If you speak to most fishermen, fishing is not really about catching fish but rather the preparation, expectation, exploring remote places, learning new cultures, meeting different people and generally just getting out of the house or office and onto the water.
It is the sense of adventure and good clean fun. Catching a fish is the cream on the top and if it happens to be a trophy it just makes the trip all that much better and also to have a few pictures to show friends and family that spending all that money actually got results or to boast a bit on Facebook!
We have been lucky enough to make fishing our business and enjoy running charters, being on the water daily, talking to people in our Fishing Shop located inside the Dubai Garden Center on Sheikh Zayed Road in Dubai and best of all setting up new fishing destinations or targeting new species. Over the last few years we have been guiding clients in some amazing places like Maldives, Seychelles, Thailand etc. but it is not these tropical destinations that has been the most exciting for us but rather setting up our new operation in Hallaniyat Islands Southern Oman. Hallaniyat Islands are right on our doorstep and is one of the best places I have ever had the privilege of fishing and visiting. Hallaniyat Islands is situated in Southern Oman and lies about 30 miles off the coastline. The water is deep the currents strong and the fish enormous! Just the type of place we like!
We have been running trips to Hallaniyat Islands for the last year and have had some amazing results catching some record Giant Trevally (GT) along with a lot of other fish. But we had still not found the big Amberjack (AJ) that lurk in these waters. We have seen some local Omani fisherman with some big AJs but have not found the big shoals that we believed to be around the islands. The Hallaniyat Islands are made up of 5 islands of different sizes and the water drops down to over 2000m close to the islands so there is a lot of water to search and explore!
With a bit of an exploratory trip in mind I contacted a good friend Sami Ghandour from Saltywater Tackle in the USA and set up team for a trip to Southern Oman in October 12 to target big AJs along with GTs. We also had a few new fishing products to test on the trip which is always good fun. We all met up at the Dubai Airport and got into the trucks and headed for Southern Oman. The drive is long but enjoyable. It takes about 10 hours to drive from Dubai to the small town of Shuwaymiyah in Southern Oman which is our base to run out to the islands. The town of Shuwaymiyah is a small traditional fishing town and has been lost in the decades. The local people living here still have the old world beliefs and hospitality. Really amazing place to visit and experience. After a long drive it is always welcome to arrive at your destination and start preparing your tackle and the anticipation of what lies ahead!
For the next few days we fished around the islands and caught some huge GTs on heavy popping equipment and searched for the big AJs. We used our depth finders, charts, and all of our experience to try and find the 
AJs but they proved to be elusive. Finally after speaking to some local fisherman, working out currents and depths from charts we came up with a final game plan! On one of the final mornings we woke up extra early and in the early morning darkness headed for one if the furthest islands. On arriving in our chosen area the sea was calm and the sun just coming up over the sea, it was a setting straight out of a movie! We turned on the depth finder and all we could see top to bottom was showings of big fish! The excitement levels went through the roof and there was a scramble to get our jigs into the water and on the first drop everyone hooked up and there were shouts of delight all-round the boat!! We had finally found what we had been looking for, we had found the elusive Amberjack of Southern Oman. They are an amazing fish and extremely strong. We put all of our fishing tackle to the test, we hooked into some monster fish that we could not stop but then we also managed to get a few fish out, take a few pictures and released them to swim another day.
Southern Oman is truly a mystical place with a stark beauty that will be burnt into your memory for ever, the people are some of the most hospitable people I have ever met and there are some really big fish that will keep us and our clients coming back for many years to come!
For more information on charter, fishing products or fishing you can come and visit us in the Ocean Active Fishing Shop in the Dubai Garden Center off exit 42 on Shiekh Zayed Road in Dubai or log onto our website www.oceanactive.com
