Capt_Asparagus
10-07-2006, 08:56 AM
Hi folks, I have popped this report up on a couple of sites here and there, so thought I would see if you would be interested in it as well. Man, it takes a looong time to load all these darn pics! :-) Anyhow, to the story!
Recently I weakened, and decided to stop messing around with short tropical holidays of 2 or 3 weeks, and do a whole month in the Solomon Islands….basically because I am getting increasingly fed up with our kold kiwi winters!
So it was that flights and rooms were booked to get me to Zipolo Habu Resort in the Solomon Islands, (www.zipolohabu.com.sb), along with another reprobate mate, Cliff Solomon (no, they are not his islands, honest, it is just a co-inky-dink thing). We had both stayed here often enough before to know that we should be able to adjust to a life of idleness and ease, if we really put our minds to it. While I could do a month, poor ol’ Cliff could only manage a sad 2and a half weeks, but hey, that’s better than nothing I guess.
We arrived, on time, on schedule, in the right place (a minor miracle given the domestic service (Service? Hah, a laughable description) of Air Solomons, but not wanting to make issue of this great good fortune, in the fears that if we drew attention to it, then we may have no more for the rest of the trip, we stoically yet gratefully accepted our good luck, and followed our bags down to the ZipoloHabu boats waiting at a Munda (the airstrip/town where you fly in to the resort) jetty, and once aboard the boat, we were heading off to Lola Island, base of the resort.
http://www.#################.com/img/006671.jpg
Man, I have to tell you, the trip across the Vonavona lagoon to get to Zipolo Habu is just spectacular. You cruise past scattered, tropically typical, sand bordered, palm tree fringed islands at a relaxing 25knots (means a lovely cooling breeze, I call it the “2-stroke air- conditioning”), over sand flats and small reef bommies in clear, clear water, watching an assortment of fish zapping around the place as you speed past, it is like driving over an aquarium… man, it is just so beautiful, it is hard to describe.
http://www.#################.com/img/025174.jpg
After a beautiful 20minute trip, we tied up to the jetty off the bar/restaurant at Zipolo Habu, to be greeted by our Hosts, Joe and Lisa Entrikin. After a quick flurry of greetings, we were soon off and unpacking our stuff in our leaf-house style bungalow, and very quickly settling in for weeks and weeks of paradise.
http://www.#################.com/img/032068.jpg
It would be impossible to cover every days activities in the boats, let’s face it, 4 weeks of “today we got up….” makes for pretty dull reading. However, the general theme would be the same in the specific and it is in the general, that is, “…and then we went fishing.” This is the whole reason for our being in this little slice of paradise, and the fishing up here is really very interesting indeed.
Why? Well, duh! Firstly, and most importantly, it is the TROPICS. NZ in the winter is very nice, yeah, sure, nice and bracing, excellent if you like roaring log fires, flannelette sheets and hot water bottles, but really, I have found these attractions tend to wane a little as the years fly by. Now, I feel that short, cold, wet waikato days, fogs and frosts, clouds and coughs, sniffles and sneezes really are much nicer to avoid than to experience directly. I know, I know, I may be getting soft in me old age, but hell, just call me Mr Softy, and strap me onto a jet to get me to the tropics! Fishing here means… shorts, shirts, sunblock, warm water and glorious weather. Oh yeah, baby, yeah!
http://www.#################.com/img/071990.jpg
Next, I will be the first to tell you, if you want to catch piles and piles of fish, stay in NZ, go out and find a school of kahawai, you will catch fish all day until you get tired of it. In NZ, if you want, you can get dozens of fish a day without too much problem. It is just that they are all the same, and after you have caught your first ten kahawai (or rat kingfish, or schoolie snapper, or whatever) the novelty tends to pale just a little.
In the tropics, those numbers of fish are seldom encountered, and once you do tend to hook up on a fish, the others tend to disappear fast… the fishing pressure from the locals is pretty intense here you see, so fish know what it means when Uncle Henry disappears upwards. However, in the tropics, most especially I have found in the Solomons, the diversity of both the species and the types of fishing are just astounding.
http://www.#################.com/img/048948.jpg
http://www.#################.com/img/072023.jpg
If you head out for a reasonably long fishing spell, say 5 or 6 hours, you had better take along a pretty wide selection of gear with you. You will need your popper casting sets, for sure, as poppering up here is just brilliant. Indeed, it is the primary purpose of my trips. The different species you will find with your poppers is just amazing. I have poppered in Vanuatu, I have poppered in Tonga and I have poppered in the Cook Islands. Nowhere have I encountered the range of species you see up here.
