Relax Fishing At Rakit Atan

Nothing to shout about for this trip to the Rakit. But this was the first time for KT and Zul as well as two of their friends that came along.

The morning started rather abruptly with a call from Zul in the morning. We were all woken up by the ringing phone. Then we realized that we had past the meeting time and they were all waiting at our block downstairs.

The night before, we had just returned from JB, Endau Rompin and were dead exhausted. Hence, when the alarm rang at 5am, none of us woke up. We quickly scrambled to don our clothes and made our way down in 10 minutes.

Good thing though, the traffic wasn't jammed and we sailed across the checkpoint effortlessly. From there, I routed them to the eatery near to Kong Kong. We settled down for the first meal of the day. There, we introduced ourselves proper to KT's friends and found to our surprise, that we have common friends that we know. Small world indeed.

Driving the country road


They were indeed surprised that I cuold discover a place like this, that had them driving through rugged terrain and ending up in a world hidden from the mainstream traffic. When we arrived, the "carpark" area was filled with cars, and I decided to park outside instead. The way in seemed to have degraded from all the rain and some parts looked quite dangerous for our wheels to get stuck in. KT managed to find a slot nearer to the entrance. The place was quite packed due to the people doing overniters at the rakit.

Crowded Carpark


True enough, when we were returning, the place was much quieter.

Medusa going to Rakit


Tiram Sports Fishing Team Member


Hey, they got moustache! (strap of my camera)


A quick call to Atan, and the boat arrived. Reaching the Rakit, there were quite alot of people. But already, some of them were packing up. We found a spot near the comfy hammocks and starting to go about fishing.

J's first fish


G's first sizeable Tamban


Double hookup of Glassfish


Fighting with a jumping fish on the other end


We got you, Mr todak!


Seeing that the two new friends were first timer, we started them on tamban jigs to get some smallies. I wasn't sure if the todaks were around today. But after drifting some live baits, we confirmed they were. I managed to set the hook on one of them, and passed the rod to Zul and Jasmine to have a taste of the powerful of a jumping fish. Jasmine finished it off by landing the thrashing long fish successfully. Although Mr Todak was quite a small one, it was photo time, and a shot worthy on the family album.

KT's string of four


Backyard fishing


Zul biggest Grouper


As the tide was coming up, the fishes started to arrived. Zul and Jasmine were fishing at the back of the Rakit when Zul caught hold of a personal sized Grouper. Quite an achievement for a newbie fishing. Grouper was packed into the icebox and to be brought home to brag to Mom and Dad.

Anyone wants to buy my "Salmon strips"?


I was trying to help Garlan land a Todak. There were numerous strikes but unfortunately, they would always throw out the hook. Just 10 minutes when we were decided that we were going, we had a last strike but even though I was doing it, todak managed to slipped off again leaving us the mangled prawn. Alas, his todak would have to be another day.

Writings on the Wall


From there, it was straight to Bukit Indah Jusco for our dinner and some shopping. Rain came rather heavily near the Perling stretch. I was checking out if the cinemas were already up, but seems like Bukit Indah Jusco would not have any cinemas. We made our way back around 8pm and got caught in a little Jam. But the traffic was moving and we cleared it in half an hour.

KFC - Tiram Fishing Resort

Since the last positive trip to Rakit Atan, a trip was planned for 31st Jan to do a group visit here. After some planning, the turnout was quite good and on that day, 3 other cars joined mine, making a total of 4 cars to meet at my block downstairs, starting off for a trip to Rakit Atan aka Tiram Fishing resort. For this trip, I would be meeting Patrick and Marcus for the first time, who were new to the group. XN & family came too as well as Roy, all who were new to this fishing thing. ZW entire family also came along too for this trip.

The checkpoint was a breeze that day and we cleared the checkpoint with ease. But the 4 cars convoy fell apart just coming through the checkpoint and Marcus's car went missing and didn't turn up at the designated meetup area. After some frantic calls, we located Marcus at the nearby stadium a short distance away from the shell station. I wasn't too sure where the stadium was, but was lucky to have found the place fairly easy. After picking them up, we set out on our way to Masai to have our breakfast there.

We had to wade on the beach to get up the boat

When the boat sped up, the ride was thrilling

Breakfast was a rowdy affair as we were a fairly big group,which made for a confusing order of pratas with and without eggs. But we filled our stomachs and were ready for the day of fishing. We were soon at the fishing village for the boat ride across. For some reason, the place was rather crowded with lots of cars. Being a big group, the rakit sent a big boat that was able to fit all of us. The boat was a powerful one, and the children all enjoyed the ride immensely.

Innovative DIY floats

Whee!

