Wilderness Island Day 1

Woke up in the morning and went to have breakfast at a cafe in town. Dropped into a tackle shop and bought a popper, 2 stickbaits that Brett recommended. Hopefully, they'll catch me a fish!

We proceeded to a yard where Jim (the Wilderness Island owner/operator) normally uses to load stuff. We began to load the boat with our kayaks and things to bring over to Wilderness Island. I'm amazed how much stuff we packed onto the boat and still have room for taking passengers. 2 Hobie Pro Anglers and 2 Revo 13's were put on the boat and lots of our belongings, fishing gear and also food and cases and cases of beer!

After we finished loading up, Jim said we had to wait for the wind to die down a bit before crossing over to the camp. So we waited till around 1pm when he gave the go ahead. He launched the boat at the marina and all 10 of us, yes 10, got onto the boat. Some of the other guys were wearing raincoats and all sorts of protection from the spray. I was expecting like the usual occasional seaspray like in Desaru so I wasn't too bothered. Boy, was I wrong!

When we exited the marina, the wind was blowing and swells were quite high. Because of all the gear, the boat was sitting rather low near the waterline and when the boat moved through the waves, buckets and buckets of water just came splashing over! Within 5mins, I was completely soaked to the bone! And this continued for about 45mins. When we passed almost the halfway point, the wind died down a bit and we didn't get as much spray as the first part of the journey.

When we reached the island, we began unloading all the stuff and by the time we finished unloading, my Columbia shirt was already dry! Awesome!

There was an ATV with a trailer that brought all the stuff to the main camp grounds. Scotty showed me the kayak that I'll be using for this trip, which is a Hobie Outback. Too bad it didn't come with Turbo Fins on the the MirageDrive, only the standard fins.

We then launched our kayaks and began pedalling our way to the camp grounds. Got into the kayak and began pedalling. The Outback was rather wide and with the winds still blowing, I was trying to get a feel of the balance of the kayak. Couple of times, I almost lost balance when a swell just pushed the kayak around.

Real sloppy conditions!!

After a 20mins pedal, we reached our accomodations. Beached the kayak and went up to the "House". The House is basically where everybody hangs out, have meals and drinks and get the fishing gears ready. The place looks awesome,

 Welcome to Wilderness Island!

We were assigned our cabins and I got one that was furthest away from the House, bunking with Herman. Jim was kind enough to ferry our stuff to our cabins. There were 2 bunk beds but only 2 of us, so we each took the bottom bed. After sorting out our stuff, we headed back to the House. Met up with the other 3 anglers at Wilderness Island which were Andy, John and Glenn.

Jim gave us a short briefing on the House rules at the Island. He told us to be liberal in applying the "Bushman" brand insect repellent spray to deter the sandflies from biting. John told me that I had better wear a T-shirt inside my Columbia fishing shirt as the ventilating flap behind will actually allow the sandflies to creep in and bite. Sound advice!! Luckily I brought an extra T-shirt and my face wrap. Man, the flies are everywhere! Looks like I'll have to be covered up from head to toe 24/7 for this trip.

There was also a "Wall of Shame" blackboard at the kitchen area. It was explained to me that for the whole duration of the trip, any angler that does the following, will get a point:
a. loses a lure
b. breaks something
c. forgets the House rules

and a whole host of other funny rules! At the end of the trip, the angler with the most points gets to wear a pink dress for a whole day!

After the briefing, I began setting up all my fishing gear. Then Brett told me that he's going to go for a quick session down the beach, at the North End rockwall, flicking lures. I decided to join him.

Armed with my TCurve paired with Shimano Stradic Ci4, I packed a couple of lures and followed him. We walked for about 10mins to the north end of the beach where there was rocky outcrop and began casting lures off the rock edge. Straight away Brett was hooked onto a small Queenfish. I tied on my Rapala Subwalk lure and began casting also. After casting about 10 times, I got my first hit! Woohoo! I tried to control the fish so that my line won't be cut by the sharp rocks around and up came a nice Black-Spotted Grouper. Yay, my first fish at Wilderness Island! I realised that I forgot the crush the barbs on the trebles but managed to unhook them and after a quick photo, the fish was released.

Proceeded to crush the barbs and continued fishing. About 5mins later, just as the lure was about 5m from the me, a fish came out and grabbed the lure! Fish ON! This was a smaller specimen and I quickly reeled it in. It was a small Mangrove Jack! Nice colors, reflecting off the sunset.

As sunset approached, we started making our way back to the main deck. Pretty good fishing for 30mins! We then had dinner which was amazing, prepared by Joel.

As the other anglers were having drinks after dinner, I decided to take a shower. There's only 1 shower in the whole camp and it was wonderful! Totally open air, on the beach and has hot saltwater shower. Felt a bit weird showering in saltwater but it felt great after that! Didn't even use soap and I didn't even feel sticky after that!
Went back to the main deck again for a chat and Scott said that they will decide on where to fish tomorrow depending on what the winds are like in the morning. So I decided to head back to the cabin at 1045pm. The walk back to the cabin was in total darkness except for the buzzing flies and the clear skies above! it was just beautiful, seeing the whole sky lighted up with all the stars. Paradise!
I did have my head lamp so managed to make my way back. Can't wait for what's in store for tomorrow!