We have got, apart from the main target species of the fabulous Giant Trevally,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_fixSolsJun06_159.jpg
Bluefin trevally, Golden trevally,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_fixSolsJun06_160.jpg
Coral trout, Red Sea-bass,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_fixSolsJun06_122.jpg
Flowery cod, Maori Sea-perch, Maori Humphead Wrasse, Triggerfish, Sharks, Sweetlips, Tuna, Logtoms, Spanish Mackerel, Baracuda, even had a few shots from Sailfish. That really is one helluva list of fish. So whatever it was that just made that big white hole in the water behind your popper is a total unknown, you never know what it was ‘til it is beside the boat, and sometimes that ain’t so easy to achieve.
Now, after you have done an hour or so of poppering, and you feel like a bit of a breather (and you will, I promise you), then you are going to need some sets of trolling gear. Me personally, I would use 15kg trolling gear pretty much exclusively, as this weight line let’s you have a bit of a tussle with your fish, while ensuring it arrives boatside before the sharks can find it.
http://www.#################.com/img/072009.jpg
http://www.#################.com/img/073398.jpg
Trolling either hard-bodied minnow lures, or skirted game lures, your target species range from the big Marlin species, Blues or Blacks, through the tuna species like Yellowfin, Mackerel tuna and Skipjack tuna, to Mahimahi, Sailfish, Spanish Mackerel, Barracuda, Wahoo,… really, all of these can be found within a few hundred yards of the reefs and islands in these deep tropical seas.
http://www.#################.com/img/071992.jpg
http://www.#################.com/img/072002.jpg
Then of course you will want to call off for a break on a beach somewhere, on one of the many beautiful small islets you see everywhere up here. Have a bit of lunch, a bit of a snorkel,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_Fix_uw_0541.jpg
and while you are there, why not a play around off the beach with a light spin set? A good light set loaded with say 6 or 10lb line will catch you a multitude of small fish, mainly smaller trevally species, sweetlips and longtoms, but there are so many other weird and wonderful species that snap at anything darting past their noses that really, heavens knows what half the fish you catch really are.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_RamonaBeautyshot3.jpg
http://www.#################.com/img/072003.jpg
Anyhow, so then, you have had lunch and a nice break on a perfect little beach somewhere, what do you do in the afternoon? Well, after a little more poppering or something, how about some bottom fishing? This is your basic old Kiwi deepwater stuff, just as you would do if fishing for hapuku. You are mostly targeting fish in 150-200m of water, the difference between NZ and the Solomons is that to reach these depths in NZ you have to be several miles offshore, while in the Solomons…hmmm, maybe 200m off the back of the island you just had lunch on? And the species you will encounter? Hells teeth, even the locals don’t know half of them.
Certainly you will find Jobfish,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_fixSolsJun06_170.jpg
of several different species, Gold lined, Rosy, Small toothed and Green,
http://www.#################.com/img/071995.jpg
among others, and snappers, such as Ruby, Short-jaw and Long-tailed snappers.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_fixSolsJun06_214.jpg
Then you have Sea-perches, breams, Gropers and Cods of different types, sizes, colours and shapes, really, what pops to the top each time is anybodies guess.
http://www.#################.com/img/072011.jpg
It is bottom fishing that a Kiwi fisherman will feel most at home with, not just the technique, the tackle and the bait (skippies!), but also the ability to quickly land a bin full of fish. Once you find a good spot for the Gold-lined and rosy jobfish, the action is just as hot as fishing on any tarakihi school in the Bay of Plenty, fish after fish, two or three at a time on multi-hook ledger rigs.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/SolsJan05_SMALL42.jpg
Then, after a couple hours of this action, you work your way home again, a little trolling perhaps, a little poppering maybe, I tell you, you arrive back at Lola a very tired, but very happy, fisherman. And all this, you have needed four of five different rods and reels. Each. Makes for a very crowded boat if there are three of you on board!
