April 20, 2008
The day was Saturday 19th of April 2008, I received a call from my hometown childhood buddy, Sao Hui. He asked if I was available on Sunday which was the next day, they had arranged a boat fishing trip to the Kong Kong river. I remembered the last trip I went with them was years ago, during the last meet up we bragged about fishing and I told them to update me if there is any trip arranged. Without much hesitation I told him that I would be going, as I was not sure where was the place to meet up, Sau Hui said he will get Kok Siang another Pontian boy to guide me there.
I woke up at around 4am on that day as I needed to reach the meeting point which was at the Taman Perling, Johor Bahru by 5:30am. I was told to look for a Shell Petrol Station there and Kok Siang would be there to bring me to the next meeting point. Everything went smoothly over at the Singapore and Malaysia custom clearance and I managed to reach there before 5:30am. There was no sight of Kok Siang and it was until 6:15am then he appeared, we were late.
We managed to reach the next rallying point at 6:35am, it was just two streets away from where I was. Sao Hui was already there and without much delay we headed towards our destination to meet up with Xiao Lee, who was also the skipper and the guide. As we were late, Sao Hui rang Xiao Lee and asked him to pack some breakfast for three of us. Brief introduction on Xiao Lee, personally I don't know him, according to Sao Hui, Xiao Lee fished at the Kong Kong river almost twice a week and he knew the place like his back yard.
Pre-arrangement was made by Xiao Lee with a fifteen footer fiber boat equipped with a Yamaha 30hp outboard motor standing by for us. There are a few boat rental companies here and their boats are always fully booked. Without prior booking, you might ended up at one of the seafood restaurant here wondering what to do next.
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| The Journey Begin |
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| Fish Farm on the River |
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| Live Prawn was bought here |
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| Village by the River Bank |
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| Heading out towards the River Mouth |
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| The Incompleted Senai-Desaru Highway Bridge in 2008 |
At the far side construction work for the Senai - Desaru Highway was underway, the bridge had help to cut short the traveling time from Johor Bahru to Desaru almost by half. Before it was built we had to travel all the way to Kota Tinggi in order to reach Desaru, now we can just en-route the new Senai - Desaru Highway from Ulu Tiram, which we can cross the Johor River via this bridge.
We decided to begin our activities at the middle of the Johor River, water level here is quite shallow and it is also a reef zone which is home to the Grouper. As soon as the boat was anchored, we dropped our lively prawn deep down to the bottom. Current was not very strong here so we only needed a size four sinker to do the job. Bite was quite slow but we were not in the hurry as this was the first spot of the day.
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| The Reef Zone |
"Fish on?" The Skipper, Xiao Lee asked
Kok Siang didn't reply, maybe he was too excited. He chose to pay all his focus on the fighting, it was a fierce fight with the fish dragging the fishing line from left to right.
"Sam Poh Kong!" shouted Sao Hui as he saw the silver shadow of the fish swam across the surface.
The Queefish aka Sam Poh Kong aka Talang is famous of giving a aggressive fight when it is hooked, it is a very strong and fast swimmer too.
"Slowly! Patience!" Xiao Lee told Kok Siang
For almost ten minutes we watched with excitement as the Queenie demonstrating it's excellent skill in swimming, dashing forward and backward with occasionally cutting through the surface. This desperate attempt to struggle off from the hook gave Kok Siang some hard time. Kok Siang kept his calm and slowly wearing off it's energy, he eventually landed the first trophy of the day, it was weighed around 800 grams.
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| Still Struggling Aggressively |
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| The Marked Snapper |
Another exciting fish fighting scene when Sao Hui hooked up this Marked Snapper aka Ang Chor Kee, it was a powerful swimmer too and it took Sao Hui some struggle to bring the fish up.
We spent an hour here and caught a numbers of small fishes, I hooked up a baby Sharks and a few small size Groupers. The Captain, Xiao Lee suggested that we moved on to the next spot as the tide was full and the current had slowed down.
