FR for Sailfish trip @ Merchong(17th Sept 2006)
Participants: Myself, DD, TomX, Pin and Zamri
Departed from Kl at 6pm on 16th, due to the jam and the heavy down pour, we reached Senawang exit at about 7pm. From Senawang, we travelled to Kuala Pilah using the trunk roads, which took us about 30 minutes. From Kuala Pilah, we travelled about 1.5 hours to Muazam Shah and from Muazam Shah to Merchong is about 30minutes.
Reached Merchong at 1am in the morning, the road is in great condition, straight and just cruising about 100kmh.
Woke up at 6.30am, grab a quick bite at the malay stall and off we go for the battle. :)
From the chalet to reach to the first destination was about 1/2 hour to do apollo jig for selar. The selar there was kinda huge, easily the size of 8~10 inches!!
After getting enuff selar, we shoot to the sailfish area which is about 40minutes.
The rig of the sail fish is kinda unique. It's mainline(50lb)--> shockleader(100lb)-->bearing swivel(130lb)-->wire trace(50lb)-->hooks(6/0 circle hook)
the selar is being hooked on the shoulder and after dorsal fin, stripped about 20feet of line then place the balloon. Then strip more line about 20feet after the balloon. Gotta cast the selar out using your hands....once it's casted out, the selar will start swimming to 1 particular direction(it could be different direction on different selar). Once you have firm out the direction of the selar, you continue strip your line till it's about 50m away from your boat. The idea here is not to tangle with other drift balloon out there :) Then fully released your drag..you need not strike but to allow the hook to slide to the beak of the fish and automatically hooked on. This is the tricky part...see how i did it below.
started waiting....
and waited for about 15 mins....
the balloon starts to move sideways slowly...then more sideways with higher speed with some splashes, slowly i lift up my rod from rod holder...slowly tightening my drag as the fish is pulling away, cruising~....more drags is locked on, the line gets it tension....
POP~! the balloon blew...the sailfish felt the tension and starts to get havoc. At this time my drag is set at 50%, need not strikes, the sail fish jumps and keep jumping, shaking its head as it jumps peeling lines like theres no tomorrow...your reel screams at it's loudest pitch asking for mercy...drag screams for 15 seconds.....and it's still keep going....it slows down a little bit...hehehe...this is the time i show my arsenals...the pumps and reeling in line is extremely tough...
the line strips slowly, i tightened my drags to the max 100% FULLY DRAG ON....the sailfish realised that it's tension again...off it goes...more jumping and head shaking...now the drag's pitch is even higher~!! screaming and never ends for 20~30 seconds with a full drag, i felt helpless but to hold on to the rod and my reel(was using the one that is customised rod and the okuma Zonar multiplier)....from green lines....now i'm seeing my line backing....damn...it's more than 200 meters now...
Slowly, the sailfish gets exhausted, now it's the time for me to recover my line....pumping and reeling in line....managed to recover about 100m of lines before it got crazy again~!!!
DANG~! The sailfish wanna shows that he's not easily conquered, gives more jumps and head shakes..but this time, i guess the sailfish is realyl exhausted, the jumps are low and short....then it slows down and tries to dive....as for me, i'm still reeling in the lines and still pumping...
FINALLY, it reaches the side of the boat...can see the beautiful color of it...the size of the gigantic beauty, the ferocious beak and it's arrow shaped tail...BUT WAIT~! There it goes again!!!..it kicks in again giving great beautiful jumps for few rounds.... Reeled in slowly and the Sailfish is landed successfully.
Removed the hook, too the picture and revive the sailfish before releasing it...all less than 3 minutes job :)
Those that we caught was in the range of 30~35kgs according to the tekong.
The tricks: As you pumped up the rod, the fish tends to jumps if it's at surface and be expected to reel in as fast as you can, otherwise the hooks will be spitted out.
One hell of an experience. :)
-END-
![[PIMPIN]](https://data.zerotohundred.com/avatars/s/2/2994.jpg?1520178211){kind=avatar}
