8th December 2013 - East Coast Park & Labrador Park

8th December 2013
Time: 11am to 5.00pm
Location: East Coast and Labrador Park
Bait: Grey prawns & Bread
Anglers: Cowboy Fisherman papa, 阿辉 (me)

Woke up later than before for the weekend fishing this time because high tide is in the afternoon.
Cowboy Fisherman papa has already eaten his breakfast and bought the drinks and bait for our fishing trip. Took a quick bath and a quick bite, and off we go!

Cowboy Fisherman papa wants to catch some red sea bream which he hasn't had any luck on for quite some time. I'm going for some whitings instead.

Reached East Coast, weather is nice, not very sunny but seems likely to rain in a few hours.. water is looking great.

There were more anglers and fishing rods than usual, some going for whitings as well. One uncle fisherman has a really long telescopic rod going for the whitings. Another younger uncle is using a short rod about 1.5m or shorter going for whitings as well.

Set up my 2.1m rod and cast out towards the open sea but it is sangkot haven if you can't cast far enough.. decided to just concentrate on my LoveFisher 185 to catch some whitings instead..

 Tied an apollo with 4 small hooks..

 Nice grey prawns cut into small small pieces..

 Find a good spot near the water and get ready to fish!

After a long while, many small nibbles, re-baiting, re-casting over and over.. finally a stronger pull.. up came a baby trigger.. really cute! 

 Continued fishing after releasing the trigger fish, very dark clouds forming ahead of us..

 Small droplets started to hit us, another uncle kept repeating himself, time to go definitely going to rain.. time to go definitely going to rain..

 Another nice pull, up came a whiting! My first and probably last whiting for the day.. as the rain starts to get heavier.. Cowboy Fisherman papa signaled to pack up. Cowboy Fisherman papa caught 1 pufferfish and an eel, no pictures taken as I didn't want to walk away from my rod.

Whiting placed in bag to bring home to fry.. tastes really awesome when fried with a little salt.. can eat it whole but I don't dare to bite into the head so Cowboy Fisherman papa usually gets to do that hahaha!

 Rain got really heavy, we were drenched when we reach the car.. quite a long walk from the beach..
Cowboy Fisherman papa doesn't wish to go home just like that.. it was only 1pm+, not even high tide yet! I took out my phone and looked at the weather app, North, Central and East with heavy rain, West is raining, left South is cloudy, yet to rain...

Cowboy Fisherman papa decides to head over to Labrador Park where there are sheltered pavilions by the sea, so even if it rains heavily we can hide in under the shelter.

Labrador park is pretty big, clean and have proper toilets if you decide to come for a picnic with your wife and children. Bring some recreational activities along though!

 It is drizzling but still alright to fish so we quickly set up our gears after a toilet break..

Cowboy Fisherman papa launched 2 surf rods out into the open sea, I am not prepared for that so I only used my LoveFisher with a floating rig to try my luck at some groupers..

Just after a short while, Cowboy Fisherman papa's surf rod is shaking, the bell is ringing, ringgg ringgg ringggg, rinng ringg rringggg! A light strike! Fish on! Up came a nice red sea bream! Cowboy Fisherman papa is really delighted! His target fish with really sweet and tender flesh. You will really love this fish once you've tasted one that is this fresh!!

 A really beautiful fish!!

 After a while, another smaller one was caught, really beautiful fishes..

 There were lots of seaweed a few meters out from shore..

 Still no fish for me.. Weird.. my float is showing some pretty fierce bites and my whole grey prawn is gone really fast! Remembered seeing some old fishermen with pole rods some distance away... hmm.. maybe there are lots of rabbit fishes around! I remember seeing some bread in the bait box! Quickly changed hooks to a small one and took some bread..

Cowboy Fisherman papa then caught a puffer fish!

The rain is getting really heavy, but I didn't cared much.. there were tall trees aboth us, didn't feel as worried as fishing out in the open..

Patience paid off!! Float went down, gave it a light strike! FISH ON!!!! really fun to play with, love getting rabbit fishes.. the LoveFisher is pretty light but not light enough to fully enjoy the fight with a rabbit fish! Will come back with ultra light gears next time! Already placed an order for a size 500 reel and ultralight rods. Really nice reels, will be here in January, post pics and pre-orders when it arrives..

