Cosmoledo Atoll, Seychelles - November 2014

By a series of fortuitous circumstances I managed to jump on a last minute special deal and flew out of Bangkok to Mahe, via Colombo. I had a day layover which I spent relaxing on the beach at Coral Strand Hotel at Beau Vallon, and the next morning at 5am I was at the IDC hanger ready for a 6am flight.

Beau Vallon beach on the main island

 

Local grumpy crab

 

The twin prop plane flew us to Alphonse Island first for a fuel top up, and then a 1 ½ hour hop took us to Assumption, where our home for the week awaited. 

One of the Assumption locals - part of the greeting party

Our plane - Beechcraft 1900

 

Maya's Dugong waiting for us

 

The Maya’s Dugong was the perfect boat, comfy AC cabins and lots of room for gear and hanging out, plus stable and seaworthy. We met our guides for the week, Keith Rose-Innes, Jako Lukas, Cameron Musgrave and Serge Samson, and then we unpacked our stuff and had a quick briefing before heading out for an afternoon session on Assumption. It didn’t take long before we landed a few GTs, and then we found a bunch of milkfish feeding in a scum line – lots of casts but no hookup, great start to the trip and lines stretched.

  

We then set sail overnight for the 10 hour crossing to Cosmoledo, where we were woken up by the anchor dropping at anchorage. Breakfast and then onto the boat, our guide for the day was Keith Rose-Innes, head guide and Cosmoledo expert extraordinaire. My fishing partners for the week were Rocky, a dentist from Seattle, and Dave his friend, a salmon biologist also from the Seattle area. Keith took us to Manai, to walk the flats, and it wasn’t long before we saw our first fish while we were slowly drifting with the boat.

A good GT was holding on the edge of the current like a trout, I cast the fly and a big bohar snapper raced out from under the ledge, grabbed the fly and turned back. I hung on and managed to stop it just in time, and after a few pictures it was released.

We then jumped into the water and started walking, and straight away started seeing huge numbers of milkfish, and then a big permit swam past. A quick change of rods to the 9 weight with a crab fly and another permit swam into view. As expected he did the usual permit thing, took a long look and then cleared off. We kept on walking down the flat, and as the water started to get shallower we started to see bonefish. They were moving in small schools or in singles/doubles, all good sized fish. For the next hour or so until lunch we all managed to catch heaps of bones, they were hungry and not shy, racing towards the fly to eat it.

 

At one point I saw what looked like two massive bonefish swim out from near the mangroves. I put the fly down a metre in front, they raced over and the bigger fish nailed the fly and tore off into the distance. For a while I thought I had a double figure bonefish on, but as it got closer I realised the size was right, but it was in fact a GT - a great fight on the bonefish rod. After lunch with the tide approaching low we headed off to look for GTs elsewhere, and finished off the day teasing up and landing a few GTs outside the lagoon.

Back to the boat for drinks and sushi, and to hear everyone else's stories. Highlight of the day was 3 metre plus fish caught by Ian, Ty and Andy with Serge - they found a honey hole with lots of GTs. After dinner Rocky and I went to the back of the boat for a bit more fishing, and I managed to add a very coveted new species to my list - a dogtooth tuna. I actually managed to catch 2 of them dropping a heavy fly deep down, as well as bluefin and bigeye trevally, plus a few pickhandle barracuda.

The next morning it was our turn with Serge. Rocky had a rough night with a bout of kidney stones so decided to wait at the boat, so Dave and I headed off with Serge, the GT Whisperer.

The weather was phenomenal, not a breath of wind, so given the tide was still falling we went to a spot in the lagoon amongst coral bombies to look for GTs.

It was like fishing in an aquarium, fish everywhere, and if you left your fly in the water it would get eaten by bohar snapper and other beasties. I managed to land a lovely whitespotted grouper, another new species.

At one point I needed to take a leak so went to the back of the boat. I was peeing and said to Serge and Dave "Isn't this when a big GT turns up?", and when I turned back around sure enough there he was, the biggest GT I had ever seen, about a foot across the eyes and swimming slowly towards me to see what the tinkling sound was. I froze, and when I went to grab my flyrod he turned and swam off. That proved to be the start of a memorable experience, where all of a sudden GTs would swim by, come and look, chase their buddies, and attack our flies. All up I managed to land 10 GTs that session

The biggest I managed to land was 101cm, a cracking fish

Dave's 103cm fish

The ones that got away however, were far larger. One fish swam into view, slurped the tan fly and tore off. The top 3 sections of my 12wt came off, and after a frantic chase we managed to get the rod together, but it was too late, the monster fish had swum through coral and I ended up with a flyline in 3 pieces. I then tried to put a new line on, but it was so difficult to concentrate with all the carnage around the boat, Serge shouting "cast, strip strip strip, cast again", fish smashing Dave''s fly and all sorts of chaos. I managed to hook another leviathan, the rod stayed together and we chased it through a maze of coral bombies. We thought we had him once we popped out the other end, but he did a quick U-turn and got me on another coral head. All up I hooked 3 fish that were all well over 80lbs but I was a passenger really, in that terrain.

