Hunting Big Blue - Mauritius Feb 2000(Published in Scotland on Sunday in an edited form on 2nd April 2000 titled "Devil in the Deep Blue") I spent the final few
weeks before I left on the Internet tracking tropical
cyclonic disturbances. The biggest was Connie; a monster storm even
by tropical standards and its outer arms had lightly kissed the island.
Connie was cyclone number three for the year so far in the Indian Ocean
and as my departure date drew nearer, I was following Tropical Cyclonic
Disturbance Leon
closely: Leon was number eleven so that gives an impression of just how
busy these weeks were weather-wise in the Indian Ocean. But it’s a
huge area, and the chances of a cyclone landing squarely on Mauritius
and spoiling my trip were, hopefully, slim. Luckily Connie had not done too
much damage. In actual fact, the effect was mostly beneficial as the
island was deluged by several inches of much needed rain which
replenished the reservoirs For those who have never been, Mauritius is a mixed up kind of place. The Portuguese “found” it first followed by the Dutch (who ate the Dodo to extinction), then the French and finally the British. The population, however, reflects none of these national characteristics very strongly and is a blend of African, Indian and Chinese races. The road signs are all in English, which is the “official” language, they drive on the left and the most common bird is the familiar British house sparrow.
Overall, though, the whole Mauritian experience
is very, very French, which is the actual spoken language for the vast
bulk of the population. That and Creole of course.
There are Hindu temples and Catholic shrines everywhere. Just
offshore there are two islands: Round Island which isn’t round and has
snakes and Snake Island which is a perfect hemisphere and has no snakes.
Like I said, a mixed up place, but it all kinda works and the people
seem to rub along just fine. It had been nine years since my
last visit and what a change there was in the place. A new dual
carriageway (grandly named the M1) runs virtually all the way from the
airport to the main tourist area of Grand Baie in the north;
neo-skyscraper office buildings have sprouted in the capital Port-Louis
(which I remembered as a mono-storied, bustling market town); there are
now Kentucky Fried Chicken outlets; brand new BMW’s, Mercedes and
Toyotas are everywhere replacing the old Ford Capri’s, Morris Oxfords
and Austin Allegros of before. Grand Baie has become a riot of swanky
designer clothing and jewellery boutiques where island rum is giving way,
tragically, to the scourge of narcotics in certain nightspots. Yep,
Mauritius has got western style civilisation, bad. Mind you, it is still a pretty
safe place to walk at night and the beer has improved immeasurably. The
currency is the Rupee and at around 42 to the pound, Mauritius is
neither expensive nor exclusive these days. There has been a massive change
in the general environment, sadly for the worse. What used to be
turquoise, crystal-clear waters are now turquoise, milky waters. Where
there were shell covered unspoilt beaches, there is now litter and
crowds on the beach. Where there was bird song there is now the
throbbing background of dance music. Mauritius is the new Millennium
Marbella – at least in Grand Baie. But who am I to judge a people
trying their best to make a living from tourism? Paradise lost or modern
lifestyles found: depends on which side of the poverty divide you are
standing really. All of the island isn’t like
this of course, and there are still unspoilt beaches, secluded coves and
coral reefs where the surreal coloured fish and the graceful mantas soar.
Hopefully, these will remain pristine. But I wasn’t here to do the
tourist thang (or the environmentalist thang for that matter). I was here to Hunt Big Blue. The
waters around Mauritius are a Mecca for big game anglers, particularly
those sad people who, like me, are obsessed by blue marlin. This
massive, magnificent game fish grows up to 1500lbs in these waters and I
had just 5 days to get me one. As well as blue marlin, there are black
marlin, sailfish, spearfish, dorado, wahoo (named after the Hawaiian
island of Oahu, not the sound you make when you catch one), tuna and,
inevitably, shark. Loch Long it isn’t and that’s the great thing
about Mauritius: you’re sure to catch something, blue marlin or not. I had arrived at 10.00 am local
time after a 17 hour journey (Sunday overnight) from Glasgow (booked via
Air France but strangely none of the planes were actually operated by
Air France – the first being Jersey European to Paris and the second
being Air Mauritius) and I was due on the boat by 1.00 pm. Action Man or
just plain nuts – you decide. First I checked into my hotel,
the Veranda
Bungalows and it was pleasant enough. Pleasant, that is, apart from
the squadrons of mosquitoes laying in wait for me in my room. Luckily
the porter provided me with a mosquito killer and the room had a ceiling
fan rather than air conditioning, which I always think is better as the
mossies can’t seem to fly too well in a stiff breeze. Needless to say
I had the thing turned up constantly to cyclone Connie level. It was
like sleeping in a scene from Apocalypse Now. “This is the end…”
haunted my dreams.
