, I also use it for troutfishing in Norway.

Miss Singapore already, cant wait to get back, hopefully me and my family will return next year. We had many great adventures in our holiday, there is a lot to explore in this small country.

And of course, we now have a fantastic part of our family living in Singapore. Oyvind and Sumika, our sister and brother and fantastic hosts during our stay here, are two wonderful people that we want to visit as often as we can. So it will be more opportunities.

Cheers

Chris <;))><