Newsletter October 2017

Catches, entertainment and news from Thailand’s only exclusive syndicated sport-fishing venue

5 STAR FISHING AT ITS VERY BEST. Fishing in Thailand

Welcome once again to the Jurassic Mountain newsletter that gives you all the news, gossip, catch reports and light hearted anglers antics that relates to this exclusive Thailand fishing paradise for the month of October. A big thanks indeed are extended to all the new faces and returning guests who succumbed to the gravitational pull of our ‘extreme fishing gem.’ It was our pleasure to welcome you all to Jurassic Mountain Resort and Fishing Park.

THE WEATHER

You may recall that I mentioned in last month’s newsletter how the rainy season in Thailand more often than not produces days upon end where it simply doesn’t rain. Yeah? Well me and my big mouth! For a few days at the beginning of October, Buddah let us have it with a vengeance. So much so, the lads were kept busy erecting the flood defences just in case we had the same scenario in 2013 where the heavens literally opened for thirty six hours solid and the adjacent rice paddies went under two metres of water resulting in a flood that was reminiscent of looking at the ocean from our elevated vantage point of the resort. Luckily enough, the flood defences held firm with all fish stocks remaining intact and after three subsequent days of dry weather, it drained away and normal service was quickly resumed. This time around we escaped with nothing more than wet flip flops and hopefully that’s the last we’ve seen of a major bucket load for another season.

During his relentless quest to make Jurassic Mountain the top fishing resort in Asia, rain stopped play for a few days in 2013, and now? Four years further on as his vision progresses into reality, you’ll see exactly what he was smiling about.

FACTS AND FIGURES.
For those of you who’ve read more than one of my newsletters, I think you’ll have noticed by now that I’m not one for writing about how ‘He caught twenty odd fish totaling this’ or ‘He caught so many odd fish totaling that’ because basically I find that too many facts and figures tends to make the newsletter boring but more importantly, I’d get bored writing it! This is why you’ll find that I pick the best photos and just say a few light hearted words or sometimes take the mickey about them instead. Seeing as the list of people who read this newsletter increases each month, the common consensus is that my style of writing seems to work.

However, unless something out of the ordinary occurs such as the guy who landed thirty fish of almost every available species in a single day or the other guy who managed to land almost a ton of carp before the sun went down, then that’s the facts and figures you’ll be hearing about from yours truly in the future. In any case, It’s almost become commonplace for anglers to bag double figures of fish at Jurassic Mountain so when you next see that photo of someone smiling over a solitary redtail, best you look at the bigger picture because the odds are that he’s had a bagful of others during the day to go with it.

Anyway, just out of curiosity, the other evening I decided to do a bit of research as to the number of fish and their total weight which were landed at Jurassic from January to December last year. I’m extremely sorry to report to all you facts and figures fanatics that once I’d reached a total of five thousand fish getting on for almost a quarter of a million pounds in weight, I got bored with it!

MY ASIA TRAVELS CONTINUE……
I again took advantage of the close proximity of Bali and grabbed a week there at the beginning of the month with Neti. The minor detail that Bali had issued a warning of an imminent eruption of it’s volcano didn’t deter us and apart from the ominous sight of the largest smoking chimney I’ve ever seen in my life, we enjoyed a fantastic and thankfully a pyroclastic free week on this beautiful tropical island.

Our trip didn’t get off to the best of starts though because upon checking in at the hotel, I noticed a huge dog stretched out in front of the reception desk.
‘Is that the hotel’s dog?’ I casually enquired and just before the manager disappeared into his office he replied,
‘Yes it is, his name is Chook.’
So I bent down to give Chook a welcoming pat and immediately after Chook had almost taken my hand off drawing blood at the same time, the manager’s head reappeared from behind the door as if in an afterthought of something he should have mentioned and added,
‘But best not stroke him, he bites!’

After checking that I was clear of rabies and after I’d given Chook his daily retaliatory kick in the nuts, It was towards the end of the week that we ventured into yet another of the multitude of bars that Bali has to offer and the last place where I’d expect to bump into someone I knew who’d fished at Jurassic Mountain let alone one who’d had the good fortune to hook into a monster 170 pounder Siamese last time they were here.
Mark and Karen Butcher on holiday from Yorkshire were as amazed to see me as I was amazed to see them and I couldn’t believe that out of all the bars in Bali they just happened to be in this one. Mind you, being from Yorkshire where they have the well known reputation of being, how shall I say, ‘slightly careful around a pound note’, I believe the fact that this bar which just happened to have a “Buy One Get One Free” promotion on that night may well have been a contributory factor in the matter. However, in his defence, I have to say that Mark definitely doesn’t seem to be one of your supposedly frugal fellas from Yorkshire because he picked the bar bill up at the end of the night. Cheers mate!