The first day passed with a near
miss as a sailfish was raised and teased towards the lures. It’s huge
scythe-like tail sliced through the waves as it shot forward and swirled
at the lures. But it didn’t strike so day one remained blank. I had
never before seen a billfish in the water and it was very exciting to
see the tailfin and the bronze shape below the lures, so close to the
boat too. On day two we hit a big wahoo of
50lb within one hour of leaving shore. Wahoo are a long, cigar-shaped
tube of solid muscle with a collection of interlocking razors at the
front end where most normal creatures have teeth. It’s unusual to hang
onto them without a wire trace on the line, but this one stuck and
someone was in for a feast that night: wahoo are delicious eating. The
wahoo was followed quickly by two dorado (even more delicious) and then
three bonito tuna (kinda tough but good in a curry). The wahoo that I
have caught before have all been on light tackle but this one was on the
heavy marlin rod and 135lb test line; it was more of a winch it in type affair
rather than the long searing runs I had come to expect from wahoo. But no marlin. Two of the other
Sportfisher boats had billfish: a marlin of 140 lbs and a sailfish of
72lbs. There were lots of birds out there and where there are birds
there are shoals of tuna and where there are tuna, there are marlin.
Hopes were still high. A torrential downpour started
that evening which carried on into the night. You know the effect of
throwing cold water on sauna rocks? Well imagine it over a few hundred
square miles and you’ll get an idea of just what happened to the
temperature and humidity. The mossies loved it!
The unusual thing about these fish was that both of them disgorged some of their prey when brought aboard. The fish they had been feeding on were tiny: only an inch or so long. Yet they had both taken big marlin lures with some authority. At the boat dock later, I heard
a Scots voice. Another answered this voice and I eariwigged until I
discovered that the voices came from two Edinburgh guys. Stu, an
electrician, was fishing here for his eleventh year and Brian, a
nightclub owner, was his fishing buddy on this trip. They were both on
one of the other boats in the Sportfisher fleet (there are five boats in
the fleet – all immaculate). What a small world. It was great to
blether to someone who understood what you were saying the first time
you said it (I subscribe to the British School of Linguistics: speak
slowly, very loudly and say everything twice). We drank a lot of local
beer and the owner of the fleet, Benoit (pronounced Ben-wa) invited us
all for a Barbie the next night at his house. Haud me back says I… On the way to the Barbie, I passed the local fish market where marlin and sailfish that had been caught that day were being butchered. It wasn't a pretty sight (or smell) with swarms of flies all over the fish. Interestingly, some of the locals were taking away the intestines of the fish. Perhaps it was to make soup - but for all I know it could have been a remedy for mouth ulcers or just plain cat-food.. Marlin are not wasted on this island, that's for sure and the local specialty is smoked marlin which is delicious. But it was, nonetheless, a sad sight to see these magnificent game-fish being unceremoniously chopped up by the roadside. Benoit and his wife Karen were
fabulous hosts. The wine flowed, the doradao was barbequed, the ritual
slavering commenced. Stu came up with the fabulous idea of an All
Scottish Big Game Angling Tournament to be held in Mauritius next year.
Not as dumb as it might sound, get a couple of sponsors, some journos to
cover it, fly the saltire on all the boats: brilliant! Talking to
Benoit, you had to admire the man. He built the business from scratch
and for many years he lived on the boats as well as chartered them. His
business is now thriving, thankfully, and we swapped stories of building
something from scratch and how friends and relatives never appreciate
just how much it costs you personally. That day had been strange: we
trolled and trolled and trolled all day for almost nothing. Occasionally
we saw small groups of birds shadowing dorado’s, but the fish were not
temptable. Man, it was boring! Then we saw some birds and we headed
over. Suddenly, behind one of the lures a bronze shape appeared. I could
see it clearly in the water. It flitted between the lures like a
hummingbird at a bunch of flowers. And then it was gone. Jean Francois hand-lined the
lures in and we found the leader abraded on one and the plastic scored
on another. The fish had knocked the lures about with its bill but
didn’t actually take them. 10 minutes later, we spotted a
huge flock of birds on tuna and we headed over. On the way, Michel said
“Oook!” and nodded vaguely towards a passing oil tanker. I agreed
sagely; an "oook" was it eh? Bruno explained: “Oook” was the Creole name
for a large dolphin like creature (false killer whales I reckoned) and
Bruno described them as “a very dangerous feesh. You hook a marlin and
they eat it!”.