At the end of the days, arms aching and smiles massive, we were heading back to the boat when we came across a school of milkies feeding hard outside the surf. I managed to get a few casts in and then it happened, I was hooked up.

After a good 20 minute fight he was on board, my first milkfish, and the fitting end to a fantastic day's fishing

Rocky unfortunately had taken a turn for the worse, so the decision was made to steam back to Assumption and medivac him out, so we upped anchor and steamed back overnight. The next day we were in Assumption and after seeing off Rocky and Keith, it was our turn to fish with Cam. We went over to the other side of the island, and after a bit of trepidation managed to get the boat in to the beach and we started walking. We found a big school of bones that showed no interest in our usual flies, so Cam suggested something bright which worked straight away

We walked the surf but didn't see and GTs, we managed to land a few more bones and then jumped on the boat and headed back out. The other boats weren't seeing much in the surf so we went to plan B, teasing up the GTs in the deeper water, and this didn't disappoint

We managed some big bluefin trevally as well

And another new species, a Lyretailed grouper

That night we headed back across to Cosmoledo, and the next day it was our turn to fish with Jako. We had barely left the boat when we found a couple of large schools of milkfish feeding hard behind the surf. I managed to hook one up after a few casts, and he took off, pulling line and leaping out of the water. After about 5 minutes and 4 big jumps the hook pulled. I managed to hook a second fish that also came off and then they were gone...

We went looking for triggers on some pancake flats and it didn't take long for us to find a happy tailer. Dave and Jako jumped out of the boat and waded up to him. A couple of casts and he was on

We spent the morning looking for GTs on the flats without much luck, tides still not ideal. Whilst drifting across a large flat three fish came into view. Jako got excited and said cast, Island Trevally. I put the shrimp fly close and I was on. A spirited fight on the 8 weight and I had it, another new species for me

We finished off the day teasing up GTs outside the lagoon and had another blinder - another 10 GTs for me with a number of fish getting close to a meter. I even managed to land 2 fish on successive casts twice. In both cases the hooked fish had a friend following him, and as soon as we got the fly out of the first fish a quick cast and the second one was on - absolutely insane fishing action

That night we upped anchor again and headed over to Astove. Our guide for the day was Wayne, who had replaced Keith when he flew back to Mahe with Rocky. We pulled into the beach and walked across the island to fish the lagoon for bones, permit and GTs. The lagoon was stunning, shallow clear water crawling with bonefish. We caught plenty of tailers in ankle deep water and then waded deeper to look for permit.

We found a couple but as we got within range a turtle spooked and scared the permit away too. The number of turtles lounging in the sun in the lagoon was astounding. A school of mullet swam past, I made a cast and added a blue tailed mullet to the species list.

I put on a crab fly and spent the next hour picking off 6-7lb bonefish from amongst the little guys

Rob and his son Dominic were not far away, a GT swam along the flat and Rob managed to hook and land it

We then headed back across to the surfside where we were greeted by a massive school of bonefish milling around the boat. I managed to hook a very large fish on the edge of the school that came off, and then we caught a few more solid 5-6lbers before heading off to look for GTs. We cruised along the beach looking for the turtle eaters - the sandy beach was a turtle nesting spot and the big GTs were used to eating baby turtles, but we didn't find any. While the other guys fished the Astove channel we spent the rest of the afternoon catching GTs and other reef species along the drop off - 300m from the beach the seabed drops down to 500m and all sorts of big fish cruise the edge. we raised and hooked plenty of GTs and went back to the boat with sore arms once again

Last day loomed and overnight we had steamed back to Cosmoledo. We were back with Cam and the quest was a big GT from the surf or the flats. We headed across the back of North Island past the shipwreck zone

We started walking a lovely turtlegrass flat, where we had casts at some triggerfish and caught some assorted reef species in very shallow water

We then made our way to the surf side and had more shots at triggers, and managed to catch a few GTs in the surf. A large fish swam into view, Cam shouted out to run after him, and after a good 100m run in waist deep water I got within casting range puffing and panting. I belted out the cast, the GT turned and charged the fly, straight towards me. A savage take, I turned to set the hook and nothing, fish gone. It was a big fish but that's the way it is sometimes. We spent the rest of the day wading different flats and caught more GTs, on turtlegrass, in big holes in the flats, and ended up near a beach where Dave managed to land a lovely fish that cruised in on a wave. Cam had seen a much larger fish further out, we waited but it never came into range.

We then finished things off teasing offshore, and landed some more GTs and a lovely Marbled Grouper that I managed to keep out of the coral. just...