Mark was the guy a couple of years back who was having his photo taken holding a nice arapaima as his wife looked on when I just happened to appear with my ex wife in tow.
‘They’re from the Amazon’ I said to the wife pointing at the fish.
Amid cries of Yorkshire delight which included, ‘Bloody Nora, you don’t catch ‘owt like this in Yarksha’ and ‘This beats pigeon racing ‘ent day o week’ followed by ‘Ooh, I’ll think I’ll have me a nice spam n’egg sandwich for m’tea’, the ex wife looked at me and quite seriously asked,
‘The Amazon? Can they speak English’?

Mark has a particularly peculiar trait when he goes fishing. He STANDS by his rods from dawn until dusk and the only time he sits down is either to recuperate for a few minutes after playing one of those arapaima for over an hour or when he stuffs his face with the Jurassic full English.
So having told Eddy that I bumped into Mark in Bali and bearing in mind that our Eddy remembers everything about everybody especially if they happen to owe him a few quid, I asked him if he could remember what particular thing Mark does all day when he’s fishing that 99.9% of others do not? For once, Eddy’s normally sharp brain went blank because after thinking about it for a moment or two he said,
‘Nah, can’t recall’.
So I decided to give him a clue and was about to say to him it’s what one does when a judge walks into the courtroom but with the obvious answer to that being ‘plead not guilty and keep your fingers crossed’, I changed it slightly,
‘I’ll give you a clue Eddy, think national anthem!’ I said.
Eddy thought long and hard about it and after a sustained period of time in deep concentration, the answer he came up even by Eddy’s high standards of intellect was pretty impressive indeed ……
‘He sings the national anthem’?
Hmm, best we just put that down to a blank moment and leave it at that!

ALFIE’S STILL HERE……
I almost had some very sad news to announce this month. For those of you who have had the pleasure of meeting my Alfie the Shih-tzu who is the Jurassic Mountain mascot, you’ll be pleased to hear that despite getting run over and knocked thirty foot into the air by a car doing at least 40mph, he’s still alive and kicking and welcoming visitors to Jurassic Mountain as well as ever.
Luckily, Buddah smiled down on Alfie that day because it was the corner of the car’s bumper that smacked into him but if Alfie had been a millisecond faster when he uncharacteristically ran across that road as he spotted Neti, it would have been the wheel….. and I have absolutely no idea if I’d have ever got over losing the best friend I’ve

IT’LL SOON BE CHRISTMAS….
Before we get onto the fishing reports and as Christmas is not too far away, I’d like to tell you about a fantastic new car accessory that some may think would make the ideal gift.
In order to stop that annoying ‘ding dong bell’ alert that you hear if you haven’t fastened your seatbelt, they’ve come up with an ingenious gadget that is basically just a seat belt clip that when inserted means you can drive to your heart’s content not only belt free but bell free too….. and that’s not all! This innovative invention also acts as a bottle opener which enables the driver to enjoy his favourite beer whilst doing so. Safe journeys!

RIGHT, LET’S GO FISHING….

Let’s now take a light hearted look at some of the antics of a selection of anglers who graced Jurassic Mountain for the month of October.. My apologies are extended to those who visited us and who didn’t get a mention, it’s nothing personal, there’s just far too many of you for me to keep up with. Here goes …..

Running the girls close but just being pipped at the post for the Jurassic Mountain angler of the month award was Denise Smock, that well renowned and much respected Singapore based match angler who is also a resident here along with her not so renowned but nevertheless much respected and angling mad husband Gary. There were no signs of Gary this time at Jurassic because he’d disappeared on a boys fishing trip somewhere in deepest darkest Malaysia apparently catching sod all again so Denise decided to get a couple of hours in on the lake to pit her wits against the predators totally unhindered by her normal procedure of having to sort out Gary’s tackle and tangles for him first. Denise soon amazed everyone with an excellent display of her angling skills when she immediately hooked into a thirty pound Indian carp which was quickly followed by two nice Amazon redtails, a Siamese around the eighty mark and an absolute beast of an arapaima which sadly spat the hook at the net after she’d played it to perfection. Once again, this female fishing phenomenon well and truly kicked arse amongst the male angling fraternity including husband Gary’s and I shall expect the cancellation of my invite to his 50th birthday bash in Singapore in due course!

You’d think Marc Pickering was advertising Colgate such was the smile on his face after landing this nice tambaqui as the sun went down on yet another satisfactory day’s fishing for him during his visit here.

Marc had previously fished several other venues in Thailand over the years and despite having some reservations about our draw system for selecting swims he gave Jurassic a chance and we were pleased that his first time visit to us here lived up to and subsequently exceeded all of his expectations. Marc even reinforced our own belief about the fairness of the draw when on one particular day he had last dibs of swims and was left with swim 9 named Lover’s Retreat which is typically an all out predator swim and proceeded to pull out SIX decent size carp in the session up to 85lbs or so.