My last day and I had a thick
head from the wine the night before. The marlin were proving scarce this
week. Now, last week, that was different. They had eight or more marlin.
This week though, things were slow with only three on the scales. At precisely 8.20 am local time,
Big Blue whacked the lure on the starboard outrigger. The clip snapped
like a gunshot and there was a huge splash behind the boat. We all
jumped up and the crew started shouting in Creole. The cry “Mahli,
mahli, mahli” was raised as around eight feet of blue, green and gold
aggression shot out of the water like a Trident missile. We had hooked
our first blue marlin of the week! And then we hadn’t. One of the million-and-one things that can go wrong when you fish for marlin, suddenly went wrong and the hook came free. Big Blue was gone, but not before she whacked the lure on the opposite outrigger on her way. I fancied it was a show of defiance – can’t catch me suckers! I
suspect that it came off because Michel had missed the strike: the
skipper must accelerate the boat to set the hook and we had all been
taken by surprise with the ferocity and suddenness of the strike. But I
could be wrong, what with all the pandemonium, and how can you blame a
man who smiles so much? We shrugged
and carried on. Within 10 minutes a big bronze shape appeared behind the
lures. Everyone on the boat was shouting and pointing and willing the
thing to take but… nothing. Michel swung the boat around and went back
over the area. Once again a bronze shape appeared behind the lures and
we all started roaring at it to take. For 30 seconds it stayed bronze
and then it changed to a dark blue, almost black as the aggression in
the fish built up and it charged forward, slamming into the lure.
Michel gunned the engine to set the hook and we were in! Bruno shouted
“Sailfeesh!” - so it wasn’t a marlin, but it was the next best
thing. They got the harness on me,
settled me in the fighting chair and I fought my prize. It was strong;
Bruno reckoned it was 80-100 lbs and that’s a respectable sailfish. I
had it to within 40ft or so of the boat and the gaffs came out. “No
gaffs!” I said. I’m a catch and release man - no-one was killing
this fish as long as it was able to swim away with only a sore mouth.
There was some debate in Creole and then Bruno said “Ok – we see how
she’s hooked”. Fair enough, I nodded agreement and Bruno went off to
get the camera. Then the line went sickeningly
slack as the hook hold gave way and the fish got off. But that’s the thing about
being committed to catch and release: you can get to make up your own rules.
For example, I have no official definition of exactly how far away the
fish has to be before I release it. This one was rather further away
than ideally I would have liked: a long distance release if you will.
But I’m counting it as a catch! We teased it, saw it strike, hooked it
and fought it. So what if it got away 5 minutes before the intended
time? It was a billfish and it was a near-perfect end to a near-perfect
week! The radio crackled into life and Benoit told us that Stu had caught a marlin, so he was a very happy bunny. On the way back, half a mile and
half an hour from port, a marlin struck a lure on another Sportfisher
boat that was running parallel to us, about one hundred yards away. It
stayed on too and they stopped to fight it. One hundred yards from the
dream outcome: a marlin on my way home. The lucky angler had paid a
quarter share to join a trip and hadn’t even chartered the boat
himself. He got off the boat singing “We are the champions…” Stu’s fish was small, only
140lbs or so and they had killed it. “Child killer” I accused and he
looked at his feet sheepishly. “Och, Benoit wanted to christen the new
boat for me” he offered in defence. I laughed and he poured the wine.
After a few (well, a lot) I tottered off to get a shower, check out of
my hotel and start the long trip home. I missed my family lots and couldn’t wait to see them, but I was sad to go. It was a great week, spent with great people, on great boats using great gear and fishing in great waters. What more could a man ask.
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