When bottom fishing, you are often blown away by some BIG fish… almost certainly big Groupers.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_SolsJun06_010FIX.jpg
You feel the hook-up of some small fish, much the same size as our kiwi deepwater pest, those bloody Scarfies (or Jock Stewarts or Banded Sea-perch, depending on how technical you want to get), then a minute or two later, your rod would just buckle over in a massive bow, as some monstrous something would swallow this little flapper, and lifting the beast is pretty much hopeless.
This last trip, Cliff was into one such huge fish for well over half an hour before his small hook simply tore free of the fishes mouth. There was no scuffing, abrasion or anything on the trace, so it certainly was no shark or ray….yep, I am pretty sure it’d be one of those huge tropical groupers. In all that time, whatever it was never came more than a few dozen metres off the bottom before languidly swimming back down again (and it was this lack of any panic or urgency that really rankles... they could at least feel a LITTLE concerned about us!), leaving Cliff hot, bothered and buggered. Next trip, we have resolved, we take 300lb trace, 16/0 circle hooks, and we are gonna GET one of them devils! Well, maybe, anyhow.
The weather while we were there was just glorious, you really could not ask for any better.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_fixSolsJun06_185.jpg
Sure, there were a couple of days of cloudy, wet weather, but this was something of a boon, as we had days in a row of hot, still, sunny days, when the sea was a sheet of glass as far as the eye could see, the waters were all crystal clear….oooh, mate! It was bliss!
http://www.#################.com/img/031992.jpg
The weather around the western provinces of the Solomons is different from much of the other Pacific Islands, as it is within just a few degrees of the equator, and therefore outside the zone controlled by the “Trades”, the steady strong winds that powered the sailing ships of yore. Places like Tonga, the Cooks, Fiji and what have you are all subject to steady sea-breezes of around 15-20knots for weeks at a time, meaning the sea-states are seldom better than those we here in NZ experience… yup, I mean nudging rough, often nudging over to bloody rough. But in these tropical doldrums, the normal sea state is… well, flat. Occasional swells, but basically flat.
This is something that is VERY easy to get used to. It is really quite funny, folks from NZ will come up to the Solomons, and hop on a boat to go out fishing for a day as one does. If however, you round the island and find that there is a light breeze of around 10knots say (a blessed soft breeze in NZ), with a tiny one-foot chop on the surface (again, in NZ, nothing at all), I will immediately cry off, and head the boat around to some other part of the ocean more sheltered.
The “Good Keen Men” so used to white-caps and waves almost invariably think you are mad, or soft, or just plain annoying… until that is, they realise that within ten minutes you can get from a slightly sloppy patch of water in one direction into one that is glass calm, just as full of fishing potential, on the other side of the lagoon. That doesn’t happen in NZ, but it is just the way things are in the Sols!
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_SolsJun06_105.jpg
Then, finally, if you feel a break from the sea is required, and want to check out something totally different, you can always try venturing up the various jungle rivers or the small mangrove lined channels threading amongst the islands. Here you are in a different world entirely… and one in which you are definitely not the top of the food chain either. Be warned, there ARE crocodiles in these waters… no swimming, and this means YOU!
http://www.#################.com/img/024401.jpg
However... not many crocs actually climb into a boat with you, so you are pretty safe really. Just watch out for any logs floating slowly upstream, eh.
In these waters though there are still fish among the mangroves, and they are fun to get too.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_fixSolsJun06_075.jpg
Mangrove jacks, trevallys, barracudas, Wolf herring and Estuary cods all abound in these waters, even some rather large sharks, and if you have some decent light-to-medium spinning gear, say 10lb Fireline, you will have a ball flicking around small lures, either minnows like rapalas, or even better, some of the wide range of soft plastics available these days.
Once you move out from the mangroves, further into the jungle up the rivers, the water becomes fresh, swift-flowing and clear, and herein dwell some mighty fish… Spot-tail Bass.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_fixSolsJun06_087.jpg
These fish can get up to 20kgs or more, but these days mostly around 4-6lbs or so would be most usual, especially in the more accessible lower reaches. However, if you dedicate a day to this, and work your way far upstream past the gardens of the local villagers (scattered along the banks of the rivers nearer the river mouths), and get way up into the upper rivers, the deep pools you find up there will still hold very large bass.