As we have always said to our guests here, we cant speak for other fisheries but on ours it is usually angling SKILL that catches the fish not peg choice (or preferential treatment). The myth that you can pre-bait to build a swim with a pellet that dissolves in 45 minutes seems to have been well and truly debunked for Marc. In fact Marc seems to have dispelled two myths, the first being that a draw system for swims disadvantages the angler when in reality it’s the ONLY fair way to manage swim selection, all other ways being open to managers “discretion”. The second being that pre-baiting to build a swim rarely makes a blind bit of difference on waters with a high population of big fish. What makes a difference is an anglers ability to feed little and often throughout the day AND the willingness to be pro-active in your fishing even if you have doubts about the swim selection because if you get the feed rhythm right, the feeding fish will come to you wherever you are, siamese carp particularly love the “plunk, plunk” sound of pellet being fed into the lake one by one.

The day was especially sweet for Barry who landed the biggest snakehead to come out of Jurassic Mountain so far. This specimen which weighed in 24 lbs was only a bag of sugar in weight from beating the I.G.F.A. world record so could the day get any better for Barry? You’re dead right it could, take a look at this…

BEEJAY PETIT
Share prices in Sangsom Thai rum have plummeted since Jurassic resident Beejay Petit departed the resort.
Beejay didn’t do too much fishing this time around but this was mainly due to the fact that he never usually woke up until at least three in the afternoon. Beejay is famous in these parts for being able to drink everyone into oblivion before he’s even got started and so, as there’s no angling photo of the man this time around, here’s one of him in the bar with his standard rum filled beer tower on the evening prior to his departure

Some anglers demand full time assistance whereas there are those who just want to be pointed in the right direction and then be allowed to get on with it. One such angler was Marc Pickering who was more than able to seek out and catch cracking fish of his own accord.

The lakeside foliage makes a nice backdrop to the above photo of Steve from Sussex who was thoroughly enjoying his holiday here at Jurassic Mountain……well he was until I lent him my bike.

On the day that Steve decided to take a break from the fishing and explore the local area, I suggested that he take my mountain bike which had been sitting unused since the first and only day that I’d rode it. I’d bought this bike in an effort to keep myself a bit fit but because I’d overdone it first time around with a ten mile slog in ninety degrees of heat sitting on a saddle that was like being sat astride a blunt knife, I quickly gave up.
So there I was pushing it for the last mile and a half walking like John Wayne with piles and it was a painful experience to say the least, so without any intention of ever getting on the damn thing again, Steve was more than welcome to it! So off cycled Steve on his exploratory trip happy as a pig in the proverbial but his happiness was not to last for very long I’m afraid.

I’ve often wondered why almost every Thai from the age of eight rides motorcycles instead of pushbikes and now I think I know why. The pack of stray dogs that clocked Steve pedalling past them must have wondered what this strange contraption ridden by an equally strange looking foreigner was and so upon deciding that it was something that wasn’t at all to their liking, they gave chase to the terrified Steve snapping and snarling like a pack of demented dingos. In the grip of blind panic, Steve took off like his life depended on it and if it was the Tour de France he was on instead of a tour around Thailand, they’d have given him the yellow jersey!

Anyway, after the dogs had got bored with scaring the life and whatever else out of him, shaking Steven arrived back at the resort thankful that the dog’s barks were far worse than their bites and after a stiff drink to settle his shattered nerves and a clean pair of shorts to go with it, Steve returned the bike to me where it will sit and forever rust in peace.

It seems that the above alligator gar for Simon was apparently more than enough to send him down the town to celebrate and by all accounts he did just that in a big big way.Twelve hours later, a rather fragile looking Simon arrived back and when he eventually got stuck back into the fishing, in the following photo you’ll see his personal best Siamese which was no doubt all it needed and the perfect excuse for him to get that celebratory hat back on again!

NEW ADDITIONS….. You may remember that last month I informed you about a new species that we were introducing this month? Well it’s arrived folks! The salween rita catfish is the latest addition to reside at Jurassic Mountain and with thirty odd of these beauties let loose into the lake, we’ve really pushed the boat out with them because not only are they all a fair size for you anglers to hook into, the biggest one held by Eddy below tipped the scales at just over the magical 100 pounds. This fish is most probably bigger than any salween rita you’ll find on any other fishery in Thailand and would easily be ‘top dog’ or rather ‘top cat’ in the current vacant IGFA record books. Bearing in mind that this species can reach a length of 2 metres and over 300 pounds in weight, we wish good luck to the first angler who can land it …!

