Labrador Park

Went Labrador to attempt to get my first salty (saltwater fish). Really determined, hence decided to do baiting. (legal there). Dropped by Changi Pro to get 10 milkfish and 10 live prawns. Reached there in the evening around 6pm. Quite pleasant after the upgrade. Saw a bunch of squirrels playing around a tree. Not spooky of people. Reminded me of the time in Germany when I encountered playful squirrels in the park. Not something you see everyday in urban singapore.

Tide was low, will take a while to come up again (I estimated to be around 10-11pm). Not much people and to our good fortune, there was a shelter available. Lab park has good facilities, there is even a tap with running water. Looked like we were set for the night. Started hooking up live prawns. Took a bit of skill and _cruelty_ to pierce the hook through their tail end. Started dropping lines into the sea. I did a bit of luring with light tackle (newly bought :)) but found it to be fruitless after a while.

Around 7pm, one of the rod went "ttting ttting" (from the fishing bell). Woah, got a fish. Everyone was excited. I quickly grabbed the rod and started to pull the fish in. Not very big, but I think should be a good sized something. It was getting dark and I couldn't quite see what it was. When it reached the bottom part of the jetty, it did a aerial jump and to our dismay, managed to escape. Haz! And I thot I had it for sure. Amy caught a glimpse of it and said that it had a flat whitesh head. Dunno what.

The prawns all started dying. Looked like an air pump would be needed to keep them alive. We quickly used up all the prawns and started using the milkfish. Hooking fish seems a little more cruel. Maybe I will stick to prawns instead in future.

Around 9pm, people started coming to the jetty in loads. Guess that they must have read the tide info. There was a bunch of 5-6 middle aged man and they started occupying the whole stretch of the jetty near to my shelter. Serious surfcaster type with 12 ft rods (at a jetty?) and what nots cheapo equipment. Some of the lines got like 10 hooks. Irritating, cos they while dropping lines everywhere near to me. One of them got a big hookup as I passed by on my way to the loo. His rod when "ttting ttting". He yanked and pulled the rod with such a force (and his is a 12 footer rod), that the line broke. Of cos man. Pulling teeth for the fish or what? Looked like bunch of newbies.

Another family bunch of hokkien spewing people came (with trolley load of stuff, mind you) and to our surprise, started to park themselves in our shelter. Come on, the whole jetty was relatively unoccupied, why was it that they all have to stationed themselves here? I was quite pissed but seeing a pregnant womanfolk, I cleared the bench for her to sit down. Again, lines started dropping all over my area effectively breaking rule #1, never fish in an overcrowded area with bunch of hokkien spewing smoking people. True enough, I didn't get anymore hookup for the rest of the night.



There was a display of fireworks somewhere in the direction of Sentosa. Not sure what that was for. At one point, star cruise passed by creating quite a beautiful display of xmas tree lights and shimmery movement. Certainly looked like an expensive boat.

The bunch of hokkien jokers started smoking and blaring loud chinese mandarin pop. They now even had a 4 man tent right in front of me. The wind was blowing my side and I got blasted with their nicotine laden breath. I got pretty upset. Gave them the coughing act. (but it didn't stop them) At the end of the jetty, some couple was providing a free show with their romantic kissing and necking under the yellow light. Did they actually think that no one could see them???

Decided to pack up and call it a night. Bait all used up and nothing caught. Maybe another night. The fishing was alot better before the whole bunch of inconsiderate people arrived. Next time bring constentinal wire and wire up the area. Too bad about the first fish. Should have gotten that prize. First salty will have to wait for another day.