I had the pleasure of fishing in New Caledonia with Le Poisson Banane in October. Before I get started though, a little recap from my last trip. Last time I fished in New Caledonia a number of different factors made for an incredibly difficult trip. The number of GT's caught throughout the week between three anglers could almost be counted on one hand, we had bad weather, GPS problems and had to cut the trip a day short due to fuel constraints as we'd used so much trying to simply find some fish that were biting. When I asked Rudy what was the worst trip they'd ever done he looked at me hesitantly and said, "....maybe this one?".... oh well, a great time was still had. You would almost think that it's enough to put you off a certain destination but it had the opposite effect, it just fueled my desire to return even more and fish New Caledonia the way New Caledonia should be experienced with LPB.

So return I did. A little later than I had originally anticipated though! I was however a little dissapointed to find out a week prior that Tak, Brandon and Konishi-San's trip, which was supposed to be the same week as ours had been canceled due to mechanical problems on the Antares. I was looking forward to meeting Tak and Brandon and seeing Konishi-San again whom I'd meet the month prior at the Montebello Islands here in Western Australia but it was not to be. Joining me on this trip was a good mate from Karratha and member of this forum Karl Nelson and long time fishing partner Glenn Hall.

Gear Used:

Rods: Carpenter Monster Hunter MH80H & 79XH, Carpenter Coral Viper CV79/40, Ripple Fisher GT78PF, Ripple Fisher Oceanic 86, Smith WRC 77-HIIB Rocket, Hots Tide Lez 78XXXH
Reels: Shimano Stella SW18000HG, Daiwa Saltiga Dogfight 6500, Shimano Stella 10000SW
Line: Varivas Avani GT PE8 & PE10
Leader System: PR Knot, Varivas Shock Leader 170lb & 200lb

Day One:
The first morning we woke to fantastic weather, it was warm, humid and there was a very light breeze causing only a small ripple on what was a dead flat ocean with zero swell. We headed south from Koumac and began fishing a beautiful island inside the lagoon that had an exposed fringing reef that dropped off to around 10m. The ground was incredibly familiar to the areas I fish back home and it was a nice experience. As we made a slow drift along the edge we didn't raise much interest apart from a few small school mackerel so we headed south to a nice looking shoal. Rudy spotted a school of nervous fusiliers so we all cast, anxious to capture the first GT of the trip. It was pandemonium, my pencil got monstered instantaneously on touchdown but the fish failed to find hooks and Glenns stickbait had a real nice follow by a good sized fish but no strike. The GT's went quiet, despite the presence of the fusilier school still easily visible so we changed location. We had a few more strikes but still failed to get a solid hookup and then things went quiet. I switched to a Sea Frog 110 light in the hopes that the smaller lure would entice the GT's more and entice it did. It wasn't long before a decent fish inhaled the offering and a nice solid hookup. A nice fight ensued but unfortunately I pulled the hooks boat side. Lunchtime passed and still no GT's had hit the deck, despite a consistent amount of action. We decided to move from the lagoon to the outside of the reef but by this time the wind had changed to a westerly and completely shut down the fishing. But boy was it calm, on the outside there was barely a wave breaking on the reef. We persisted and it was mid afternoon by the time I finally hooked a solid fish. This time it didn't get off and a nice fish around 30kg made it's way onto the deck... finally! It was pretty close to start heading back in and we made our way closer to Koumac. Karl proceeded to land a mini GT and I felt quite content having landed the biggest fish of the day. Rudy made the call for final 10 casts. I think it was probably on about Glenns 8th cast and bam! He came up solid. This fish was foul hooked, and just about broke Glenn... not an ideal first GT for the trip... but after a very tough slug up came a nice GT around 35kg... damn, pipped at the post. This evening back at Koumac I noticed the wind pick up considerably, unusual for NC according to Rudy, and I tried not to think about the following day, beer aided with this.

Day Two:
Well, what else can I say, we woke up to Hell. On. Earth. The anemometer at the marina read a consistent 30 knots and the gusts would have been at least 40 knots. Spray jackets on, and onwards we pushed. "Only lagoon today", was Rudy's call - we were happy to oblige. The only fortunate thing about today was that the GT's were a lot more active, and with a few solid fish on the deck before 9am it almost made the horrendous wind bearable. We had a consistent array of GT's to around 25kg throughout the day which was quite enjoyable and then Glenn hooked a considerably better fish off a stunning island. After a really nice fight Glenn boated a rather respectable fish which Rudy called for 38kg. Shortly after, we fished a really nice looking shoal which Rudy said always produces so we were all eager to get our lures in. 3 casts all just about synchronised made their way into the water, Karl hooked up first and then Glenn proceeded to crank his popper in at 100kph to avoid a tangle upon which a nice GT smashed his popper in spectacular fashion. Double hookup! I continued to work mine and had an average GT come up and smash it but missed the hookup, nearly 3 rods bending! After the two fish were both landed and some pics taken things went quiet so we moved on and fished some isolated bommies just inside the outer reef. It was here that I saw the biggest coral trout I've ever seen in my life come up on Karls popper and we landed another couple of average GT's... Extremely tired from fishing in terrible weather all day we made the call to run home early, "Wind direction very bad", according to Rudy, which made for a very wet trip home.

