2017 / Cook Islands / Aitutaki / Fly fishing for GT – Part 1

In the land of the giants

A big GT on the fly is what every saltwater fly fisherman is dreaming of. I’m fascinated of GT’s since I saw the a video about it on YouTube many years back. Its a brutal non-forgiving fish that you either can tame or he will show you who is the boss on the reef. There is no room for any mistakes and no GT will give you a second chance. GT in the surf… it can’t get any better! Read More

2017 / Cook Islands / Aitutaki / Bonefish fly fishing

2017 / Cook Islands / Aitutaki / Bonefish fly fishing

The biggest asset of Aitutaki in the eyes of a fly fisherman are the bonefish. These silver shadows grow up to massive sizes of more than 20 lbs on Aitutaki and although they are not regularly caught on the fly there is nowhere else in the world a higher chance to catch a double figure bonefish on the fly than on Aitutaki. Because this sizes are common on every flat in numerous sizes.  Read More

2017 / Cook Islands / Aitutaki / Another fly fishing trip to paradise

2017 / Cook Islands / Aitutaki / Another fly fishing trip to paradise

It was long time quite silent around me. I apologise if you got bored to look on an outdated blog but I was and I’m still pretty busy with my job, and .. here it becomes interesting for you, the preparation for another epic fly fishing trip. And finally I got married which is also one of the reasons I can tell you some stories. We finally came back to Aitutaki. Read More

RügenY16 / Fly fishing in ice

5 years ago I went the for the first time to Rügen. Many times I thought not to come back and check out something totally different but I’m coming back year after year because of a unique chance. The chance of the really really big one. It is still waiting for me, unfortunately! Someone is calling it the pike wonderland and that’s actually a pretty sweet description for it. Read More

Los Roques Fly Fishing, The Bonefish Experience

Chapter 3

Bonefish I guess it is one of the few fish out there that make you addicted with just one fish caught. That fish is everything else than boring. If you are reading this, so I suspect you are a fisherman, and you haven’t caught one already you should threw away all your unnecessary tackle an go bonefish fishing. This is the experience every fly fisherman has to experience. Read More

Y12 Cuba, Chapter 1

Cuba Special
Hola Amigos!!!! This story tells about my very first saltwater fly fishing experience back in 2012. A fly fishing journey to Cuba, the country of Fidel Castro, Che Guevara, Cohiba cigars and Havana Club rum. A trip back in the past, feeling a country that hasn’t changed for centuries and fishing remarkable places, catching fish of a lifetime. Read More

Y14 Rügen Pike Adventure, Chapter 1

Day 1

The sun rises over the endless reed beds that are softly blowing in the slight morning breeze. The water is calm and crystal clear. Some small baitfish are swimming around your feed when you wade slowly through the water. Everything seems to be peaceful. But appearance are deceptive……. There is something in the water with bad intention. This is the moment when you focus your attention to just on one thing. Strip line off your reel, lift the rod and cast the your fly. All your senses told you where to cast, you can feel it. You start stripping, 1, 2, 3, 4, a jerk in your line…. and you know this morning becomes a great Read More

Y14 Rügen Pike Fly Adventure

As every year it draws my fellows and me to the north for some for some Baltic pike fly fishing on the archipelago Rügen. Let’s call it a relaxed men’s retreat wade fishing for plenty of toothy critters. The last two years were a hell of a fun with a partially unbelievable good fishery. With the cooling water temperature the big pikes migrate from the open Baltic sea into the archipelago. They can now be found in the deeper water areas and wholes. The journey begins…… now.. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 21 “The End”

The conclusion
What should I say now. I hope, with all my pictures I was able to convey you the beauty and the fascination of the south pacific. It is truly an unbelievable beautiful place on great planet earth and I am really proud to have visited it in my life. All the money I have spent for it, all the worries I survived, all the troubles lay behind, what is left is the memory of the journey of a lifetime. You have to see it before you believe it. What you have seen is just a snapshot of it. There are so many more varieties, the cooks offer, I haven’t shown, simply because I focused on the fishery there only.
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Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 20

The last day
We are now at the end of my Aitutaki fishing journey. I didn’t thought initially, but I made an extra fishing day, especially due to the finally consistent weather with wind from the least problematic direction. And I couldn’t leave that paradise without another day with the hope for another good fishery. It says you should finish when it is the best so I wanted this feeling when leaving Aitutaki. I had this already once at Cuba, fishing for Tarpon. I lost a big one some days before and this was in my mind and It didn’t let me sleep. So I went for it and caught an even bigger Tarpon on the extra day. A big fish on the last day makes a trip totally perfect. So see what happened on Day #8 at Aitutaki. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 19