Here your 10lb line will be inadequate, I would definitely encourage you using something more like 14lb Fireline and 6inch lures in these waters. Big Bass Hit Hard.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_SolsJun06_082.jpg
Now if you are up there for a while, you will soon start thinking “hmmmm… how much is this going to cost?” Well, if you want to ease these financial pangs every so often, instead of spending days after day charging about the oceans, why not spend an odd day fishing the sand flats and small coral bommies immediately around the resort? If you are into fly fishing, or light spin fishing, then this is the place for you. Sure, mostly you will get the standard small trevallies and sweetlips which are common here in these two-foot deep waters, but you never know, there may be something like the odd bonefish to add some zest to your day.
http://www.#################.com/img/048600.jpg
The resort has several small boats and dinghies or indeed, kayaks, that you can borrow to explore the hundreds of acres of lagoon waters surrounding the island, it is stunningly beautiful scenery, and I assure you, you will really enjoy it.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/SolsJan05_SMALL25.jpg
If you are not just into fishing, there is more to do than being mean to poor wee fishies… there is world class diving and snorkelling,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_Fix_uw_052.jpg
especially the diving on the many World War 2 wrecks in the immediate area, as well as some pretty good surfing at times on the reef just immediately behind Lola Island itself…. very handy indeed, just 5 minutes from the jetty!
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_SkullSurf1.jpg
At first I was going to give you a blow-by-blow account of the trip, what we caught, where and when, but really, there was just too much to relate. We caught mahimahi (dolphinfish) off Shark Point, we had sailfish around the boat several times, we caught heaps of fish on poppers. The river fishing was a hoot, and we got some nice Bass in the fresh water, and Mangrove jacks and trevally in the mouth.
On the sand flats we had a ball, and I am delighted with some of the pictures I got of the girls (I went fishing with the Entrikin Kids after Cliff left)
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_JenRamPhylonBow.jpg
and the small fish we were catching over the sand flats behind Manta Ray Island.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_JennoBikiniStunningShot1.jpg
The GTs were in good numbers off Munda Bar and “Hotspot”, really, it was all I could have wanted in a trip.
The big question is.. will I be able to limit myself to only short, three week, trips again? I don’t know, I will find out soon though, in a month I am going to be back there ofr 3 weeks, I’ll let you know after that!
Cheers all,
Stu.
IP: 219.88.11.84
Recently I weakened, and decided to stop messing around with short tropical holidays of 2 or 3 weeks, and do a whole month in the Solomon Islands….basically because I am getting increasingly fed up with our kold kiwi winters!
So it was that flights and rooms were booked to get me to Zipolo Habu Resort in the Solomon Islands, (www.zipolohabu.com.sb), along with another reprobate mate, Cliff Solomon (no, they are not his islands, honest, it is just a co-inky-dink thing). We had both stayed here often enough before to know that we should be able to adjust to a life of idleness and ease, if we really put our minds to it. While I could do a month, poor ol’ Cliff could only manage a sad 2and a half weeks, but hey, that’s better than nothing I guess.
We arrived, on time, on schedule, in the right place (a minor miracle given the domestic service (Service? Hah, a laughable description) of Air Solomons, but not wanting to make issue of this great good fortune, in the fears that if we drew attention to it, then we may have no more for the rest of the trip, we stoically yet gratefully accepted our good luck, and followed our bags down to the ZipoloHabu boats waiting at a Munda (the airstrip/town where you fly in to the resort) jetty, and once aboard the boat, we were heading off to Lola Island, base of the resort.
http://www.#################.com/img/006671.jpg
Man, I have to tell you, the trip across the Vonavona lagoon to get to Zipolo Habu is just spectacular. You cruise past scattered, tropically typical, sand bordered, palm tree fringed islands at a relaxing 25knots (means a lovely cooling breeze, I call it the “2-stroke air- conditioning”), over sand flats and small reef bommies in clear, clear water, watching an assortment of fish zapping around the place as you speed past, it is like driving over an aquarium… man, it is just so beautiful, it is hard to describe.
http://www.#################.com/img/025174.jpg
After a beautiful 20minute trip, we tied up to the jetty off the bar/restaurant at Zipolo Habu, to be greeted by our Hosts, Joe and Lisa Entrikin. After a quick flurry of greetings, we were soon off and unpacking our stuff in our leaf-house style bungalow, and very quickly settling in for weeks and weeks of paradise.
http://www.#################.com/img/032068.jpg
It would be impossible to cover every days activities in the boats, let’s face it, 4 weeks of “today we got up….” makes for pretty dull reading. However, the general theme would be the same in the specific and it is in the general, that is, “…and then we went fishing.” This is the whole reason for our being in this little slice of paradise, and the fishing up here is really very interesting indeed.
