Farquhar Blog: 23-30 March 2016

This week on Farquhar atoll we welcomed a group of eight guests from Russia, one from Scotland and one from the US. It would be a momentous week for everyone on the trip, firstly this would be the first saltwater fly fishing experience for our new friends from Russia, whilst it would be Alex and Brandon’s first time with us on Farquhar. All would catch some truly memorable fish thanks to a bit of wind and the ensuing cold water that has thankfully arrived.

On arriving at the atoll, we quickly set about setting up our guests tackle, following which we spent the rest of the afternoon giving our Russian guests some casting, line management and other essential instruction. Needless to say spirits were high as a delicious dinner and a few ‘cold ones’ were enjoyed by all. As the week went by it became very clear to us our new friends were completely overwhelmed with the fishery and the atoll as a whole. The sheer numbers of fish species and general marine life encountered no doubt changing their perception about a fishing holiday.

The GT’s are still around in good numbers with multiple casting opportunities occurring on a daily basis. This iconic species impresses all fortunate to tussle with it, non more so than Alex who landed three fine fish during his trip which no doubt has given him highly contagious “GT fever”. These were his first three fever GT’s and to cap it off he earned the covered red GT cap with a monster 119 cm fish.

The beast was cruising on the back of a Blacktip Shark off the point of one of the islands, following which he made the perfect cast and stripped to perfection. The fish ate with huge force and took off with speed and power as headed straight out to sea, peeling off 150 meters of backing as it did so. After an agonizingly tense battle which required guide and angler to follow the fish with the boat, the fin perfect specimen was tailed, revived, photographed and released. A massive moment enjoyed by both angler and guide! This was however not the only special to come out, as Kirill landed his first GT which came in 4 cm under the meter mark, whilst Brandon and Dimitri also landed their first GT’s. A total of 7 were captured during the week.

The Bumpies were around in solid numbers this week, with shoals frequently followed by eager anglers throughout the trip. Despite hooking ten of 10 of these blue/green giants luck was against as all ten escaped thanks to their astonishing power. We also managed to get into some really solid Bonefish for the week, the biggest a very respectable fish with a fork length of 64 cm. A big mission was made by all on the species front, to give you an idea of what is possible when visiting Farquhar, Alex managed to rack up 20 different species during the 6 days out on the flats with. Congrats once again Alex!

The guys were also very keen on doing some offshore during the week. All manor of species lurk just off the flats and we got stuck into Yellowfin Tuna, Wahoo, Skipjack Tuna, Jobfish and a variety of other species, not to mention the Dogtooth Tuna that proceeded to give us a serious hiding. The result 7 hooked and 0 landed. There still some Sailfish around which is very unusual, but despite hooking into one good specimen, luck was against us the fly popped out.

All in all a very very enjoyable week with some great news friends who we hope to fish with again soon!

The Farquhar guide team