Words + Photos By: Daniel Birkhofer
If you are not a fisherman, you will certainly not understand this article and the motivation and excitement behind it. If you are one, you know why we can hop on a small boat, stay there for hours and stare at the big endless blue of the ocean without getting bored at all.
My fishing days started back home in Germany, mainly focusing on trout and from time to time a pike or carp. Living far away from the sea, a big fish for me was 2-3kg. After relocating to Dubai, I was able to raise this bar after some months of failure and a slow learning curve, finally getting into the double digits. Like every passionate fisherman young or old, I love to read fishing articles or exchange fishing stories and photos with friends. The most exciting stories and those most fishermen dream of is to go big game fishing and catch the real deal. Heavy lines, wearing a harness, being tied to a boat and fighting a fish for hours are what fantasies are made of. Until now, I never went for big game fishing and also have no experience or much knowledge of techniques catching big tunas, marlin, sailfish and other species. Of course, I know how to fish, but any type of fishing, waters or targeted catch can be so different.
When we received the invitation from Malaysian Tourism for the Royal Pahang International Billfish Competition 2013, it was unlikely that it will pass my desk and be forwarded to another journalist. This was my big chance! Luckily, the event dates fitted into my schedule so that I confirmed my attendance in two weeks time. Since there were only days until the event, I didn’t have the time to research properly about Pahang and the fishing conditions there. Usual targets for a billfish competition are marlin and sailfish – the rockets of the ocean and faster predators. Afraid of facing these strong and fast fighters, I removed the dust from my heaviest trawling rods and put hundreds of metres of new 80lbs line on them to prepare for long and challenging fights.
At this point, I want to highlight that I usually do my homework and research in detail, check expected fishing conditions, as well as the right gear to to take with me. The invitation came late and my main purpose was to actually cover the event so I neglected my fishing preparation duties (more of this later).
About RIPBC
The Royal Pahang Billfish International Challenge (RPBIC) is the flagship event for Pahang Government State, Tioman Development Authority and Pahang Tourism. This event is currently the largest fishing competition in Malaysia which involves many local and overseas participants.
RPBIC is an annual off-shore fishing competition initiated in 2004 and for the past four years it has been held at the sea off the town and serene beaches of Kuala Rompin in Pahang. RPBIC takes advantage of the active migration season of the billfish, such as marlin and sailfish, passing the Rompin area from the northern hemisphere to their destination in Australia between March to September. This annual billfish migration, passing through the area in thousands, could be tracked via satellite. One reason for their presence in the area is the abundance of shoals of anchovies and other small fishes to feed on. The reefs at Rompin provide some of the best resting places for the billfish before they move on.
One of the objectives for the RPBIC is to attract tourists to the state of Pahang, especially those who seek adventure and eco-friendly sports. Rompin is about 350km from Kuala Lumpur which takes approximately five hours by bus from the airport.
General information
Malaysian Airlines is flying daily from Dubai to Kuala Lumpur and back with round trip prices starting at 1,600 AED only for the seven and a half hours flight. I took the 4:10 a.m. plane and arrived at 3:25 p.m. local time (4hrs + UAE time) and reached the Lanjut Resort in Rompin at 9:00 p.m. after a five-hour bus trip. It would also be possible to fly to Kuantan which is only 125km from Rompin and costs about 300 AED for the 45min flight, but the roads are good so that the bus journey is quite okay and considering the transit time, most probably also faster. A mini bus which can accommodate up to nine people cost only about 500 AED for the transfer from Kuala Lumpur Airport to Rompin.
There are not too many options to stay in Rompin since the only main attraction is fishing. I stayed at the Lanjut Resort which has a huge hotel plot with the private beach and a golf course. There is one main hotel building with rooms as well as spacious chalets in different sizes which are nicely set close to the beach in the green surrounding of the main building. Being in Asia and outside of the metropolis, you should not expect facilities you find in the UAE. The rooms are clean with all the facilities you need; there’s even a kitchen and AC, but a little bit run down. A needed refurbishment and renovation of the whole area is on the way. Neither I nor any of the other media delegates was bothered by the basic facilities. The hotel offers a very limited buffet menu and no a la carte food, so you should consider bringing your own or get it from the local supermarkets like most of the locals who come to the resort for a weekend stay. The rooms start at 250 AED per night for a double room including breakfast to about 900 AED per night for a three-bedroom villa for up to six people including breakfast. The hotel also offers other activities and will soon offer a complete fishing package. For more details visit: www.lanjut.my
Most important are the prices for the fishing boats which ranges from 1,000-2,000 AED per boat and per day. You should bring your own fishing gear. Some of the charter boats you can find on the fishing competition website www.rpbic.com.my or the boat can be organised through the hotel.