Why? Well, duh! Firstly, and most importantly, it is the TROPICS. NZ in the winter is very nice, yeah, sure, nice and bracing, excellent if you like roaring log fires, flannelette sheets and hot water bottles, but really, I have found these attractions tend to wane a little as the years fly by. Now, I feel that short, cold, wet waikato days, fogs and frosts, clouds and coughs, sniffles and sneezes really are much nicer to avoid than to experience directly. I know, I know, I may be getting soft in me old age, but hell, just call me Mr Softy, and strap me onto a jet to get me to the tropics! Fishing here means… shorts, shirts, sunblock, warm water and glorious weather. Oh yeah, baby, yeah!
http://www.#################.com/img/071990.jpg
Next, I will be the first to tell you, if you want to catch piles and piles of fish, stay in NZ, go out and find a school of kahawai, you will catch fish all day until you get tired of it. In NZ, if you want, you can get dozens of fish a day without too much problem. It is just that they are all the same, and after you have caught your first ten kahawai (or rat kingfish, or schoolie snapper, or whatever) the novelty tends to pale just a little.
In the tropics, those numbers of fish are seldom encountered, and once you do tend to hook up on a fish, the others tend to disappear fast… the fishing pressure from the locals is pretty intense here you see, so fish know what it means when Uncle Henry disappears upwards. However, in the tropics, most especially I have found in the Solomons, the diversity of both the species and the types of fishing are just astounding.
http://www.#################.com/img/048948.jpg
http://www.#################.com/img/072023.jpg
If you head out for a reasonably long fishing spell, say 5 or 6 hours, you had better take along a pretty wide selection of gear with you. You will need your popper casting sets, for sure, as poppering up here is just brilliant. Indeed, it is the primary purpose of my trips. The different species you will find with your poppers is just amazing. I have poppered in Vanuatu, I have poppered in Tonga and I have poppered in the Cook Islands. Nowhere have I encountered the range of species you see up here.
We have got, apart from the main target species of the fabulous Giant Trevally,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_fixSolsJun06_159.jpg
Bluefin trevally, Golden trevally,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_fixSolsJun06_160.jpg
Coral trout, Red Sea-bass,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_fixSolsJun06_122.jpg
Flowery cod, Maori Sea-perch, Maori Humphead Wrasse, Triggerfish, Sharks, Sweetlips, Tuna, Logtoms, Spanish Mackerel, Baracuda, even had a few shots from Sailfish. That really is one helluva list of fish. So whatever it was that just made that big white hole in the water behind your popper is a total unknown, you never know what it was ‘til it is beside the boat, and sometimes that ain’t so easy to achieve.
Now, after you have done an hour or so of poppering, and you feel like a bit of a breather (and you will, I promise you), then you are going to need some sets of trolling gear. Me personally, I would use 15kg trolling gear pretty much exclusively, as this weight line let’s you have a bit of a tussle with your fish, while ensuring it arrives boatside before the sharks can find it.
http://www.#################.com/img/072009.jpg
http://www.#################.com/img/073398.jpg
Trolling either hard-bodied minnow lures, or skirted game lures, your target species range from the big Marlin species, Blues or Blacks, through the tuna species like Yellowfin, Mackerel tuna and Skipjack tuna, to Mahimahi, Sailfish, Spanish Mackerel, Barracuda, Wahoo,… really, all of these can be found within a few hundred yards of the reefs and islands in these deep tropical seas.