JURASSIC CARP FISHING COMPETITION 2018… Fishing in Thailand
There’s only THREE spaces left in our head to head carp fishing competition that’s being held here in July 2018. Just to refresh your memory, we’re closing the lake to the public for one week to accommodate this contest so if you fancy being one of the eleven anglers who’ll be fighting it out between themselves to try and land the biggest Siamese carp of the week where the lucky winner will have all of his accommodation and fishing costs refunded in FULL, you’ll receive the full details by contacting enquiries@wordpress-1242400-4445492.cloudwaysapps.com.

AND DON’T FORGET THE JURASSIC PHOTO COMPETITION…
A big thanks to all those who’ve sent in their photos for entry into our best photo of the year competition. Below are three more selected from those sent in so far. Please keep sending your best photos but no more than three please to enquiries@wordpress-1242400-4445492.cloudwaysapps.com and not only will you get your best shots posted on our Jurassic facebook page, it might just be yours that wins the fabulous prize of an all inclusive, all expenses paid holiday in our little piece of paradise over here in Thailand.

AND FINALLY, IT SEEMS THERE’S ALWAYS ONE ….
I’ve lived at Jurassic for over three years solid now and during that time I’ve met literally thousands of people that I would never have normally met and of which some have become really good friends too.
I would say that the very vast majority of the people I meet here have only complimentary comments to make about Jurassic Mountain but invariably there’s always one who pops up every now and then who love to moan and more often than not, love to moan about anything and everything. Obviously, if there are any valid gripes to be made, they are dealt with promptly and efficiently by the management but you really wouldn’t believe some of the ‘complaints’ that have come our way from certain ‘anglers’ in the past. Here’s a couple of them….

Apart from those who constantly complained about the weather being too hot and who obviously preferred the tropical climes of sunny Scarborough, I’ve heard more than one angler genuinely complain like hell that they didn’t manage to catch an arapaima during their visit and there was one other guy who was actually well peed off because he didn’t land a triple figure carp either. He was only here one day for God’s sake! He seemed to think that by simply paying his money to fish on what he was reliably informed was one of Thailand’s top carp fisheries, it automatically meant he’d land a ton plus carp too. Sorry pal, I’m afraid it don’t work that way, you have to be able to fish. Maybe best you stick to your local pond!
Another person who springs to mind apart from the small minority of ‘anglers’ who start moaning because they haven’t had a bite for almost five minutes was the budding gastronomist from Barnsley who despite apparently enjoying every dish that was served up to him in our restaurant, constantly moaned about how much he missed his McDonalds and that the nearest one was too far from the resort. Seriously, every day he mentioned it! Whereas most anglers come to Thailand for a big carp, all this guy seemed interested in was getting into a Big Mac.
So on that note, could you imagine what one of this little lot would moan about if that enormous mountain that towers over Jurassic’s resort unbeknowingly turned out to be a dormant volcano that decided to erupt just when one of this lot showed up? Here’s my tongue in cheek take on the letter we’d no doubt be receiving…..

Sirs,
Are you having a laugh? You could have warned us that your resort was next to a bloody volcano. Apparently the views from around the resort are pretty spectacular but seeing as we were stuck in the middle of an ash cloud for a week, we didn’t see any! In fact, the only thing that we managed to see was the bloody bill!
On the odd occasion that the sun did manage to burst through the cloud for a few minutes, we stopped fishing to take advantage of your swimming pool facilities in the hope of getting a tan but by constantly being peppered with red hot lumps of rock, we found it was safer to lay under the sun loungers instead of on top of ‘em.
The molten lava flow that encircled the resort meant our trips to McDonalds had to be cancelled from our itinerary but when after a few days we eventually managed to pinpoint a way through the lava to get a triple cheeseburger, double fries and a diet coke, the volcano exploded and a pyroclastic cloud tore out the top of it at 200 miles an hour. Fortunately for us and even more fortunately for you because we’d have sued you for damages, it veered off to the west taking out half of Cha-am including McDonalds with it.
So, taking all this into consideration along with the fact that I still ain’t caught an arapaima, I’d just like to say that I think your resort sucks and not only will we be posting our customary derogatory comment on Trip Advisor, you can rest assured that we’ll be taking all of our future holidays in Scarborough!

Well that’s it for this month readers, I’d like to thank you for taking the time to read this newsletter and hopefully we’ll see you here at Jurassic Mountain in the future where it’ll be time to realise your dreams and maybe catch that fish of a lifetime. However, if the fishing gods decree that the monster fish lurking in the murky depths eludes you on the day, at least you’ll return home safe in the knowledge that you’ve just had the pleasure of fishing at what is widely considered to be Thailand’s number one fishing resort and the closest place resembling paradise that you could ever imagine possible. Paradise? Jurassic Mountain exemplifies the very word so why not join me and see for yourself. It’s very easy to get here ….. but a damn sight harder to leave!

TIGHT LINES, SEE YOU ALL ON HERE NEXT MONTH.