Kiribati Island 2012 - Christmas All Year Round

[ONTHECHEW]

This is now my second trip to Kiribati Island and it still keeps surprising me, Kiribati Island otherwise known as Christmas Island (not the refugee one) is half way between Fiji and Hawaii. It is a coral atoll with an inland lagoon and reefs offshore that drop away very quickly. It has a population of 7000, with fisheries and tropical fish being the main industries. Another interesting fact is that its highest point above sea level is only 2.7m, so as you could imagine when Hawaii got their tsunami warning we did not get much sleep that night.

We have combined over 1000 photos and 8 hours of go pro footage to go through, so to make it a little easier I will break it up into days 1-7 rather than try and do it at once. Also one of the anglers is writing a magazine article about the trip so there a quiet a number of photos I don't want to put up until after the article comes out, but they will follow, also will do up a compilation video but this will take some time with so much footage.

As mentioned the main attraction to this island is the number of different styles of fishing you can do from land based fly fishing, light or heavy tackle through to offshore popping, jigging or trolling. We caught a good variety of species, queenfish, mack tuna, wahoo, GT, red bass, papuan travelly, coronation trout, long nose emperor, bluefin trevally, green jobfish, multiple cod species, multiple trout species, rainbow runner, trigger fish, bone fish, sharks, red snapper, yellow fin tuna, barracuda, yellow lip sweetlip, brown jobfish, multiple wrass species, goat fish and yellow tail trevally plus nameless others.

Well time to start the report...

[ellicat]

Looking forward to the finished product/s.

Can't say I'm looking forward to seeing a pic of a brown jobfish though :dry: :pinch:

[Angus]

Cannot wait for these reports...

Cannot wait to see how our lure samples went!

Angus

[ONTHECHEW]

Day one 7am bright and early and every one is at the brisbane airport pumped ready for a great trip, day one is a very long day as you have a four hour flight to fiji, then a 8 hour lay over in fiji then a 4 hour flight to Kiribati Island. To add to this due to heading so far east we pick up 4 hours as well to make it worse. Basically how it works is by the time you arrive at the island you have been awake for at least 21 hours, you are given breakfast and before even unpacking your bags you go on your first half day of fishing, no time is wasted.

No one complains about being tired or the lack of sleep, or being a little under the weather from spending the entire 8 hours in fiji at a pub.. It's just a matter of as soon as everyone has their gear ready you go fishing. We have a group of seven Lee (RU4Reel), Tom (Nomad), Ray (Tom's old man) Brett (Fishhead), John (Go Fishing) Warren and myself (Fishhead customers).

How it works is generally every day you break up into two boats and it is totally up to you what you do. From inshore fly/soft plastics for bonefish, trigger fish, gts, sweetlip, milkfish etc or offhsore plastic/jig/popping/trolling for all sorts of fish all of which have lots of teeth.

So I don't bore people and take to long to do it I will just go through my own photos, which obviously only covers the boat I am on for the day, will keep the photos down to as seriously caught a heap of gts and red bass every day so that could get a little repetitive.

First day was pretty much just a half day so we decided just to do a quick run out of the bay and do a quick bit of plasticing and jigging.

The international airport, this has been improved from last year.

After a quick offshore mission, we all went for a quick walk along the shore and we picked up a few bone fish and mini gt's on plastic. A very long first day but well worth the wait and pumped for tomorrow.

[Angus]

Just a quiet first day

Angus

[Damien2Rad]

Absolutely amazing.

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 2, I was on the boat that went offshore again, we didn't have to travel far, we fished the shallows for popping 20-30m and jigged between 50-80m. What I have noticed is something pretty amazing compaired to where we live is that the distance you are out from the shore is roughly how deep it is ie 30m out 30m deep, 100m out 100m deep, 500m out 500m deep etc etc.

Today GT's 10-15kg, red bass, long nose sweetlip, papuan trevally, bluefin trevally and green job fish where the order of the day.