http://www.#################.com/img/071992.jpg
http://www.#################.com/img/072002.jpg
Then of course you will want to call off for a break on a beach somewhere, on one of the many beautiful small islets you see everywhere up here. Have a bit of lunch, a bit of a snorkel,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_Fix_uw_0541.jpg
and while you are there, why not a play around off the beach with a light spin set? A good light set loaded with say 6 or 10lb line will catch you a multitude of small fish, mainly smaller trevally species, sweetlips and longtoms, but there are so many other weird and wonderful species that snap at anything darting past their noses that really, heavens knows what half the fish you catch really are.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_RamonaBeautyshot3.jpg
http://www.#################.com/img/072003.jpg
Anyhow, so then, you have had lunch and a nice break on a perfect little beach somewhere, what do you do in the afternoon? Well, after a little more poppering or something, how about some bottom fishing? This is your basic old Kiwi deepwater stuff, just as you would do if fishing for hapuku. You are mostly targeting fish in 150-200m of water, the difference between NZ and the Solomons is that to reach these depths in NZ you have to be several miles offshore, while in the Solomons…hmmm, maybe 200m off the back of the island you just had lunch on? And the species you will encounter? Hells teeth, even the locals don’t know half of them.
Certainly you will find Jobfish,
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_fixSolsJun06_170.jpg
of several different species, Gold lined, Rosy, Small toothed and Green,
http://www.#################.com/img/071995.jpg
among others, and snappers, such as Ruby, Short-jaw and Long-tailed snappers.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/Web_fixSolsJun06_214.jpg
Then you have Sea-perches, breams, Gropers and Cods of different types, sizes, colours and shapes, really, what pops to the top each time is anybodies guess.
http://www.#################.com/img/072011.jpg
It is bottom fishing that a Kiwi fisherman will feel most at home with, not just the technique, the tackle and the bait (skippies!), but also the ability to quickly land a bin full of fish. Once you find a good spot for the Gold-lined and rosy jobfish, the action is just as hot as fishing on any tarakihi school in the Bay of Plenty, fish after fish, two or three at a time on multi-hook ledger rigs.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/medium/SolsJan05_SMALL42.jpg
Then, after a couple hours of this action, you work your way home again, a little trolling perhaps, a little poppering maybe, I tell you, you arrive back at Lola a very tired, but very happy, fisherman. And all this, you have needed four of five different rods and reels. Each. Makes for a very crowded boat if there are three of you on board!
When bottom fishing, you are often blown away by some BIG fish… almost certainly big Groupers.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_SolsJun06_010FIX.jpg
You feel the hook-up of some small fish, much the same size as our kiwi deepwater pest, those bloody Scarfies (or Jock Stewarts or Banded Sea-perch, depending on how technical you want to get), then a minute or two later, your rod would just buckle over in a massive bow, as some monstrous something would swallow this little flapper, and lifting the beast is pretty much hopeless.
This last trip, Cliff was into one such huge fish for well over half an hour before his small hook simply tore free of the fishes mouth. There was no scuffing, abrasion or anything on the trace, so it certainly was no shark or ray….yep, I am pretty sure it’d be one of those huge tropical groupers. In all that time, whatever it was never came more than a few dozen metres off the bottom before languidly swimming back down again (and it was this lack of any panic or urgency that really rankles... they could at least feel a LITTLE concerned about us!), leaving Cliff hot, bothered and buggered. Next trip, we have resolved, we take 300lb trace, 16/0 circle hooks, and we are gonna GET one of them devils! Well, maybe, anyhow.
The weather while we were there was just glorious, you really could not ask for any better.
http://www.senortuna.com/pics/data/500/Web_fixSolsJun06_185.jpg
Sure, there were a couple of days of cloudy, wet weather, but this was something of a boon, as we had days in a row of hot, still, sunny days, when the sea was a sheet of glass as far as the eye could see, the waters were all crystal clear….oooh, mate! It was bliss!
http://www.#################.com/img/031992.jpg
The weather around the western provinces of the Solomons is different from much of the other Pacific Islands, as it is within just a few degrees of the equator, and therefore outside the zone controlled by the “Trades”, the steady strong winds that powered the sailing ships of yore. Places like Tonga, the Cooks, Fiji and what have you are all subject to steady sea-breezes of around 15-20knots for weeks at a time, meaning the sea-states are seldom better than those we here in NZ experience… yup, I mean nudging rough, often nudging over to bloody rough. But in these tropical doldrums, the normal sea state is… well, flat. Occasional swells, but basically flat.