Feeding fishes

Reaching there, the children all began to have fun at the hammocks, which I noticed to be an instant attraction to all new visitors here. Certainly, it was a perfect setup for a lazy timeout here.

First tiny Queenie

Those who were here for fishing immediately setup their gears. Given that the tide would be low, I setup a bottom rig for targeting Gelamas. However, there was totally no bites at all from the bottom. In fact for the entire trip, no Gelamas were caught at all, much to my surprise. I next changed to a sabiki and went about the rakit looking where the fishes might be hiding. I needed to break the egg to show the newbies how to go about getting their first fish. With some luck, I managed to get a little tiny queenie on the jigs, much to the delights of the children.

Warm up catches by Roy

My Papa caught one. He very clever

ZW went on to try out to see if mr todaks were around. Within half an hour, he brought in a small specimen establishing their presence in the water. Seeing the fairly good hit rate, I encouraged all the newbies to try their hands at todak fishing. XN and Roy managed to get some bites but were unsuccessful in connecting them. That continued for the morning, with all the todaks getting away with our free meals. However, the todaks did keep the newbies interested in fishing and the morning saw them trying and trying.

I was speechless. The Kurau was caught using Tamban Jig with live glass fish

Patrick caught the todak with his bare hands

His girl was afraid of getting close to mr sharp teeth

Patrick was first to hit a good fish of a Kurau that was of a good size. I was startled and impressed that he and his family did seem to know how to fish. :). He was also skilled at todak fishing and soon got one for the family album.

Yay! Todak fishing is SO fun!

This is for assam curry fish head tomorrow

Wah..so big

Even the children knew to put their foot to take fish pictures! hehe

Mrs Zhao aka Emmy also tried her hands at todak fishing and was grinning ear to ear when one was caught on her own. Now she knew why Mr Zhao loves to fish todak and was always bringing it back for dinner. :O. To her extra credit, she also brought back a new fish this time, an Assam fish. I myself only caught it 3x in my life. No mean feat :)

I also know how to fish

Step 1: First, pick the fish you like

Step 2: And then, catch it

The children all had their own fun of fishing as well and managed to catch some small fishes which was already very exciting for them.

Whole morning of trying and finally!

Family with todak photo

Wah, this is harder than programming

No no..easy as restarting server

Seeing the situation, I changed tactics and asked them to change the hook size to a smaller one. I wasn't too sure about it but when XN finally managed to get his first todak, that was confirmed to be the reason why mr todaks were all getting away. After that, Roy too broke his todak-less history and hauled up a decent specimen for some photo taking. At the end of the day, XN was to score 2 todaks, and Roy surpassed it with 3, ending with the largest todak of his life ever.

Strange looking prawn (Mantis prawn)

Yahoo! My first Tenggiri on lure

Now, I love crystal minnow

I gave power to my Papa one

ZW and I did some luring. I noticed Patrick was also luring but he was away from us in another corner and I wasn't sure how he was doing. But ZW and I did manage to get some bites, although it was far and in between. We took the opportunity to be test out our less frequently used lures. I was just teasing him that he was so lucky not to have even lost one lure after so long when he tossed out his newly acquired x-rap and the braided line broke and lure went flying into Sg Layang forever. Must be my unlucky mouth :P.

ZW got lucky and his red head crystal minnow got a hit and I saw the line going deep. That was a good sign as it certainly wasn't another todak. When the fish surfaced, it was a tenggiri. Seemed that Tengirris are fairly common here and they were a joy to be gotten on lure.

Their 2nd todaks

To wrap it up, the champion of them all. Don't play play

Children playing fish. *poor fishes*

Ok. Wash your hands, then we go play fish doctor

Setting up the timer for the camera

Group pic of the trip

Marcus was doing his own thing and I didn't quite check on him as he was already a seasoned angler having been to some boat trips and sibu kelongs and all. I realized that I had kind of forgotten about him when I realized that I didn't even have a good photo shot of him at the Rakit. Sorry Marcus :P On the way back, we huddled for a group photo luckily and managed to have a small pic of his face. :))

I checked the icebox and found LIVE fishes swimming in the plastic container

The culprit who was trying to "smuggle" live fishes back to Singapore

Another exciting boat ride

Driven by this little boy!

We fished till about 5pm and started packing to return to the mainland for dinner and shopping. To our shock, the boat ferrying us was to be driven by a small 10-12 yrs old boy. But he handled the craft deftly and we landed safely back at the jetty to return to our cars.

Can we stay here overnite?

Wah, lots of cars

Food at Bukit Indah

And toilet breaks!