Took a picture quite far away from the fish, really scared of its spines if I were to go too near.. I'm really timid and afraid of pain, do not dare to touch fishes.. an embarassment for someone who has been fishing for some time.. 

 Thereafter, Cowboy Fisherman papa had a bigger take, fish got near I saw some red on the water surface.. most likely a really bigger red sea bream.. a pity the fish managed to free itself when it is about a meter from shore.. really sad..

 Star Cruise Virgo spotted coming out into the open sea.. really nice view! Virgo is HUGE!! Many people were taking pictures.. so I took a few as well! hahaha..

 No other catches that day.. Brought home the sea bream, whiting and rabbit fish.. Fried them with a pinch of salt.. tastes super awesome!!

Tackle bag, Rod bag, pretty much everything was drenched... first time fishing under such a heavy downpour.. drenched all the way through even the underwear was soaked!! hahahaha..

These are what I have in my tackle bag.. after washing the reels, placed them on the table to dry..

Hope you enjoyed reading this week's journal.. next week I will be overseas so no fishing for me.. T.T

1st Dec 2013 - East Coast

1st December 2013
Time: 8am to 12.30pm
Location: East Coast
Bait: Grey prawns
Anglers: Cowboy Fisherman papa, 阿辉 (me)

 A cooling and drizzling Sunday morning..  woke up at 7.15am,
Cowboy Fisherman papa has already prepared and is ready to go.. quickly took a shower and prepared fishing gears..

1st stop.. nearby market to buy bait, drinks and breakfast.. today's grey prawns are quite big.. I prefer smaller sized grey prawns to hook it whole with a size 1 Owner hook.. totally delicious if a grouper swims by..

It was drizzling when we entered the eastern part of Singapore.. didn't have a good feeling about fishing in the rain..

Quickly set up our gears to start fishing.. left my rod bag in 新仔's car from the previous Ah Lim Fishing Pond trip.. so I brought along a "LoveFisher 185" spinning rod.. (To know more about this rod, please see our product page.. "Spinning Rods".

Forgot I left my size 3000 reel together with the rod bag.. all I have in my fishing tackle bag is a Shimano Slade 1000 and an oversized size 5000 reel for my longer surf rod.. so I paired the LoveFisher 185 with the Shimano Slade 1000 that I've had for years (this reel once flew into the sea at this spot years ago together with a small eupro rod.. a nice sized parrot pulled my set up across the railings and into the sea.. was lucky Cowboy Fisherman papa's hook caught my line - that is still under the sea - managed to bring my set up back up to shore and reeled the fish in!! How lucky was that?? so this lucky reel sticked with me until now!!)

The LoveFisher 185 is surprisingly light and nice to grip. The colorful guides are really beautiful and the Bronze gradient on the rod blank looks more like a solid green under the sun light compared to under indoor conditions..

Some pictures of the place..

 It looked really beautiful when the sun peeked through the rain clouds.. "there is a plane in the picture, it is not an UFO" 

 When the tide started to go out.. out came the rubbish.. lots of bottles.. sad..

 Throughout the morning there were many nibbles.. small ones.. really small ones.. Cowboy Fisherman papa didn't manage to catch any fishes today but I caught a juvenile ang chor kee about a palm's size.. very cute and beautiful fish (released).. hope it grows big enough and I'll get it again some other day!! haha!!

There were 2 other Malay abangs fishing together with us at the same spot and one of them caught a good table-sized sweet lips! Failed to catch any fishes with the floater and apollo rigs we tied.. I decided to try using a set of old sabiki hooks (those with small shiny whiskers that doesn't really prove to be useful in our jetties) that I used months ago and was really surprised that the Tambans are biting!! There are a bit of rust on the hooks and they aren't as sharp so a lot of fishes got away.. but they still provided me with some fun!  There was a really strong bite that Cowboy Fisherman papa also saw my rod bent.. the rusty hooks failed to secure a hook on.. was a bit disappointed.. probably a juvenile queenie or a big selar.. Didn't take pictures of the Tambans I caught with this new set up.. but it was really fun.. caught and released numerous baby Tambans - really cute baby ones ~3-5cm long only!! - the big ones were given to the malay abangs for night fishing bait..

Dark clouds began to gather above us again, Cowboy Fisherman papa made the call to pack up before the heavy downpour and so we went home for lunch..

My new found love.. this LoveFisher 185 spinning rod will be my new tackle that shall be put to test during my next paypond visit..