Night Rakit

I had wanted to check out the night fishing in Rakit. TC asked to go Rakit again after seeing my last successful one with Eric. So this time, we planned a sat evening to sun morning one.

TC friend, Ho, came along. It started out rather difficult, with the day long drizzle still not relenting. The traffic there was a nightmarish turn into a long bumper to bumper jam after making a right at woodlands road. I quickly manovuered the car out onto the expressway. We all decided to go in via the 2nd link. There, we were caught also in a jam, but not as terrible as the infamous woodlands checkpoint one.

Traffic in JB was not much better. Pasir Gudang was quite heavy at some stretch. But we eventually reach our Rakit, around 6.30pm after a tiring 3 hours odessey. To our shock, there were plenty of cars there makeing the rough parking area almost full house. There were many anglers coming and going. I was quite worried about the Salleh one being jammed packed with people.

Little boy having a good time


There was a swarm of these white birds on that island


Cat wants to go mainland to look for boyfriend


"boat" boy said only about 10 people then, so not so bad. Reaching there, there were still a few shelters that were not taken, so we had some choices. The air was feeling very cold and we were all quite worried as we didn't came quite prepared for spending a freezing night here. But we finally settled beside a malay family near to the end of the rakit, where the awning could be rolled down to give some measure of shield from the cold wind.

Row of rods


They had completed the extension on the far end, so the rakit was now a little bigger with more fishing space. But later on in the night, more people came. I thought there were like about 50 pax on that small platform.

Proof that TC rod also can get fish


Plenty of these. Hmm..in fact, only these


Alamak, missed the hook again


I started with jigging, but nope it was not a tambanful session. Walked around the rakit, nothing was biting. A was the first to land some big eye herrings, which were like the only fish that everyone was getting. TC and friend, Ho too got some. Some were used as baits with our bottom rig. But it was largely unsuccessful. Nothing seemed to be biting except for the one time when TC bait came back up half bodied.

Quite scenic to be luring from here


Yikes, where my L-minnow?


But in the night, there were times that the water current was slow and I could see plentiful of surface activity. There were like splashes every once a while, and I saw visually some oval shaped fishes which I suspect were big eye travellies. I also saw a ribbon swimming past on the surface. I started squidding to check for squids, but lost my Yamashita due to a snag below. Since I couldn't quite sleep due to all the ciggie smoke and mp3 phone music, I was mainly luring throughout the night. But tried as I might, nothing was biting my "super" minnow. There was only 1 solid bite but it missed the hook. I next changed to L-minnow, but that was lost after one cast when it came back with a leaf, missing the lure. It was the darn snap that I was using. I next tried the pinny which was more successful. There were like 4-5 strikes, but alas, all missing the hook.

One of my only catch. Big eye herring


Loot for the trip. Mostly caught by TC and Ho


This trip was quite uncomfortable due to the crowd, especially when start chain smoking and blasting mak yoyo music. Add on to the cold, and the discomfort of not being able to wash hands, the trip was not that pleasant. But A and D managed to catch some shuteyes, thankfully.

Morning waters. Looked good actually but I was too tired to fish


Morning broke and we all packed rather quickly, eager to go back to some civilised living. I supposed that the trip would have been better if we were better prepared, and not go during the weekends. The crowd made the fishing just like doing it at bedok jetty. There were rows of rods, and casting was quite a challenged affair. I really couldn't stand all the smoke, particulary the malaysia brand of pungent ciggies. For these people, fishing and smoking had to go together somehow.

But my assessment was that the place was ideal for luring. There were very few places that you could be looking out at the calm sea, and see all the splashes of fishes all around. It was almost a luxury and at some corners, very pictureque. It was probably just my poor technique and luck that I couldn't get anything. Definitely worth another try in the future.

My friend


Our corner (with the awning)


The new extension


Don't leave home without these