I think we actually did poorly during the frenzy. We lost a few non sagai fish. Ah Du also caught and released a decent goldie.  "So, this will be a tenggiri batang jigging trip ya. Anyone caught using micro jigs will be thrown off board because we don't want any sagai shit happening." We started the trip off with this mindset which was promising and I felt somewhat vindicated in my efforts. I always tell folks that when you go fishing in Desaru, dream big when jigging. Instead of fooling around with micro jigs, one should try bigger jigs especially when combing the bottom for tenggiri and snapper.  Or that's what we thought lah. We didn't even last the first spot. I mean, we started out well with big jigs and all but we slowly started to degrade into sagai kakis. Even the last man standing, Sherwinder, also changed to smaller jigs to catch some sagai. Kraken Gear Ah Du getting ready The crew setting up shop We even got chided by Captain Ah Long of Desaru who lite...

The story of the trip... It's been too long since we visited Merchong so we hastily arranged a 1 day sortie to Merchong since the restrictions have lifted. It was a self drive trip so we had a little flexibility.  Showing the trip report in a photo journey way :) First step was 古来友明 Restaurant Yuw Meng over at Kulai where we had our dinner! Their signature pork ribs Fried ice cream! Another signature of theirs. Their hokkien mee is still good. I would say the best in JB. Pineapple pork intestines was surprisingly good. Fried squirrel! Steamed prawns two styles Freshly ground fruit juice First we settled into the chalet... How nostalgic! The rustic feels Private jetty Even the room was so familiar Managed to get a few sotongs at nail island aka pulau berhala The trusty lunch box Love the space of the boat! Can fit 8 pax easily Ah Chong sort of turned into a rockstar and kept casting but kept getting the thrash fish. Hmmm... Shark! No, Cobia... Heavy! Foul hooked... Lawrence nailed ...

An awesome specimen! So this Ah Fong fishing trip was slightly interesting because of two things... We were fishing shallow reefs and I love to fish at such fishing spots simply because there are a lot of small reef fish to catch on sabiki rig. However, this time they were gone (the last time I caught so many assorted reef fish with bare sabiki rig)! I tried sabiki with prawn meat to tempt them but I got busted off by two bruisers. The kind of fish that take off once I set hooked. And of course, I got rattled by Ah Fong. But when I tried thicker lines with flasher hooks, they wouldn't take again. Apparently, the thin sabiki lines made them commit... I later on caught a mangrove jack with sabiki but that was just poor, boring fight. Yep, it took sabiki without bait Flasher rig didn't work Meanwhile... My size made the fish look small again. This was around 2kg. We had to call it off halfway though as the weather got really nasty. Yummy fish though. Fairly decent fishing Balek ka...

So, yet another overdue catch report and this time from one of the best fishing captains in the north - Jeff Tsen or some people call him "captain underpants". Dad isn't so well these days and fishing the whole day can be tiring for him so I cooked up a half day trip onboard the Prince of Peace (POP) fishing boat. I was kinda worried that Dad wouldn't catch anything but he still showed that he got that fishing blood in him by bagging a good barramundi that we dispatched at 1036 Seafood at the club after fishing. Very tasty looking kim! Dad looking edgy Caught a small snapper! Dad yanked this kbl into the boat in double time Nick scored a good one but lost a whopper. See video here . Really precious time spent with Dad. Thanks Jeff! Beautiful barramundi The amigos We slurped up everything

A standard day out with Sam Law It's been literally more than three months since this catch report on Sam Law but still not short of amazing. Sam Law has been producing super fishing catch reports over the last few years. He is one of the most consistent fishing gurus around in Singapore. This trip wasn't working too well for me as I was mostly doing jigging. But not too bad, caught a couple of groupers on jig and also a sweetlips (must catch because of the tee shirt). But Sam took the mickey out of me for not catching any snappers. Very fat fish! This was actually quite big at 1kg but not sure why photo so small Good gao The snappers were biting! Joshua on a roll Really easy fishing today with shallow fishing spots so we used small sinkers and light setups. Almost explode box Kaci t shirt of shame Some of the snappers were really good sized Good day! We had dinner at our favourite zhi char after Sam Law. One of the best steamed fish I have eaten in my life in and of Singapore!...