The itinerary was to fish for three days. Friday was the day for media to try their luck to get a sailfish and Saturday and Sunday were the competition days. After arrival and a quick update for the next morning, I was informed that the plans changed and instead on going for billfish, we would go for prawn fishing. Arriving with the image of huge billfish in mind, I was not very excited about the prawn fishing, yet I was very curious since I was not sure what to expect from this activity. As far as I knew, prawns are caught with a net, so I was imagining all kinds of ways how I would catch them – with spears to my bare hands in the mud.
The next day revealed the secret and to my surprise as well as my media colleagues who are all specialised fishing journalists except me (“a jack of all trades and master of none” as I would consider my knowledge and experience in most outdoor activities). Tiny rods with little reels, thin mono line and special prawn hooks were prepared – yes, very surprising – you can actually catch prawns with rod and reel. Even more surprising is that prawn fishing seemed to be a national sport providing income for whole families and even villages. We entered boats which were tiny, but the crack in the floor of the fiberglass boat didn’t make me worry about my safety so I preferred to use the lifejacket as a seat cushion, but I was very worried about all the camera gear I had with me in this little nutshell. Our captain was mastering the 3hp outboard engine and provided us with the luxury of putting the prawn bait (worms or chicken intestines) on the hook. I was sharing the boat with an Aussie and a Kiwi, the Aussie was concerned about the free board and asked for assurance that we would not need to worry about crocodiles. This concern was followed by fishing stories from Australia with the regular encounters of crocs. Being in a nutshell with some guys you’ve never met before connected by the common passion for fishing, it was a great opportunity to exchange our fishing experience from different continents and directly make new friends. This comes down to one special thing about fishing, sometimes it is not about the fish (or in this case, the prawn), it’s about the guys you share the boat with. Therefore we were not bothered much that our boat was not one of the successful ones; catching only a handful of prawns, but we had a great time on the water. So if you ever get the chance to go prawn fishing, take it and enjoy some hours on the water surrounded by dense green jungle, but leave your camera gear at home or take a dry-bag with you. The rest of the day was spent at the resort relaxing. A few of us took the opportunity to catch the freshwater fish “snakehead” in a rather unusual location – the ponds of the golf course.
This year, 28 teams entered the competition mainly from Malaysia and neighbouring countries as well teams from China, two teams from Australia and one from New Zealand, yet no team from the UAE. The competition follows the international standards of the Billfish Foundation and the IGFA, and every billfish has to be released back after catching it. As proof of the competition only a photo of the catch and the angler is taken. Only billfish count for the competition with marlin 1000 points and sailfish 600 points, no matter of the size. Each team is allowed to have three anglers and each angler is allowed to have maximum two lines in the water. The competition is for two days with fishing time from 8:00 a.m. to 6:00 p.m. (4:00 p.m. on the second day). Each boat has a marshal on board to ensure rules are kept and all fishes are released as quickly as possible (only single hooks were allowed) and to take photos of the proof. A total of more than 50,000 AED prize money was up for grabs.
On the first day, we got on one of the bigger boats with two powerful four-stroke engines which was about 35ft and very stable in the water. After the opening ceremony on Saturday morning, we left after all the competing boats at around 9:00 a.m. The game plan for most of the boats was to first catch live bait and then target the sails. Our captain didn’t speak a word of English, but we were lucky enough to have a translator on board who made communication possible and we learned that we need to catch squid since this is the best bait for sailfish. To my surprise – as well as the three guys on board who all were well-experienced in big game fishing, which was great for me because I had two days of great learning ahead – was that trawling was not really considered as fishing method. Also the average size of the sailfish in Rompin is about 20-30kg which is huge in my eyes but considering the size they can get, it is not as big as in my wild fantasies. Also marlins are rarely caught and don’t reach the monster sizes they are known for. My heavy trawling gear was directly disqualified as inappropriate for our task. I recognised this already with some feeling of embarrassment at the harbour, my gear was by far the heaviest I saw around. Proper research would have provided me the right information on which gear to take. But being fortunate with my new friends on board, I happily accepted to borrow some lighter gear to try my luck. It has to be said again that we have been the media boat and not competing, so the focus was for everyone to cover the event or at least not admit that we wanted to get a chance to catch a sailfish. Compared to the competing boats, we never had more than two lines in the water. After we successfully caught the right squid – the sailfish seems to be very picky and is only attracted to arrow squid but not the more roundish brown one – we were ready to get the first line in the water. After reaching the fishing grounds, you directly knew that sailfish is there. You could see shoals passing and their sails cutting through the calm surface of the ocean and also the huge jumps for which sailfish are famous for could be spotted everywhere. It was a perfect day on the water with almost no wind or waves. Before lunch, we could witness some of the competing boats catching sailfish and we were also lucky to had that action on our boat. Since the first one of us was successful, it made way for my try. One of the squid was hooked at the very end tip of his body to the single hook.