Day 7
The day I was waiting for the whole trip. The day started as usually with a call from Itu what and where to fish. Itu said something like that the conditions were rough but possible to went outside of the reef. We agreed to went outside of the reef to fish for tuna and mahi mahi. Sushi time!! Screaming reel and fresh sushi with soy sauce were already in my mind but it came completely different. See what happened Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 18

Blue Water Fishing
There is another very interesting kind of fishing you can do at Aitutaki. Far aside of the blue lagoon, outside of the reef Aitutaki offers a paradise for blue water fishery for a big variety of fish. If you want to fish for yellowfin tuna, no problem. Fishing for Wahoo, Barracuda or GT, No problem. Even Marlin or Sailfish shouldn’t be a problem. Caught fish are regularly reported. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 17

Day 6
We are coming to the sixth guided fishing day. Else than the more or less poor last day, this day should be again like Day #4 with a lot of big fish. I mean Day 5 wasn’t totally bad but at Aitutaki you get spoiled with some day where you catch and catch and catch. Also that day?, Rua was again my guide, Itu was still booked by another guide. Although I’m really happy with Rua, I hope that there will be at least one more day fishing with Itu. Why? Not because I thought Itu is better than Rua. No, but you know Itu is Itu, from Itus Bones and I would like to experience also with him. OK, now it starts. 8:30 Rua arrived at Ootu beach, also this time together with Junior. They were pretty hectic because they have seen something…. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 16

DIY Fishing

For DIY fishing Aitutaki offers a big spectrum of possibilities depending where you stay. I can fully recommend Ootu Beach, close to the Airport. Don’t you will not recognize the Airport at all. The advantage there is that you have 3 very good flats directly infront of your house and the reef directly in the back. Everything reachable within 5 min walk and the home flat just 20meters away. But be carefull. DIY fishing for bonefish is not as easy as it might look. Firstly there were a lot of fisherman who tried their luck already, secondly you also have a lot of swimmers and surfers around. The last is less a problem than it might look. The bones are used to it. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 15

Day 5
Day5, and still 8 days on Aitutaki. Slowly I won back my confidence that the luck will be on my side to fish all planned 7 guided days. When I planned the trip I thought the weather would be the least problem in the south pacific. Sometimes you are be wrong. On my fifth day the weather was not perfect either. Still a lot of wind and partially clouds, but the clouds where the smalles problem of all. Of course it made sight fishing for me more complicated but Rua, with whom I was fishing that day, had no problem spotting fish under such conditions. With Itu, we called each other every morning, I agreed with him every morning how we will fish, no matter if he will guide me or Rua. The guide that day was again Rua, joined by Junior, a trainee Guide, and fishing for Bonefish and partially for GT. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 14

The Guides
Bone fishing is a big business on Aitutaki. Depending on the season there are more or less a lot of anglers on the atoll. In terms of guiding you have two options at Aitutaki. Firstly you do have Itu Davey and his guides that offer all kind of fishing. Literally everything you want to do in terms of fishing can be provided by them. No matter of bone fishing, GT fishing, Reef fishing or even offshore fishing with their new 10 meter offshore boat. The second option is Butch Leone who is already guiding on Aitutaki since a lot of years whom you can book fishing inside the lagoon for bonefish and also other species. Since I haven’t fished with him I can’t tell you much about him, just that he is a friendly and competent guide. So my below review is only in respect to Itu and Rua Davey. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 13

Day 4
The fish are getting bigger. This day it was planned to fish again for GT in the hope to get at last the big GT we were after. Itu was unfortunately already booked by another client. It was planned to fish more days with him but the weather really balked my plans. So Rua saved the day once more and came together with Shaka, a funny guy that is also guiding for Itu. The weather was much better than the days before but not fully perfect. At least the wind came from a direction from where the flats where sheltered by the islands. Good but not perfect
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Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 10

