The Maledives – A fishing paradise on earth!

»Light Tackle Fishing in dreamy atolls«

Punctually arrived with the CONDOR flight Frankfurt-Male,we continue our journey with a water airplane to the Lhaviyani atoll. We booked the “Palm Beach Ressort & Spa”. The 4-Stars-Hotel lies on a approx.. 2 km long island, surrounded by a tropical garden landscape – actually so, how we imagined a Maldives atoll from Germany! The “Palm Beach Ressort” is visited predominantly by divers, offers beside a tennis and a football field, a Fitnesscenter and still many other sport possibilities. The to the hotel belonging Spa spoils the guests with excellent Massages and Sauna with all thinkable comfort. The right place for stressed souls like mine. Culinarily there is also nothing to criticize. For Martina and me the late opening times of the restaurant and breakfast area are only habituation needy.

Fishing

First I have to thank Joachim Volz; he gave me many good tackle-tips and also much on of its large Maldives experience in some, very long telephone calls; Thanks also for the map material at Juergen! In my luggage I had a 20’s, 30’s and 50’s lb rod, 2 Popperrods and a fly rod. In addition still a dozen of Popper, 5 Jigs, some smaller Lures and 3 Bonita-lures. My goal fish were the Trevalies and other riff-fish – which means: throwing, thowing, hurting arms and glowing rolls. My strategy: Trolling from the one to the other popper-hot spot. But, like always…..you can´t really plan fishing.

1. Fishing Day:

Punctually at 7.00 o’clock (Palm Beach time) I waited, totally tackled at the bar. By the booked “Hibaru I” however, far and broadly nothing to be seen. That begins well. Against 8.00 o’clock local time the “Kandi Hibaru”, 75 foot a long boat (measure for 14 guests), comes around the corner steamed. It turns out the fact that the “Hibaru I” lies still on the dry dock. This situation will also continue the next 5 days: That means… I fish the next days on a 25 meter boat alone! At the same time, a very big rain-shower comes and our exit arises the next hour. Briefly after 9.00 o’clock the by-boat finally comes and brings me on board. After short greetings it turned out, the guys seemed to adapt their times of the respective islands. On the next day despite arrangement the same problem; The day after then it was ok – I had changed secretly all clocks over.

After 10 minutes running time the three baits were behind our boat; further 10 minutes later the first Strike comes on the 50lb rod and “Williamson-live-Ballyhoo-Combo” and upstream Teaserbird; I caught a beautiful Maldives sail fish.

After a short fotoshooting we release the fish again. Further outside we find a large swarm of racing Tuna between 50 and 100 lbs. A beautiful sight, which I never saw in this kind and size. Everywhere Tuna who jumped after the bait fish. I am located in the nose of the boat and wait for the suitable opportunity to start throwing my popper to the tuna – no easy; three times the Popper is briefly taken, released however immediately again; then the charm is unfortunately from one moment on the others past. We drive back to the reef and yield our dragging baits again. With an eye always at the reef, I hope for suitable Popper Waypoints. This kind of fishing is very stressy, arduously, time-consuming and in addition still without tidy crew: dragging equipment, popper rods out… – no recovery, but finally (apparently) nevertheless very promisingly!? With the Popper I haven´t (unfortunately) success – the sea is mirror-smoothly and even at the reef gives it only to few current and waves. Between them however again and again sail fish: 5 Strikes, 3 imprisoned – all beautiful large fish!

The second fish brought me the idea to transfer after the bite into these little boat to fight the fish in this dinghy. In the review: Not to overbidding thrill. – You are eye in eye with the fish, and sometimes the fish pulls you and your little boat. Also releasing and photographing is much more careful for the fish – try it (naturally only on a calm sea).

2. Day:

Calm sea, today Martina comes with me. That must become a superday! Also today no wind and few waves; with the Popper only some trailers, however not one bite. However there are a lot of sail fish there: I can land three of nine fish, again from the little byboat of the ship. Against evening we catch still another Wahoo, a Dorado and a Rainbowrunner. Occasionally with the Jigging a small Snapper bites – the correct booty for the crew Dinner.