From there, I led the group to the newly opened Jusco at Bukit Indah. Dinner was a simple meal at the foodcourt and then to some shopping. On the way out, we lost Roy whose car automatically headed for Sg Petani, where his in-laws were. After some worried wait, Roy managed to relocate us and regroup. We headed then to the final SHELL station for refueling before parting ways and going back via 2nd link. The way was entirely smooth was no jam whatsoever.

Certainly a "fruitful" fishing trip with almost everyone getting a fish or two. I noticed that the rakit had mostly smaller specimens being at the tip of the river system. But it was fairly consistent in terms of the chances of getting some fishes, although there were hardly any tambans here. Not a bad trip and I did think that all enjoyed it one way or the other. The children certainly had lots of fun playing fish today.

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KFC - Trip To Rakit Atan (previously Known As Rakit Reiza)

This trip was completely not planned. ZW called out of the blue the friday before and said that his project was extended and had time to go fishing. So I decided to push forward the layang trip. As usual, we set off at the early hour of 5.30am. This time round, his other daughter Amanda came with us. (to be fair mah)

Plenty of cats here

View of the Rakit. Used to be Red roof, but now became multi colored

Checking the tide table, high tide would come early. So we spared the leisurely breakfast and grabbed some fast food from a drive through Mac. We arrived at the Rakit around 7.30am. From there, I found that the Rakit was no longer known as Reiza. It has probably changed hands, and now would be called Rakit Atan. It is still known by the other name of Tiram Fishing Resort.

Manageress of the resort

This chap was using sarong worms. Got a decent Sickle fish. (Chow Xi)

We touched down, and ZW was impressed with the comfortable and spacious Rakit. The facilities here were indeed not bad, as well as the going rate. It was only RM20 per adult, and they charge a RM5 for children. So, it was quite cheap fishing. However there were quite a lot of people this time round, as compared to the previous time. Still it wasn't too much of a problem as there were lots of fishing space.

Another good thing here was that it provide live prawns (RM0.50 each). We tossed out some lines for bottom after setting up. My first attempt at bait fish jigging didn't work. Water wasn't teeming with Tambans. But further tries yielded me a small tiny queenie. ZW also attempted a float rig at my bidding.

Finally something from the bottom. Sea dragon king heard our prayers

First decent fish for the year. Looks ugly but is fast to cook, good to eat

This trip, I was hoping to break the egg for this year's fishing. We were teasing Amanda that we needed her power to help with that. She gamely agreed to impart "power" to us. And it worked and my bottom line went twitching and I hauled up a good flat head. With that I considered myself to have at least kicked off the fishing for the year. ZW did well too, and soon he got a small Todak to his count.

The malay group catches

Todaks were fairly plentiful here, and ZW got numerous strikes. Very soon, he was adding a couple of todaks to his catch for this year.

Come to daddy!

Alamak, fish is fake one~haz

Yahoo!

I went to try out luring and was pleased to finally successfully get a good sized Todak on my X-Rap lure. Wahoo! That added a first to my luring history. What a good way to start off my year of luring.

From my last trip, I noted that Gelamas were also plenty here. One got sit under the shade and do Gelama fishing for the whole day. We tried, and indeed managed to get some Gelamas.

Lunch time. The children befriended a Malay speaking boy who yak and yak despite the children not understanding what he is saying


ZW first Pasir Pasir (Swa chiam)


But soon, the tide went down and the current flow became very strong. High tide was at 9.30am and I was thinking that the fishing would be a goner by 12pm. However, we found that the todaks were still around behind the Rakit where the current was blocked and the water was still fishable. I had thought that we would leave this place by noon, but instead we stayed through lunch and until about 4+pm. Everytime I said to go in half hour, some fish activity became evident and we continued to extend the time. :). ZW caught a grunter but lose it due to the line being only 4lbs. Line broke and the Grunter fell back into the water. Quite a waste.

I lured until the lure "mouth" dropped out. (actually I hit it against the chair and it broke...keke)


We did more luring when bottom fishing slowed. I managed to hit a small Tengirri on lure! Although just a small one, it was a good catch. Another notch for my this year's lure history. Perfect for a personal Saba dish.

Changed lure, and hit a Tengirri (small one)

The children were given a starfish by a friendly uncle

Use net to catch arh? (half beaks)

Going back from successful fishing trip

We left the place and headed to Permas Jaya to visit a tackle shop. From there, it was dinner at that place and then back to Singapore. The Jam at first was ok, until we hit the Singapore side where it was maddening that the lanes all merged into two and then one. We spent about an hour in the Jam and then hit home at around 9.30pm. Not a bad trip today and we were considering an overniter in the near future.

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