CR: LG Training Camp

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I've just recoded entirely the "music player" that's in the sidebar.

The code I'm using now is something like this.

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The good thing about this is that it allows you great control and even greater room for expansion, so be prepared for some new features in the near future.

LorryGang

Lorry Gang Secret Training Camp

Attendees:
BlueStream
Icebomb
Gary Lim
Malau
Nick
Oldman
Vin Tan

Location:
See heading

Time:
07:00hrs Day 1 -> 12:00hrs Day 2


For me, the day started the night before as I couldn't sleep properly. Days spent tying rigs during classes, had left me a great deal of choice in the rigs that i wanted to bring.

And so the day began...

I woke up at about 4am on DDay, reeling from the lack of sleep, yet happy to get up.

After a quick and cold shower, I got myself ready and after about 2hrs of lazing around, I carried my really heavy gear over to Nicks where Vin was supposed to pick us up.

I finally reached Nicks', exhausted from the heavy lifting.

I had brought along:
All the fishing gear I had plus 20 size 2 and 20 size 3 sinkers, 10 of each which were for Ice. I also brought along a big foldable chair, four rods, four rod stands, a bubu, change of clothes, mess tin, wax for cooking, mess tin stand, all the rest of my fishing gear, etc...

Our spirits were high as we made our way to the spot.

When we arrived, we saw that we had the whole place to ourselves.

Everybody quickly unpacked and soon most of our rods were standing proud and tall. No pun intended. :D:P

It was about noon on the first day when I heard my 12ft rod begin to release out line. Then it began to bend till it almost bent 90° but the line wasn't coming out fast enough to ease the strain on the rod and it was already at the lowest possible drag. So, not knowing what it was, I struck figuring if it was some kind of sea creature, I could foul hook it. And if there wasn't any, it was time to change the bait anyway and I always strike before changing baits. :D

Wham! It was like striking against a brick wall. With max drag on, line would occasionally peel off the reel. But there was no feeling. None of that brilliant twitching that you get with a fish on. And relatively speaking, the line was coming in rather easily. So it was unlikely that it was a fish.

And indeed it wasn't. It was the biggest clump of seaweed I'd ever seen, stuck all over the legs of my home-made anti-sangkut grip sinker.

Then my other 9ft rod began to do the same thing. Annoyed that I was probably going to be occupied with removing seaweed for the rest of the day, I rebaited up my 12ft rod, ignored the 9ft rod, and took my remaining two rods, both 6ft, to another location.

Gary had also by now had 2 sangkuts at almost the same spot as me.

Almost everyone else, save for Vin, had by now shifted to another spot. Nick also had cast out his medium light action rod already while he netcasted for baitfish.

It wasn't long before Gary caught a flathead on dead prawns.

While wading through the relatively shallow waters at this new spot, I spotted a half eaten fish, rotting in the water. It looked a bit like an Ang Chor Kee est at around 500 grams. Before it was eaten of course.

Intrigued that I might find more of them, I waded around a litlle more. And indeed I did find some interesting stuff. There were a number of crab claws that littered the sea bed that were big enough to eat. But, I passed. :P

I also found another half eaten Ang-Chor-like fish est at around 400 grams.

While I stood there wondering what happened here and more importantly, if any of their parents or relatives were still around, I noticed a baby stingray right next to my feet. It had a dark cobalt skin and it wasn't moving so I motioned for Gary to pass me my rod stand which had a triangle at the bottom instead of the usual blunt end.

SpearFishing, LG style. Well, it was actually more BlueStream style. :P But then Gary suggested I let it live instead and then the hunter in me disappeared and Dr Rational took his place and I was like, "Crap! What was I thinking?!".

So I tried to scare it away with my foot but it didn't move. It was dead.

So I left with a great many questions still burning in my mind.

Nick had finished his run in getting some bait and was about to do some distance casting with his 6ft rod. As he so well put it, he walks the distance to cast. He walked out about 30-40 metres as it was still relatively shallow(at this point we also realised just how shallow the waters that we cast at were).

As he was walking back after his distancecasting, releasing line as he went along, before he could even put the rod into the rod holder or adjust the drag, he felt a heavy take. Since he was using circle hooks, he didn't need to strike.