[ellicat]

The colour of the fish in pic 1 is just fantastic !

Sounded like a very tough day ... :whistle:

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 2 ctd.. We where having a pretty good day then all of a sudden John hooks onto a pretty solid fish on the jig. This fish is pulling some decent line, so we all pulled up and gave the driver instructions on where we needed to keep the boat to stay on top of the fish. John was using some pretty light gear using 40lb main line and 60lb leader, but after a good fight something popped up that we never expected.DOG TOOTH TUNA :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo: :woohoo:

Now a lot of people have caught dog tooth tuna before at exotic locations, but the amazing thing was no one, that is right no one has ever caught a dog tooth tuna at Kiribati ever. This was a first ever and to say the guide English was a little excited was an understatement. There was high fives all round and every one was very keen for a few drinks that night.

Unfortunately I cant put any decent photos up ..yet.. but he was a solid fish of 35kg on fairly light gear which made it an even more special catch. I am pretty sure English would have been the town hero that night, we kept fishing and caught more good fish but nothing could compete and we wanted to go back to brag to the other boys.

[Jewy]

Sounds awesome so far chief. Cant wait to here about the rest of the week. Less than 12 months till we go. So pumped

Matty

[bersim]

Those fish look amazing

James

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 3 -

Well even thought he boys had been cleaning up of the first two days on the flats with fly and their light gear, they where pretty quick to change their mind once they heard about the dog tooth tuna. So the decision was made that a few of us would go and try land based popping on the ocean side of the island for a land based GT which none of us had go before.

Definitely an interesting drive across the island, much more relaxed road rules and car road worthies :whistle: . Also if it has wheels, the general concensus the more the merrier. There is not much to the island, lots of coconut trees, but it still took about 1.5 hours to get from our base to the opposite end of the island, but it was worth it.

Basically it was a shallow reef about a foot deep, about 30 metres out until it breaks and then there is a decent drop off. The only difficulty is you can't get real close to the edge and you have to get some decent lengths on the cast. Biggest issue was there are fingers of the reef that head out, which have deeper sections either side of them. It was not unusual to be standing in foot deep water one minute, take one step in any direction and end up neck deep in water. Was quiet funny to watch when it was not you. But overall one of the best land based sessions I have ever had, highlight was hooking a 2.5 metre barracuda only for him to shake free, that would have been awesome.

Landed my first ever land based GT and red bass so very cool day.

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 3 Continued. Even when you got some of these up over the reef and into the shallow reef they still gave you a fair bit of curry.

We got back to the camp site to find out that the boys had caught another DOG TOOTH TUNA, this one was only 5kg but still amazing that we caught two of a species that had never been caught there before.

About about 10pm that night, the week turned for the worse, I rang my wife and she informed me that Hawaii had just received a Tsunami alert. To say this freaked us out was an under statement, we where stuck on an island which was the next land mass pass Hawaii, the only difference is that Kiribati Island lack of any high ground, in saying that there isn't even a two level building on the island. After the first wave hit Hawaii we relaxed a bit had a couple of drinks and called it a night.

[Damien2Rad]

Awesome.

Add a trip like that to the list!

[tugger]

Awesome trip Andrew some amazing colours on those fish with big smiles on ya faces looks like you had a ball they a trips you never forget and worth the money to do some day me thinks

[Shane69]

Im so jealous lol. That looks like a insane trip.

Some good fish caught too.

You guys make it look so easy when its not.

I dont think il ever catch GT here lol, all i being caughting is bloody mack tuna and sharks on poppers .

Being trying so hard but nothing yet.

What lure are the black ones you caught little gt off land based. How heavey are they?

I saw the obbession guys post up on their page.

Shane

[Fish Head]

Great pics andrew! can't wait for next year's trip.

Did you have the roast pig at the end of the week?

Duncan

[summerbreeze]

I stopped there on the way to Hawaii in February... I had no idea what the fishing was like!!!! Nice pics looks like a great trip.