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| The Malay Eatery by the River Bank |
We came to this Malay Eatery which is built at the river bank here to have our lunch, many other anglers were here too. The place was so relax and having the lunch break here was convenience for us, our boat was docked just right in front of the Eatery.
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| Towards the Mangrove Zone |
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| The Indigenous Malay Village on the river |
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| The Floating House |
There are six wooden floating house here, using some waste materials and some huge plastic containers as float, these wooden house were built in poor manner and I was amazed by the living condition here. The house was tied on to the strongest mangrove tree to prevent it from washed away by the current. The villagers here were all fishermen and livewell was constructed to keep their catch alive. We didn't manage to see many fishes that day, we were told that the catch was bad due to the rain.
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| The Mud Crabs |
These big fat juicy mud crabs were sold at Malaysia Ringgit $16 per kilogram! We bought five kilogram of them for our dinner later.
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| Into the Mangrove Fishing Spot |
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| The Hunting Ground |
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| Deep into the Mangrove Zone |
We were told by our captain cum fishing guide that loud talking was forbidden here, the Barramundi is very sensitive and they might be scared away if we were too noisy. As the matter of fact, most species do not like noise from the outside world and this is especially true when doing the fishing on a river. That is why some river anglers preferred Electric Trolling Motor, which emitted low noise on moving.
Live prawn was hooked and it was tossed near to the mangrove's root, it is the favorite hide out for the Barramundi. Xiao Lee shown off his skill by doing the live prawn spinning style, he removed the sinker and cast the bait to the spot, when the bait touched the surface he quickly reeled back. Twice we saw the Barramundi attacked the live prawn but too bad it missed the hook.
The stint here was cut short as the Skipper thought that it was a bad omen to miss the fish twice here, he decided to retreat to the river mouth. According to him as the tide was receding there is a spot that we might had a chance to land some biggies, he said that some huge Barramundi might swim out from their nest and ambushed near the river mouth, they were waiting for their food to be flushed out by the out going tide. The water level inside here would be very shallow as well and the boat would get stuck here during the low tide, he added.
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| The Final Moment |
When we reached the spot the current had somehow weaken, none of us had any action until...
"Fish on! Fish on!" Sau Hui suddenly shouted and it happened right after I pressed on the shutter and took that photo.
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| Tiger Grouper |
The spot here was shallow and it didn't take long for Sau Hui to complete the task, in less than five minute this meat tasty Tiger Grouper was landed in the cooler box.
Our lucky star, Sau Hui learned the live prawn spinning skill from Xiao Lee and he hooked up a table size Barramundi. The Man of the Match trying to show off his skill and took his time to slowly retrieving the fish.
"Get the net!" Xiao Lee yelled
As Kok Siang was the nearest to it he grabbed the net and shifted himself nearer to Sau Hui.
"Here it come! Net it! Hurry!" Xiao Lee gave command again
Sau Hui brought his fishing rod high up and slowly guided the Barramundi close to the boat, Kok Siang leaned forward and grabbed the leader line, slowly he lowered the net into the water. As the net was moved closer to the fish Kok Siang let go of the leader, a mistake that was not noticed by our experienced guide Xiao Lee, as he too was focusing on the fishing action. The Barramundi must have felt it when the leader line was loosen, it made a swift turn which caught Kok Siang by surprise and dashed towards the opposite direction from the net. The hook was shrug off from it's mouth and it quickly disappeared in front of our horizon.
For the next thirty minutes nothing happened and the superstitious skipper made the call to end this trip, he strongly believed that the escape was a bad sign. As the sky was getting darker we all didn't object the decision he made.
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| The Catch |
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| Something to show Wife |
P.S. This is not my first trip here at Kong Kong River, I was introduced to this place by Sao Hui a few years back and I returned a few times including fishing on a wooden jetty beside the river. On one of the trip there me and my fishing buddies from Singapore were stuck inside the river, I forgot to move out when the low tide struck, we were forced to step into the mud and pushed the boat out. The story will be featured in the future post, stay tuned!
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Always Tight Line, Hardcore is the Spirit!
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