Day Three:
Day three Rudy decided to head north. With a very strong southerly, marginally less than the day prior, it was actually a very nice dry ride in the Edgewater with a following sea. We fished some very rough reefs inside the lagoon for marginal interest before heading for some calmer, protected water close to Malabou. We proceeded to fish some ground that to me, didn't look like your typical GT ground. It was very calm, mangrove-lined islands with no obvious signs that you would normally suspect to find GT’s. We began by casting toward the island and then Rudy directed us to cast in the opposite direction. It was very difficult to see in the overcast conditions but there was actually a shallow reef. My 230g bigfoot touched down, one sweep and BAM! Surface explosion and fish on.  It was a nice relief to be able to fight a fish in nice calm conditions which almost seemed a little foreign by this point. A nice fish around the 28-30kg came up and it was good to land a nice fish in trying conditions. We then made the call to do some light tackle fishing while the GT’s were quiet. Glenn proceeded to knock over a number of fish including small trout and spangled emperor before we broke for lunch. We then got back into the GT fishing and fished against some cliffs that were part of the mainland. It was directly exposed to the horrendous south east wind and the water was choppy as hell. It proved surprisingly productive and it wasn’t long before Glenn knocked over an average fish that belted his pencil close to the boat in an awesome display. Shortly after, my bigfoot was annihilated by a better than average fish but pulled the hooks during an impressive run. We persisted a little longer for not many results before deciding to make the very long journey back to Koumac, directly into the 30kt+ south easterly.

Day Four:
Headed south again, this time further than we did on Day One. A good decision since the mornings are calmer and it’s nice to come home with the wind as it increases throughout the day. We began by fishing a shoal inside the lagoon but this proved not very fruitful. We decided to see what hell looked like on the outside and were very surprised to see that it was a lot more fishable than the lagoon... this was an exciting sign. The question didn’t even need to be asked where we would spend the remainder of the day. It’s worth noting that it was still some of the most difficult water I’ve ever had to pop in. We spent the rest of the morning and afternoon popping the outside of the reef, my memory of this part of the trip is a little sketchy but it was a tough slog, the weather made popping even more exhausting than it usually is and the GT’s had a lock jaw. We did get a few average GT’s, and I landed a personal best Coral Trout on popper and a Malabar Groper around 30kg which was fun. In fact, I was the Malabar Groper king, as I had caught about 5 at this point of trip to Karl & Glenns 0. Not an achievement that you particularly want!

Day Five:
I woke up on Day 5, whole body aching, and hesitantly dragged myself out of bed... head throbbing from too many Number Ones the night prior. I braced myself to look out the window, expecting to see palm trees bent sideways as per the previous 3 days but my heart almost skipped a beat when I saw the trees barely moving. Headache just about vanished instantly and the adrenalin made the aches and pains in my body disappear... yessss! Quick shower and then woke up the other boys to share the good news. When Rudy arrived his first comment was priceless... “The weather gods have answered your prayers”. We headed straight to the outer reef directly adjacent to Koumac and began fishing North, picking up exactly where we left off from Day Four. My memory from this day is a little sketchy also, I guess that’s what happens when you catch so many fish and it’s almost like a brain overload. The total tally for the day was 24 GT’s, exactly equal to my previous best day with Nomad at Bugatti reef... although it’s worth noting that the average size of the NC fish was considerably larger. A couple of remarkable things occurred this day, the first being that the two last GT’s of the entire trip were the two biggest at 55kg and 42kg respectively. Talk about leaving it to the last minute. The other being that after Rudy commented that it was a great opportunity to film GT strikes due to the consistent activity, I pulled my camera out to try get a strike for the first time this trip. I filmed Glenn for about three casts then stopped and filmed Karl and it was his very first cast when he hooked the 55kg monster. I will make a video clip, when I get around to it. For anyone who is interested, the fight time was 10min 30sec. Also another interesting fact, LPB record is 25 GT’s.

A HUGE shoutout to LPB. As always they put in an impeccable effort to put us onto good fish and although on some days 80% of the ground was unfishable we still fished ground that was highly productive and never fished the same spots twice, always travelling to new ground every day. Thanks to Karl and Glenn for the laughs and making this the best GT trip I’ve been on   8)