Bkk Fishing, Day 1- IT MONSTER LAKE (PART 1) LOAD WARNING !

After a mere 3hours rest, me, Jpiing, Poi and my dad were on our way to our first fishing destination in Bangkok, the famous IT monster lake located in Ratchaburi, which is around 2hours drive from the city. John, our fishing guide came at 4am, yes 4am in the morning with his 7-seater SUV to fetch us. He said, we had to be there at 6, to have a higher bite rate. You know la, "Early birds gets the worms" mah.

Just a lil back ground on this amazing paypond that houses many amazing fishes.

IT(pronouce as ‘It’, not I.T) Monster Lake is a lake that belongs to Mr It Khun, a sugar refinery boss who loves fishing himself. Mr IT would buy fishes from fish farms across Thailand, fishes like araipaima, Chao Praya Catfish, Red Tail Tiger Catfish to put in his lake and he would invite some of his close angler friends over to fish them. Only lately he decides to open this monster lake to public with a minimum charge(3500bath per rod), which is RM350. Pretty pricey, but where else in the world, besides the Amazon, can you get a chance to come face-to-face with a Giant Arapaima Gigas.

After stopping half way to buy drinks, we finally reached IT Monster Lake at about 6.00 am in the morning. John helped us prepared our luring kit. ( Btw for those of you who doesnt noe what luring is, its a fishing technique where u try to catch a fish using a fake bait, usually mimicking a sick or injured fish.) John told us to try luring first, cause tricking and landing a fish on fake bait entirely on your own effort is just priceless :P

First fish on lure, Alligator Gar.

Now you know why they are called Alligator, just look at those teeth.

I manage to fight a red tail catfish on lure, and the whole fight was captured on the video below. But unfortunately, the bugger manage to unhook itself.

Double Hook-Up

Pacus, Pacus, Pacus, They were everywhere...

Brandon wit a handsome Pacu.

Mystery Fish that took our lure that was baited with carrots and cucumber.

Redtail Tiger, 3kg.

We continued on luring till noon, but the bite rate was very poor, cause the sun was just too hot. So we had a break and took some maggi goreng thai style and waited till 2pm for bait fishing. ( Visitors are only allowed to use bait @ 2pm onwards). John helped us rig up the chopped ikan kampung and we were off to catch the elusive ARAPAIMA !

Dint take long, when my brother caught our first redtail catfish. beautiful fish indeed. The kampung fish works like magic. Soon we were catching medium sized redtails after redtails ;and not to mention countless pacus.

Juping with his Asian Red tail Catfish. Notice the difference between this species and its South-American cousin.

It was til 4.30pm, when I finally hit something huge ! I knew it was a big one, and after losing the previous fish, I was determined to not let this one go..After a full 30mins tug of war, the fish finally gave in. BEST FIGHT EVER !

35kg Red tail Catfish, biggest one of the trip. Beauty.

Yours Truly with the Amazon Leviathan.

Juping too had his share of the fun..with this huge catfish.

Brandon with a 28kg catfish, caught during sunset.

Finally, at 7.30pm, when we were busy packing up, the fish we've been going after the whole day took our bait !! The fight wasn't as impressive compared to the 30kg redtail, but Yes !! Finally caught my dream fish, the 2nd largest fish in the world, the Arapaima Gigas or "JU LONG" in mandarin. Praise GOD !!

Family Picture with the Dragon fish.

Group Picture with the elusive Arapaima !

"Kiss of the Dragon" >.<

3rd Gar of the day.

Group Picture with our local guides and the last catch of the day.

We were exhausted, considering the fact we only had 3hours of sleep after touching down in Bangkok, but boy was it fun ! So far, it's been the best fishing experience in my life. Haha, just when you think the fun was over, we were going to the world famous Bungsamran lake the next day, for the Giant Mekong Catfish. So stay tune for "BKK FISHING DAY 2" update. Till then, God bless :D

Bentong Trip #3 ( 27.12.2008)

Here are some of the pictures from the previous fishing trip. For more detailed information, visit jping's blog . Till then, God bless.