3. Day:

Today we drive punctually from the hotel bar to the west side of the islands: To find Waypoints for popping, always in hoping of more wind and waves. Unfortunately we don´t find ideal conditions also on this side. With the Poppern there are again only few trailers and unfortunately only two halfhearted Strikes. With the Jigging and Trolling we catch: A small Trevally, one beautiful sail fish, three Wahoos, two Rainbowrunner and a small dogtoothtuna with approximately 15 lbs – all with bonitos.

4. Day:

Again no wind and the sea is mirror smooth. Isolated we can remove tuna jumping to see. Full power and fast – unfortunately we can´t come into throwing range. The next four hours we drag on sail fish: 5 fish with 10 Strikes we get; as it we catch 3 Wahoos, 2 Bonitos; unfortunately also five baits are lost through the over biting through Wahoos and Barracudas. The rest of the day we try it with a Bonito on Marlin, unfortunately without fish contact. In the channel before our hotel I can then nevertheless still the first small GT poppern; a further medium sized copy slits unfortunately with the twisting out.

5. and last fishing day on Kandi Hibaru:

Again zero wind and only little waves, from 7.00 to 10,00 o’clock we try again on sail fish; catch 4:10, with a doublestrike! The Popping on the eastern side of our island brings two smaller GT’s and some trailers. We take three Sails for the village of the crew today. All the other we released.

6. Day:

The booked “Hibaru I” did (again) not come – technical problems. Martina and I used the day for a snorkel/dipping safari.

Against evening I still drive out with the hotel fishing boat: The tuna are however here but they don´t bite – neither on Popper nor on Slider or other baits. We catch 3 Wahoos and 2 Skipjacks. Three sail fish did not remain hanging correctly. With the Popper except some trailers no bite. Additionally we do not watch out one instant: an enormous swarm small, jumping Barracudas traverses our lines – three baits are lost. Now nearly all Saillures went out; also I must cap again some meters of the line, like after nearly each fishing day – an enormous material battle.

7. Day:

In wise foresight I booked yesterday again the hotel boat – the “Hibaru I” does not come again. After one hour we have to drive back to the hotel: Popper, Harness and breakfast still lie in the boatshouse! Also on this day nearly no wind and few waves. With our strategy: Trolling and Popping we catch 3 of 8 sailfish, in addition 9 Wahoos and one Rainbowrunner. A few Wahoos we give to a neighbouring village – the joy is giant large!

With the Popping that becomes today my pitch day: 4 bites, but none remains hanging. A larger fish (around the 25 kg) slits out after 10 minutes. On this day I estimate my throws around 60 – 70 meters follow my throw philosophy: “long cast – big fish” accordingly: With approx.. 350 throws has I only 4 halfhearted GT bites…

8. Fishing Day and the first day on the Hibaru1:

On the travel to the Noonu atoll I can catch a sailfish. At the Noonu atoll not one bite unfortunately only some trailers. Back at the Lhaviyani atoll, we than catch another small Bluefin Trevally and a Rainbowrunner. Quite lean yield today?

9. Day:

The wind comes, the current and the waves becomes stronger. With the Popper at the external reef our Atolls it runs then nevertheless still better: We catch 6 smaller and 2 larger, hard fought GT’s, “besides” also still 2 sail fish, 1 Wahoo and 1 Barracuda.

The wind comes, the current and the waves becomes stronger. With the Popper at the external reef our Atolls it runs then nevertheless still better: We catch 6 smaller and 2 larger, hard fought GT’s, “besides” also still 2 sail fish, 1 Wahoo and 1 Barracuda.

10. Day:

The conditions are similarly as the day before – nearly all Waypoints brings fish. We catch 7 smaller and 2 larger GT’s. A correctly large Black GT (over 50 kg) attacks the Popper jumping in the rolling wave – unfortunately he misses him. That was by the way the only (estimated) fish in this size. As “bycatch” we outwit a sailfish, a small Grouper and a Barracuda.

11. day:

On the previous evening already very bad weather appeared; now we have wind forces between 8 and 10 from east. This day we trie to fish in the lee on the west side of the Atolls; unfortunately fishing is also there (nearly) impossible. Despite the adverse circumstances we have 4 attacks with the Popper, whereby the fish unfortunately always miss the bait. A fish around the 50 lbs sprintet with wind and waves under the boat through and tears off. The conditions are today too bad. During the premature home travel we still catch another Dorado, a Grouper and a Skipjack.