Last GT of the trip

And that was that. All up our group landed more than 200 GT with 10 fish over a metre. A permit and a milkfish landed, plus bonefish, dogtooth tuna and all sorts of other fish. I added 15 new species to my list.

Here are some pics of the fish the other guys caught

Bernd's 126cm

Rob's 123cm hooked on landed and landed out at sea

Bernd's 123cm from the flats

Ian's 119cm

Andy's 105cm

Frikkie's 103cm on the beach

Ty's 102cm

  Saddle back grouper

Gordon's big jobfish

Andy's permit

Rod's doggie

 Tackle and flies

I followed the pre-trip packing list pretty much to the letter, as there was a 15kg weight limit for the flight. Flies and flylines were available on the boat, but as can be imagined not cheap.

• Rods - I took a Sage TCX #8, Sage TCR #9, Sage Method #10 and 2 x #12 weight rods (Sage Xi2 and "The Jerry"). Next time I'll pack my Sigler 16/17 for the deep dredging.
• Reels - Galvan T8, Abel S9, Tibor Sig 9/10 and Mako 9550 1012. Tibor Pacific for dredging next time I go.
• Flylines - Take plenty! You really do need them, I had a full line shredded plus damage to 2 other #12 lines. Floaters for everything, and next time I go I will take some fast sinking lines for deep dredging too, T17 is probably the most cost effective option. They did not like welded loops, too many breakages, so they were cut off and replaced with braided mono loops.
• Tippet and leaders - 15lb FC tippet for the bones, 20lb FC for the milkies, and 120lb Mono for the GTs was all that was required as far as leaders and tippet are concerned. Keith knocked up a quick twistie leader for the milkfish outfits.
• Clothing and boots - My Simms Flats Boots (old model) were once again perfect, and I did use long pants, but next time it will be shorts, as running through ball-deep water is hard enough, doing it in long pants is too tough. Fingers stalls, vet wrap, finger protection is a must as line burns are almost inevitable. All the dirty clothes would get washed overnight so you only really needed two sets of fishing clothes.
• Other items - Pliers, buff, good sunglasses, and some ball sinkers to get flies down deep.
• Flies - For the bonefish I used a #2 Simram, and a #2 tan raghead fly. For the milkies the one and only fly is the #2 Milky dream on a Gamakatsu SL12S. For the GTs I tied up some tan and some black "Duck on a hook" flies, basically 8 schlappen feathers and a wool head, on a Gamakatsu 6/0 SL12S - I took 6 each and I ran out... I also used a Fusilier coloured FPF when we found a school of these baitfish getting smashed by GTs. The three Brits used some ultra heavy flies to dredge, tied by an Alphonse guide with some home made monster lead eyes - worked well for me off the back of the boat even with a floating line.

Save your pennies guys - it's bloody brilliant!

Following on from the discussion on the movie 9 degrees south - Land of Giants, I can vouch that it is, there are Geets everywhere, on the flats, in the lagoon, outside, just everywhere. And there are some monsters too.

By a series of fortuitous circumstances I managed to jump on a last minute special deal and flew out of Bangkok to Mahe, via Colombo. I had a day layover which I spent relaxing on the beach, and the next morning at 5am I was at the IDC hanger ready for a 6am flight. The twin prop plane flew us to

Save your pennies guys - it's bloody brilliant!

Following on from the discussion on the movie 9 degrees south - Land of Giants, I can vouch that it is, there are Geets everywhere, on the flats, in the lagoon, outside, just everywhere. And there are some monsters too.

By a series of fortuitous circumstances I managed to jump on a last minute special deal and flew out of Bangkok to Mahe, via Colombo. I had a day layover which I spent relaxing on the beach, and the next morning at 5am I was at the IDC hanger ready for a 6am flight. The twin prop plane flew us to

Save your pennies guys - it's bloody brilliant!

Following on from the discussion on the movie 9 degrees south - Land of Giants, I can vouch that it is, there are Geets everywhere, on the flats, in the lagoon, outside, just everywhere. And there are some monsters too.

By a series of fortuitous circumstances I managed to jump on a last minute special deal and flew out of Bangkok to Mahe, via Colombo. I had a day layover which I spent relaxing on the beach, and the next morning at 5am I was at the IDC hanger ready for a 6am flight. The twin prop plane flew us to

Save your pennies guys - it's bloody brilliant!

Following on from the discussion on the movie 9 degrees south - Land of Giants, I can vouch that it is, there are Geets everywhere, on the flats, in the lagoon, outside, just everywhere. And there are some monsters too.

By a series of fortuitous circumstances I managed to jump on a last minute special deal and flew out of Bangkok to Mahe, via Colombo. I had a day layover which I spent relaxing on the beach, and the next morning at 5am I was at the IDC hanger ready for a 6am flight. The twin prop plane flew us to