Day 3
.. at last. I was close to get a crazy there. Every day wind, wind and even more wind. Finally there came a slightly calmer day. Yuhuu.. Or should I say fuck!!?!?!. I was not the only angler on the island and Itu was already booked. Don’t give up hope, Itu said, and sent me his brother Rua. Yuhuu, lets go fishing. I really had panic that I couldn’t have made my 7 days of guided fishing. But, OK, day 3 was about to start. Quickly for a breakfast and only the cooperation of the bones could stop me now. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 9

Getting There

How to come to the most beautiful place in the world? With all the beauty of the lagoon and the big fishes in mind, as a European, I have to say Aitutaki is really far away. Flying overseas is peanuts, compared to this. Almost 50 hours of travel time, 23.000 km of distance to travel and 12 hours of time difference. If you now ask me if it was worth to do. Definitely yes, it was. I’m even honest that I did such a extreme journey. Whatever comes after will be just a piece of cake. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 8

Day two

My second guided day. This day I was invited to fish with Itu and Rua (brothers) together with a clear target. A Giant Trevally on the fly. I can tell you in front, that was the best guided day I had so far. Each, Itu or Rua, has the ability to spot fish far away and in a very good count. But having four eagle eyes on board was awesome. No fish did escape from our vision. Casting and hooking all of them was a different topic but you will see later. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 7

Giant Trevally

The ultimate gangster of the flats. I was dreaming of GTs since I saw a guy fighting one on the fly rod at Youtube. They grow up to 200 lbs and 150 cm of length. Fighting one is like you hook a truck at full speed. They can make mince meat out of a 12 weight rod with within seconds if the angler is not prepared. There is no room for mistakes when fishing for GTs. And most of all they are very clever. They really know their hunting ground and use every obstacle to fool you. If there is a coral in their way they will use it to get rid of the fly line and at last the hook. Hooking a big one, fighting and land him, then you can say you really reached the peak of what is possible with the fly rod. There is only a handful of fish that can top a Giant Trevally. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 6

Day one

Let me remind to that day….. Its already more than a month ago but I still can remember like it was yesterday. We initially canceled that day fishing because the weather forecast said that it’s too windy. So I went out in the early morning for DIY fishing. I was 10 minutes on the home flat as my girl friend came running with the message that Kaleena, Itu’s wife is on the phone with the message that fishing can start because the weather became better. I think I made the 100 meters on the flat faster than Usain Bolt. On the phone Itu told me that Rua, his brother, is going to fish with me on that day and he will pick me up directly in front of our beach villa. Read More

Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 5

Bonefish

When I think about bonefish immediately a screaming reel comes in my mind. I haven’t seen so far a fish that takes, compared to his size, more line than a bonefish. These are pretty amazing fish. Hard to land, hard to catch and the most of all hard to see. I was fishing for them already in Cuba and they were a miracle already there but in Aitutaki bone fishing comes to its peak, .. for spotting them and especially because of their size. In Aitutaki catching a bigger one, lets say, above 7 pounds is more likely
than catching a small one.
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Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 4

The Fishing

There are many reasons to come to Aitutaki, but if you are a fisherman, the biggest of all reasons is the fishery. The lagoon is full of fish, starting from Bonefish, to several trevally species, triggerfish, milkfish, and many more. And the best, they are all catchable with the fly rod if you know how. The main target fish is the Bonefish. No wonder, the atoll became known and popular for it’s bonefish conservation program. In 2009 the marine resort decided to protect the bonefish population, prohibiting netting for bonefish in the lagoon of Aitutaki, and only allowed catch and release fishery for bonefish. The device was. Get the wolf to protect the sheep. The netting fisherman of the past times are the guides that make fly fishermen’s dream come true.

Aitutaki Flies
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Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 3

The blue Lagoon

Aitutaki is famous about its turquoise-blue lagoon. And this lagoon is so blue that it should be stated in the Duden under true blue. You firstly see the lagoon when you come with the plane. When the plane circles over the lagoon you do see billions of turquoise-blue facets only interrupted by the dark color of the corals blocks, almost white sandy beaches and the green of the palm trees. In that moment I knew that it was worth to come the long way from Europe to the cook islands.

Aitutaki Flies
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Aitutaki Flyfishing, Chapter 1

Introduction

Everything started two years before in Cuba where I got infected by the salt water fly fishing virus for Bonefish and Tarpon. From the first minute it was clear that this was not my last adventure to salt water. Last year we were a little bit unsure where to go so at last we decided to go for a vacation close to our home, firstly to take the dog with, secondly to save for the ultimate trip… for this year Read More