12. Day:

The sea seems to have calmed down; at first sight all looks very good; Current and large waves at the reef, unfortunately the water is cloudily, the cause was the storm on the day before. With the Popper, as expects nothing. We change to the inside of the Atoll and want to try our luck in the Flats for Bonefish with the fly. After three kilometers foot march under burning sun, we then finally found a way by the “jungle”.

It appears to me as if we are on to something new here. Simply awesome. Small sharks patrolling up close in the ankle-deep water, hundreds of stingrays (measuring between 30 cm and 2 metres) bustling around. It doesn’t take long for me to spot the first bonefish but after casting towards it a small bluefin trevally beats him to it and unfortunately frightens off the bonefish.

I now try fishing directly in the surf behind the reef using light poppers. On my second cast I hook a small GT and 2 more follow swiftly. Suddenly my guide starts getting nervous – he has discovered a GT of some 30 kg in the flats. Unfortunately it is too lazy to take the lure and swims off leaving a big bow wave behind it.

On the way back to the boat we find a dead squid in the bushes being devoured by the crabs. It is a good three meters long. On the way back we make a short stop for 10 minutes and catch 2 snappers for the crew’s dinner on jigs.

13th and last day:

Today we concentrate entirely on popper fishing. Yet again we see hunting tunas but unfortunately they are out of our casting reach. A large reef shark of over 2 metres in length attacks my popper in the channel – just missing it. At high tide during the afternoon the action starts: in only 2 hours we catch seven small and one large GT! A grouper takes the lure and dashes straight back into its den – that was the second time the line snapped while popper fishing.

Today we free a turtle from a rogue fishing net. We also observe manta rays hunting; suddenly, when the popper is being retrieved, a sailfish swims straight under the boat, turns around, stops for a second – a magic moment which will long be remembered.

Fishing Summary:

Due to the awful conditions the popper fishing in the first week was very tough. I was latter to learn that the previous week a group of Asian anglers had wiped the atoll clean with their poppers. As compensation, however, the sailfish angling was absolutely world class. Their estimated weights were super, too. Of the 22 fish caught only very few weighed less than 70 pounds. I estimate that the largest one was in the 120 pound category.

  • The combination of trolling and popper fishing meant there was never a dull moment and was very efficient!
  • In the 2nd week I concentrated on popper fishing for 90% of the time but the GT fishing was really hard going (at least on our atoll). The fish were extremely timid and overly cautious.

The current abundance of fish in the Maldives is in my humble opinion simply gigantic. I think you would have to look long and hard to find anything similar. 

Summary of the Boats and Crews:

You mustn’t raise the bar too high in this respect. Yet the question must be asked why they have so little experience and have learned next to nothing in the course of time? The skippers and cooks know their business completely. Decent tackle is non-existent, you simply have to bring all the gear with you and make the best of it.

Hibaru I:

This vessel is suitable for day charters: 1-2 anglers but not for covering any great distances out to the waypoints. Not recommended for trips lasting several days. Its greatest disadvantage is its lack of speed (6 knots maximum). You lose too much fishing time. The hygienic conditions are also very poor and you need a good sense of balance to keep safely on your feet.

Kandi Hibaru:

Ideal for fishing safaris! Recommended for a maximum of 3-4 fishermen as it has plenty of space available and enough room to sleep at night. The skipper and his cook are good at their jobs; the crew has (in my opinion) very little angling experience.

Hotel Boat:

Ideal for day charters. Good skipper, bad crew. Boat’s engine absolutely sufficient. The vessel is in a very well-cared for condition. The charter price is about the same as the Hibaru I. Its highlight is the large roof from which to cast your poppers.

The Maldives are not only a paradise for divers. With good preparation and a decent guide, light-tackle and fly fishermen can enjoy some defining moments in this area. The variety of species is fascinating; the fishing beats and opportunities are gigantic and (apparently) inexhaustible. The Maldives are also a location where “Fishing and Family” are compatible and where everyone has a good time.

Stephan Kreupl, November 2007