[Do$tylz]

Im so jealous lol. That looks like a insane trip.

Some good fish caught too.

You guys make it look so easy when its not.

I dont think il ever catch GT here lol, all i being caughting is bloody mack tuna and sharks on poppers .

Being trying so hard but nothing yet.

What lure are the black ones you caught little gt off land based. How heavey are they?

I saw the obbession guys post up on their page.

Shane

Hey Shane. They're from a small company called T'B Lures. RE weight? I'm not sure. I myself haven't had a chance to see these in the flesh.

[Hfisho77]

What an awesome spot! Quality fish and quality pics. Loving that big coro trout at the start!

[wesfish]

What a fantastic trip with such variety of quality fish :woohoo: really enjoying this report

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 4,

After the success of the day before land based we where pumped for an offshore run again, we did the big run which is to the Koreon wreck which is basically where we had fished land based but offshore. This was a long run, last year it was really worth it though, this year it still produced the fish but not as full on. We had far less current this year and smaller tides, but was still a quality day, we concentrated a bit more on the popping today with a quick jig at the end. Fishing the 20-30m line produced the most strikes, once again no great size but certainly made up for it with numbers.

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 4 continued..

[Angus]

Glad to see a bit of mojo has been infused into the AFO shirt finally

Awesome shots of the lures man thanks.

Angus

[JarrydA]

God im jealous. :evil:

And holy some of those black GT's are REALLY black!

[Do$tylz]

Hey Andrew - is it just me or do those GT's seem a little slim?

Also - technique wise - do you guys ever pause on the walk?

[ONTHECHEW]

Angus, no worries there are more to come, great lures to use, that stick bait is awesome.

Henry, yeah a lot of the gt's where only about 15kg, but some of the bigger ones are still to come :whistle: and some time a slower technique gets more hits when they are a bit quiet.

Andrew

[Damien2Rad]

Day 5!!

C'mon, I'm hangin' for this.

[fishingnut]

EASILY the report of the year!

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 5,

Haven't got to many photos from this day as I must have got the lens dirty early in the day and didn't know so some of the photos are not so flash. Today all of us decided to take the bus across the other side of the island again for a bit of land based action. This was a great day with a heap of fish caught, red bass, GT's, barracuda, long nose sweetlip and bone fish.

Caught my first ever land based barracuda which was cool, but highlight of the day was pretty amazing. How the area fishes is there is a large coral beach which is about 2 metres high, then you walk out in starting off in foot deep water up to about waist deep to cast over the edge of the reef. Half way through the day I decided to go on a bit of a wonder and English came with me, I am walking along the beach looking out about 30m to where you normally cast from for likely spots. All of sudden English yells out 4 GT's, I am looking every where like an idiot, but could not see them. I looked back and English and he pretty much points at my feet, I am on dry land and the GT's where basically 3m's out from the beach in a foot of water, with their backs out of the water swimming along. I put a cast in with the leader barely coming out of the end of the rod and I was on, this fish of 10kg, put some 30kg fish to shame, in a foot of water and his mates stirring him up, with half of him out of the water was something I won't forget, sadly no photo as English and I had walked off a fair way, but still awesome.

Highlights of the day would have been watching Lee and Brett fishing, they are both slightly vertically challenged and I could not stop laughing every time I looked over it seemed they where just trying to stand up again, every wave seemed to knock them off their feet and it never got old..

After lunch we went to another beach which was a little more out of the swell, the boys where catching a fish every cast on fly, and Tom was killing the red bass in shoulder deep water (crazy). I had to go change my under wear half way through as I was wading out in waist deep water and a 6ft black tip reef shark just casually swam about a metre in front of me.

Andrew

[tugger]

I like how your drip feeding us Andrew this is epic now keep it coming, I thought this post would have generated more interest though I dont know why this is awesome

[Angus]

Angus, no worries there are more to come, great lures to use, that stick bait is awesome.