As Nick experienced it:

So I just followed where the unidentified object was taking me. It took me for a ride alright, all this while I was releasing the drag bit by bit. There was never a let up in it's pulling power. I thought to myself, "Siao liao. I finally met my match... I used to muscle my fish up but now it's payback time....." My first thought was that a big tree trunk could have taken my rig coz if it was a fish there should have been some let up in the run....but with current on its side, I was at a disadvantage....my reel was still screeching....rod bending....simply kinda impossible to reel back this missle....funny thing is that it never changed gear....it just raced all the way.... I had to navigate the water n also over the rest of the kakis lines that were still in the water. It was like a water obstacle course...when I walked to the point of the water breaker, I knew tua kee oredi coz once it goes beyond that i can kiss good bye to the runaway train. bcoz the current is horrendous it makes a sharp turn to the right parallel of the breaker. Then it happened my line was snagged just before the breaker while .the missle itself had gone beyond it. Vin was standing just on the breaker n I knew I couldn't go any further myself for fear of being swept away n bro Gary also warned me of a drop off that he had spotted. So I handed the rod to Bro Vin to carry on the fight....I physically removed the snag... By then, the missle has gone down with the current.... Then the unthinkable happened... another snag... this time it was on the outside of the breaker, where the really strong current was.... Vin tried getting it out but was afraid that my 15lb line and my 9.80 surecatch rod and my boisterous reel would not be able to take the punishment. So he stuck the rod in a hole in the breaker and wasted. Everyone else had by now also come to see the action. I was still on the (safe side) of the breaker when i saw the "live-net" stuck on the sand, left behind by the fast receding waters after only 10 minutes. It was quite a distance away and not wanting to miss any action, I raced to put it back in the water. Then I heard someone yelling. Not loudly at first. Then more voices chimed in. Then there were cheers. "Nick! Nick! Come and see!! It's a Golden Trevally!!" At first I thought they were pulling my leg.. But then, as I got closer to the breaker, to my surprise, I was like, "OMG. That's a nice big fish". I just wanna say, "Thanks to all for the support n help in the process of bringing the fish up".

A boga was brought in to weigh the bugger and it weighed in at about 2.9.KG

By now I was rushing frantically to find any rig that I had premade that was similar to Nick's but alas there was none that felt close enough. I always have this problem. Whatever rig I tie, I can never find one that feels right. Even if it's one I've used before.

I made a new rig and tried my luck with the exact same bait as Nick's, a 5cm fish that looked like a wah bik. But luck was not with me.

Nick at this point in time was walking his fish. Literally. He had stuck a clip through the bugger and was walking in the sea, looking for a place to park his dog, er, fish. haha...

There were some brilliant takes and as usual, Gary's rod had one super take which gave the sweet sound of a blisteringly fast turning spool. Unfortunately, I was fast asleep in my chair since Ice had sneakily took over my hammock after I went for my pee break.

Vin also caught 8 groupers. They weren't big enough to warrant “damaging” this spot though so although it was big enough to eat, he released 'em.

Then there was the event where Malau's line went slack. But when he tried to tighten up, there was this humongous take that made his reel scream. He was stumped. By the time he regained his composure, the fish had hit a snag. We spent a long time with both playing the waiting game and using brute force but alas the fish never close enough to the surface for us to have a look and the line unfortunately snapped on one of our brute force attempts.

Early in the morning of day 2, irritated that my one and only bubu had not caught anything, I walked out to the same spot where nick had caught his GT and began looking for crabs. I found a flower crab and whacked the bugger with my bubu.

Score 1 for the bubu.

Apart from those earlier groupers, Vin had also caught and released about 4 parrot fish that he had caught while I was BuBuWhacking... :p

Later on, we had a nice BBQ with the rest of the catches (comparitively negligible - after Nick's catch) including some crabs that Nick had caught in his bubu(really caught, unlike mine).

Gary's flathead was tasty too. As was the coconut juice that we squeezed from some coconuts that we had found.

While we were relaxing and some of us were playing Dai Dee, we saw "The Others" coming. No fish were caught by them as at when we left. heehee. :D

The completion of yet another fun trip. :D