Lakshadweep…

Survived an extreme adventure in India in the Lakshadweep Islands. So much has changed in two years. Heavy commercial fishing around the main base of Bangaram has made the fishing tough. Very little bait fish and the bigger predators have moved. We had to “endure” 6 days living and fishing off an open deck to reach the outer reefs some 100 miles distant often travelling at night, sleeping rough on an open deck, at 8 knots. Thank God it did not rain and the sea was relatively calm most of the time. Once there we anchored in quiet lagoons, sea water for a “bath” after a hot day of action.

The fishing, both surface popping and jigging, was exceptional at times for big GT’s, blue trevally and grouper with GT’s to 40kg. Food was good but levels of comfort as basic as it can get… not for the faint hearted. Would I do it again.. NO. The group were great, caught a lot of quality fish but generally were of the same opinion. Eric is crazy about big GT’s and loves the extreme. He is a non stop “popper” and has many huge GT’s to his name. His expertise proved a real bonus on this trip.

Havelock in the Andaman Islands off the east coast of India offers good standards of accommodation, better faster boats, short distances to very good fishing and sport is about as good. It is a No Brainer.!!! Andaman next time.!

Martin J Founds with the team of Rob, Daryl, Mike and Captain Roy plus top French GT expert.. Eric.

My recent recce trip with my friend Dr Harmohan Khanna.

We fished with Qutub who runs Captain Hook Andaman Sport Fishing out of Havelock in the Andaman Islands.
Qutub has three excellent boats that comfortably fish 2 to 3 anglers fishing for a wide variety of species. This is a good value set up for serious anglers in search of big GT’s and a variety of species. We stayed at the 3 star Dolphin Resort just 2 miles from the marina. Excellent facilities, bar and restaurant serving good value food. Air conditioned rooms, small gym and nice rooms. They have bicycle hire for just £1 per day and the island is great for sightseeing when not out fishing.. Havelock Island is very scenic and nice white sandy beaches. Radhanager Beach is one of the nicest on the island but Govind Nagar and Kala Pathar are really nice too. Good choice of restaurants on this friendly and attractive island.

My choice of restaurants would be:
Coco Restaurant, Fat Martin’s, Red Snapper at Wild Orchid and Dolphin Resort restaurant were amongst my favourites. I really like Indian food and what is great about these well run restaurants is the fact they will tailor make your menu to your own tastes – designer curries – great.!

Fishing:
We caught Bluefin trevally’s, GT’s, Spanish Mackerel, coral trout, barracuda, red snapper and small grouper. We surface popped, casting sub surface action lures into bait balls, jigging, trolling and some bottom fishing. This was only my second time fishing in the Andaman’s and so I am still on a learning curve. A couple of experienced Swedish anglers had some big GT action on poppers with Qutub. Nothing big for us but they are certainly there to be caught and released…….John Founds.