This is something that is VERY easy to get used to. It is really quite funny, folks from NZ will come up to the Solomons, and hop on a boat to go out fishing for a day as one does. If however, you round the island and find that there is a light breeze of around 10knots say (a blessed soft breeze in NZ), with a tiny one-foot chop on the surface (again, in NZ, nothing at all), I will immediately cry off, and head the boat around to some other part of the ocean more sheltered.
The “Good Keen Men” so used to white-caps and waves almost invariably think you are mad, or soft, or just plain annoying… until that is, they realise that within ten minutes you can get from a slightly sloppy patch of water in one direction into one that is glass calm, just as full of fishing potential, on the other side of the lagoon. That doesn’t happen in NZ, but it is just the way things are in the Sols!
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Then, finally, if you feel a break from the sea is required, and want to check out something totally different, you can always try venturing up the various jungle rivers or the small mangrove lined channels threading amongst the islands. Here you are in a different world entirely… and one in which you are definitely not the top of the food chain either. Be warned, there ARE crocodiles in these waters… no swimming, and this means YOU!
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However... not many crocs actually climb into a boat with you, so you are pretty safe really. Just watch out for any logs floating slowly upstream, eh.
In these waters though there are still fish among the mangroves, and they are fun to get too.
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Mangrove jacks, trevallys, barracudas, Wolf herring and Estuary cods all abound in these waters, even some rather large sharks, and if you have some decent light-to-medium spinning gear, say 10lb Fireline, you will have a ball flicking around small lures, either minnows like rapalas, or even better, some of the wide range of soft plastics available these days.
Once you move out from the mangroves, further into the jungle up the rivers, the water becomes fresh, swift-flowing and clear, and herein dwell some mighty fish… Spot-tail Bass.
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These fish can get up to 20kgs or more, but these days mostly around 4-6lbs or so would be most usual, especially in the more accessible lower reaches. However, if you dedicate a day to this, and work your way far upstream past the gardens of the local villagers (scattered along the banks of the rivers nearer the river mouths), and get way up into the upper rivers, the deep pools you find up there will still hold very large bass.
Here your 10lb line will be inadequate, I would definitely encourage you using something more like 14lb Fireline and 6inch lures in these waters. Big Bass Hit Hard.
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Now if you are up there for a while, you will soon start thinking “hmmmm… how much is this going to cost?” Well, if you want to ease these financial pangs every so often, instead of spending days after day charging about the oceans, why not spend an odd day fishing the sand flats and small coral bommies immediately around the resort? If you are into fly fishing, or light spin fishing, then this is the place for you. Sure, mostly you will get the standard small trevallies and sweetlips which are common here in these two-foot deep waters, but you never know, there may be something like the odd bonefish to add some zest to your day.
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The resort has several small boats and dinghies or indeed, kayaks, that you can borrow to explore the hundreds of acres of lagoon waters surrounding the island, it is stunningly beautiful scenery, and I assure you, you will really enjoy it.
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If you are not just into fishing, there is more to do than being mean to poor wee fishies… there is world class diving and snorkelling,
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especially the diving on the many World War 2 wrecks in the immediate area, as well as some pretty good surfing at times on the reef just immediately behind Lola Island itself…. very handy indeed, just 5 minutes from the jetty!
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At first I was going to give you a blow-by-blow account of the trip, what we caught, where and when, but really, there was just too much to relate. We caught mahimahi (dolphinfish) off Shark Point, we had sailfish around the boat several times, we caught heaps of fish on poppers. The river fishing was a hoot, and we got some nice Bass in the fresh water, and Mangrove jacks and trevally in the mouth.
On the sand flats we had a ball, and I am delighted with some of the pictures I got of the girls (I went fishing with the Entrikin Kids after Cliff left)
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and the small fish we were catching over the sand flats behind Manta Ray Island.
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The GTs were in good numbers off Munda Bar and “Hotspot”, really, it was all I could have wanted in a trip.
The big question is.. will I be able to limit myself to only short, three week, trips again? I don’t know, I will find out soon though, in a month I am going to be back there ofr 3 weeks, I’ll let you know after that!
Cheers all,
Stu.
IP: 219.88.11.84