Tarpon at Bagan Datoh with The Lap Cheong

This trip was specially arranged for Lap Cheong since he was nagging that I did not bring him along for the tarpon trip last week.

I must thank him for provide transport and the long hours of drive to Bagan Datoh. He picked me up from my house at about 4.45am... and stopped by at Hutan Melintang for breakfast before going to the target spot.  We missed the junction and had to turn back to search for it.. and reached the spot about 7.50am.

The condition of the 'parit' (drain ) was not favourable. The water was stagnant and not flowing due to full tide. The tarpons was not frenzy either. Saw only a few rises in 5 minutes.

I did not have high hopes of landing many tarpon..but I was just hoping a few will do. I prayed that Lap Cheong will at least catch a few, if not I will be deep shit... He will be surely cursing and swearing like hell just came loose...

He caught a few, landed a 12" tarpon and missed a couple of strikes as he was using his "grandfather's" spinning set up. The rod was so damn soft that would be difficult to set the hook and the reel was so damn slow even the tarpon can outrun it..... HAhahahahaha.....

I was using fly on my bamboo rod. Gurgler seems to be effective in the morning but it almost came to noon, Damsel was a hit. Landed about 13 tarpons of good sizes at least 10" in length and dropped few when I tried to lift them up...

Here are some of the photos taken during this trip.

And... this one is dedicated to Adrian Ng who missed this trip......

I still remember how to 'FLY'

This was a last minute trip where my friends wanted me to bring them to fish for tarpons and the only place I am familiar with is in Bagan Datoh.

It's been like ages since I last fly fish... fortunately, I have not forgotten how to cast a fly rod.

We reached there about 8 am and we missed the first frenzy session which start early in the morning where the sun about to rise.

My friends was using light bait casting rod and I was the only one with a fiberglass fly rod. I landed a few good sizes tarpons and failed to hook up some. They were extremely fast..

This one was landed with a gurgler.

Another...

I guess this was the largest landed..

This was landed using Olive color Damsel..