Bro with the biggest tilapia of the day. haha happy fellow.

Finally landed the monster !

Myself with the prized catch.

Again.

Brandon with his small haruan caught with fake frog.

1.5kg Sang Yu caught using bread o.0

The Patin Kings.

Kaki Pancing

Bentong Trip #2

Last Saturday, went to bentong farm together with the Lees, jping family, bro and myself. As usual, we left around 7am and had breakfast in bentong town for some awesome wanton mee and dim sum. The char siew pau is a must try too. After a heavy stomach, we continued on with our journey. It was so cooling along the raub-bentong road..In fact, it was cooler than air-con. Along the way, we saw random kmpg people popping out of no way standing along the road..hmmm..o yes we saw lots of dogs too. Joel Lee had some fun too, whistling and flirting with kampung girls. Naughty chap.

Anywho, we finally reached the farm around an hours time and were greeted by jeffrey's dad. They were here the day before to do some hunting session. Andy kew-kew showed off his prize possession from the hunting session which was two eagles..Such powerful creatures the claws the wing..So majestic but covered with blood..which explains why i dint take any pictures of them.

Moving on to the fishing..My day couldnt get any worse, when my first cast got hit by a huge patin. I was so excited when i saw the fish swam infront of me, but thats when my nightmare started..I couldnt stop it from going into the wooden plank and the leviathan just entangled the line and snap the fish was gone..I was still in denial saying the fish was still there, but jeff told me its gone sonn and finally gave in and cut the entangled strings..geezz i think thats the last patin in the big pond due to the horrible management of a particular "someone" and hoping to get another one was just impossible.

Dejected, I went back to the pondok to do some TILAPIA fishing. I decided to do a huge Bomb bait and drop it just below the pondok and jeff was saying." wahlau so big ? how the fish eat ?!" and i said, just leave it lah can one..and what do you noe, this whooper came and took my strawberry pandan bait..hahaha everyone was jumping with joy when we finally landed it.

3kilo Rohuuuu, me and jeff posing with the fish.

Catch of the Day

Dont ask me,I oso dunno wat happen..

Like what my bro said, its not about the catches but the reunion with family members that truly makes it a good trip. Now that i know the way to bentong,anyone interested to go this place just leave me a message lah. Pricing can be negotiate.

Bountiful Harvest.

Mohd.jeffrey & voon posing for the cameras.

Playing with the late-" Siew Pang Yaos"

Sang-yee, best can drink opener.

Was this "charmaine" or "liyin" di ah ?

SriPetaling Paypond

I have a love hate relationship with SP paypond. There are times where i dont catch a whisker at all and there's time where i can catch up to 10 fishes in 3hours. Its the closest pond in my area, so love it or not this is the only place where i can wash away my "racun pancing" during the holidays.

The rate here is 25bucks for 3hours per rod then additional 3bucks for every one hour added on. I started fishing from 3pm till 9pm. The pond was filled with pacus but they just kept breaking my hook. Damn, i lost about 3hooks and one hook=one fish. Things got even worse when the malay boy beside me keep hulling up fish after fish after fish. Ok, maybe he was just lucky. Then when he left a abang came and did the same thing like the small kid. Catching 3fishes in less than 3mins.

I was so frustrated, but as the saying goes "cari rezeki-lah".If its yours then its yours.( just like girls ). So i kept on waiting and waiting till around 6pm. Finally, something hit my bait and what a surprise, it was a sultan fish. The sultan fish must be a luck bringer, after that i caught two more pacu. Not a bad day. 6hours 3 fish. OK-lah at least dint go home empty handed this time. Till then, God Bless.

One of the pacus in aquarium.

Catch Report : Lure Fishing at Tropicana.

All the fish were caught using "STORM" soft rubber lure. Its quite effective against the haruans. We also caught some Jags & even tilapias. Still doesnt know why the toman i released back in January, still hasnt hit any lure we presented. Smart fellow.

( * NOTE : Not advisable to fish at tropicana as you might just get hit by golf balls ! )