Henry, yeah a lot of the gt's where only about 15kg, but some of the bigger ones are still to come :whistle: and some time a slower technique gets more hits when they are a bit quiet.

Andrew

Cheers man. Top shelf marketing images already

Angus

[Zim man]

One word describes the trip - EPIC

[ONTHECHEW]

I like how your drip feeding us Andrew this is epic now keep it coming, I thought this post would have generated more interest though I dont know why this is awesome

Wish it was intentional, first week back from holidays pulled out an 80 hour week, will try and get the next couple of days up shortly so that I can start looking through all of the video, also when the article comes out, then I can put the rest of the photos up :woohoo: (the good ones)

Andrew

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 6,

This day was a blinder, we woke up to no wind at all, for Kiribati Island this is very unusual it generally blows 15 knots every day. We did not have English on the boat today (best offshore guide) plus the boys took us to the north side of the island when we always fish the south side. Last year we did one trip on the north side and it was an absolute disaster, so I wasn't holding any high hopes, boy was I wrong.

Warren was putting a bit of pressure on me and was saying it was my job to get him a GT on popper, and also Ray was keen to get a decent jobfish on jig, and I had not yet caught a long nose sweetlip for the trip. All I can say is tick, tick, tick, plus a few more ticks that we had not even thought of.

It was very hot with no wind, but the fishing was just as hot to match, seriously pretty much every drop got a fish, I can not remember a jigging trip that even come close. Yes we caught another hundred red bass but still great fun, but we also pulled up some toothy critters as well.

We started to loose quiet a few jigs to wahoo, then finally John hooks onto one and we finally boat one around 17kg. Not long after Ray was on a good fish so I decided to rip my jig back in to get some photos for him, then I got smashed on the way back in, I struggled a bit on the heavy gear (didn't think to loosen the drag) but boated my PB wahoo (sorry no photos...yet).

We where getting buggered so decided to have some lunch and just head in 30m to some popping grounds, this was not a good way to rest, GT's and red bass where smashing our lures left right and centre, best of all Warren landed his first, second and third ever GT on popper.

After our rest :whistle: we decided to have one more jig, as it was so hot we where smashing through our water. First drop and I hadn't even got my bail arm over (actually struggled as the fish was pulling so much line) and I was on, this fish was solid and in 100m of water he was using every inch of it, at times I struggled to even lift the fish when he was near the bottom. But finally up pops a PB GT on jig for me of around 35kg, this was a very long fish and solid but photos don't do it justice.

I was a bit shattered after that so decided to spend a fair bit of time with the guides and driver on how to use there gps and sounder. Ray landed a solid green job fish (sorry no photos yet..) and then landed his best GT for the trip on jig, a very solid fish that once again used every bit of the water column available.

Not long after this we decided to call it a day as every one was buggered and water had run out, most of the guys slept the whole way back it was that good a weather.

Andrew

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 6 ctd.

[Angus]

Day 6 ctd.

[attachment=57928]IMG_2467Custom.JPG[/attachment]

Awesome.

Which lure was that on?

Angus

[Do$tylz]

^^ i'm guessing that one was on the jig.

far out man... this trip is epic as.

Whats the accommodation like? also - what lens are you using for these shots?

[ONTHECHEW]

Day 6 ctd.

[attachment=57928]IMG_2467Custom.JPG[/attachment]

Awesome.

Which lure was that on?

Angus

Angus it was on a jig, sorry no popper or stickbait for this one.

[ONTHECHEW]

^^ i'm guessing that one was on the jig.

far out man... this trip is epic as.

Whats the accommodation like? also - what lens are you using for these shots?

Yeah on the jig, wish it was on the surface wouldn't of had to bring him up 100m off the bottom. Accomodation is pretty good, 2 anglers per air conditioned room with your own bath room, but seriously you are that buggered each night it wouldn't really matter as long as it has air con.

Andrew