Whenever a fish is hooked there is action on board to bring in all the lines and the lucky angler is busy in keeping his line tight and start fighting the fish. After my line was out, it took only minutes for the first strike. The line directly got released and it was running. I got soft knees and my heart started pumping. I’ve never seen a fish taking line so much and so fast. I took the rod and was staring at the line, I’m sure if my new friends would not have been with me, I would have just watched the sailfish take all the line until it ran out. I was dreaming of this day all my life to finally see and catch a real big fish and enter into a real fight. In Hemmingway’s “The Old Man and The Sea,” which I re-read as a mental preparation for this trip, the old man waited 84 days until his ultimate fight. I was waiting all my life and now that the moment is there, I was in shock. I finally closed the bail of the reel to set the hook and the line got on tension and the rod bent – and there he was jumping out of the water. A beautiful sailfish! The bill cutting through the surface, straight up like a rocket in launch and then an elegant turn in the air, the sail wide open and the sunlight reflecting on the shiny body, diving back into the deep blue. No signs of slowing down, the only change was that to the speed of taking line, I then heard the noise of the drag of the reel. I was holding the rod as tight as I could, certain I could have pulled a boat as tight as I was holding it. Finally, the sailfish was slowing down and the tension on the line got less. I had only one thought in mind, “Keep the line tight, don’t give him a chance to get rid of the hook,” so I started reeling in like crazy.
Catching big fish is a technique I’m not really used to, but normally it is a combination of pumping the fish up and close to the boat where you do the pulling and lifting with your body and the rod, then reeling in the line while going down with the tip of the rod, to do another lift with body and rod. Billfish are strong fighters and famous for their endurance, so it can take sometime up to or more than an hour to tire the fish and get him to the boat. My interplay of pumping and reeling was anything else than harmonious, but what can you do if you are so excited and it took us almost half a day to catch the first sailfish; I was not expecting to be lucky after only minutes, in fact I didn’t expect to get lucky at all. I slowly managed to make some ground and get some line back in and the fish close to the boat. But he kept me busy. I got more tips from my fellow anglers on board, which I happily accepted especially since they made me calm down a bit. I was continuously reeling and my arm was already sore, with all the excitement I did not realise that I was reeling like a mad man even when the fish was pulling out again. I was reeling against the drag which made me and my sailfish even, since both of us were fighting against the mechanical drag in my reel at the same time. I guess after 15-20 minutes, my sailfish was tired enough that we could bring him back to the boat. It was a beautiful fish, the biggest fish I ever caught so far.
I was so incredibly happy, proud and so grateful for the invitation of Malaysian Tourism and the company on board for this amazing experience. Unfortunately, this was the second and only fish we caught for this day. The second and last day of fishing, we changed the boats to a smaller and less powerful one. Also the weather conditions changed for the worse and it was a windy and bumpy day on the water. Due to the weather, it was hard to catch live bait and we also seemed to be away from the action. At 2:00 p.m. all boats were called back to the harbour since a storm was approaching and our fishing day found an early end without a major catch. There were some little regrets from everyone that not all of us were as lucky and we also heavily discussed fishing techniques as well as the recipe to success. Since we saw the scores from the competing teams on day one, all of us knew that we just scratched the surface and got an idea of the potential in these waters. On day one, the winning team caught 16 sails, considering a general 50% chance after hooking a sailfish to land it, they got at least 30 strikes in about six hours of fishing time if the travel time to the fishing grounds and back is deducted. Imagine, this is an average of more than five strikes of sailfish in an hour, not considering the time of fighting a fish when no line is in the water. The evening of the prize ceremony and the opportunity to speak to some of the teams revealed their key to success. As most would imagine it comes down to the determination and experience of the local skippers. No surprise that the leading teams have the same skippers for years and book them well in advance for the next year. Also all the leading teams were fishing further out on sea than we were, telling us incredible stories of shoals, of thousands of sailfish and of double or even triple hook-ups. They even told us that they cut lines of too big fish, since landing them would take too long and that they focused more on smaller ones to be able to quickly land them and get all the lines back in the water since the quantity, not the size, mattered.
Team Xzoga from Malaysia won this year’s RPIBC with 25 sailfish, Team Dogo from Singapore got second with 24 and Team Albaa from Australia got third with 21. The trophy for the individual with the most catches went to David Lian Wie Sein (Dogo Team) with 12 caught sailfish.
It was my first time in Rompin and to the RPIBC, but certainly not the last. I have learned so much as one can on one trip and I got valuable experiences and unforgettable memories. It would be great to enter the competition next year with a team from the UAE. So if there is anyone interested, no matter as a full team or individual, please get in touch with me daniel@outdooruae.com.
Thanks to Malaysia Tourism, Malaysian Airlines, Lanjut Resort and the great company I had on this trip.
