The Kazakhstan SA Protea tour report

This is a personal perspective on the tour from the 5^th to the 13^th of October 2009.

The whole tour started for me whilst I was travelling Zimbabwe with a great fellow angler and friend  Gino Sada looking for venue’s for me to take potential guests to with the small business operation that I run doing guided fishing tours in Africa. A sms came through asking if both of us would be interested in going as part of the Protea team to the World champs to be held in Kazakhstan in 3 weeks time – initially we received information that the tour was going to set each of us back 60k so immediately we were both out but then a few days later we got another SMS to say that it would cost more in the region of 35k and I was more willing to go and take the hit as being able to put Protea colours behind my business would be a good thing – we were also informed that we had a sponsor of 5k towards our tickets. Gino unfortunately had to drop out of the tour due to business and financial reasons.

So now with three weeks to go everything was a mad scramble in getting the arrangements (Travel etc) find out the fish species make contact with the people on the ground, find out what tackle we required etc etc etc. For me I personally did not have the cash to make such a trip and so started canvassing  for sponsors for the trip. I was blown away by many gestures of good will from people and family (A special Thanks to the special family member that also donated 10k)– some people that I did not even know  that had been in similar situations of wanting to attend an international event and just did not have the tin to do so (a special Thanks Mev Spyker Kruger). Then there were many friends and family that said we can’t offer much but here’s a R100 – one cannot believe how much each and every little bit helped me get there – with 5 days to go before flying I was priveledged to get a call from a Sealiner saying that he would like to assist me with a 10k donation towards the trip – wow yet again I was floored – So in injury time I managed to raise all the necessary funds in order to attend.






We were watching the weather in Almaty and daily the temp was 11 -22 deg C so we thought we would be alright with South African autumn winter wear so we packed light. When it came to fishing tackle none of us were very sure what to take and we found that there was a fairly large communication problem between us and the organisers of the event and we could not find out the necessary requirements for us to make the trip successful so for the 5 of us we tried to pack the widest range of tackle that we could. Just Prior to leaving I managed to borrow 2 9ft roads from a close friend and in many ways this was a saving grace for me as these were the rods that produced the goods.

So we packed and 30kgs sounds like lots of stuff but when you put 6 rods in a rod tube and it weighs  8kgs and your reels weigh 10kgs and then you still got lures etc etc and then clothing, step outs, camera’s etc 30 kgs suddenly seems very small. Our flight was scheduled to leave at 13h55 from OR Tambo airport in Johannesburg so we all arrived at the Airport at around 11am only to find that the Plane had been delayed till 17h00 so there was nothing else to do other than sit down and make the most of the international departure lounge till our plane left. Our Airline was Ethiad and they gave us meal vouchers. So we boarded the plane  destined for Abu Dhabi and flew for 10 hours arriving at a hot sticky airport. We had a 12hour overlay (now cut to 10 hours because of the initial delay) and fortunately for us our Tour Manager “Oom Johan Steyl” had a connection with Ethiad that managed to organise us the business  class lounge at the airport. Here we were able to catch some zzz and we were also fortunate enough to get free massage’s etc so we all made the most of this “High living”.

From here we caught a 5 hour connecting flight to Almaty where we landed late Tuesday afternoon we were met by Andre and a driver – there was a hiccup with our visa’s and Andre was able to resolve this situation very quickly and before long we were in the parking lot staring at a huge black hummer. So we loaded our kit up in the two cars and we proceeded to the hotel where we were going to stay Called Tabagan this is where the opening ceremony and closing ceremony’s were to take place so although quite a drive out of town it was fairly central for us. We paid 30us$ per person per night to stay here which was not too bad – and it was not long before we headed off to the restaurant to get some food – anyway to cut a long story short we all had 2 beers and a mains course (nothing to write home about) and when the bill came we were in for a bit of a shocker – R600 each – first and last time we paid for a meal at the hotel again.

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With the time difference between SA and Almaty and all the flying we were all pretty Knackered and it was not long before we hit “Club Duvet” and we were lights out till the next day. We had finally found a country where their time is worse than “Africa time” if they say we meet you at 10 am it is closer to 12h30 so this took a bit of adjusting to. So Sometime late morning we headed off to the city to do a bit of sight seeing and also Andre had arranged to take us to some tackle shops to by some of the necessary tackle etc. We think we have bad traffic – everything I had envisioned about Russia being held some form of truth to. Big Smokey cars, very drab grey buildings lots of people that smoke, lots of Vodka. What I did not realise is how good looking the ladies are in Khazakstan – some of them real head turners. Anyways when we arrived at the tackle shop we still could not communicate so buying tackle we had very little idea of what to buy – fortunately we were able to piece together more or less what we needed using sign language and gestures -(one had to be very careful as things could be easily mis-interpreted). We bought a few spoons, heavy jig heads and some paddle tails – good thing that we did – by this time we were all padding around in shorts and short sleeved shirts wondering why they were taking us to clothing shops to buy warm jackets etc.

In the afternoon we were back at the hotel and the other teams started arriving in dribs and drabs as we were staying at a ski resort we decided to take a spin up the ski cableway (Even though there was no snow) just to have a look at the view from a bit further up the hill. This was an interesting ride sitting on a rickety frame seat suspended in some place more that 50m above the ground where if you fell  you would look like an angel suspended atop an apple tree.

So we took some photies and headed back to the hotel. The opening ceremony was due to start at 5 so the SA team got kitted out in their Step outs and made our way to where it was to be held only to have to hang around till 7 for it to kick off. We were the only team that arrived with Blazers, ties etc the rest of the teams just rocked up in their tracksuits – So we as a team really stuck out and I would like to think that we really made a serious impression on the other nations.





The opening ceremony and dinner  was very interesting with a wide variety of local dancers and musicians and some interesting food items – Horse intestine is apparently a delicacy in that part of the world and even though I tried it – IT DEFINATELY TASTES AS BAD AS IT SOUNDS........

All too soon we were off to bed again. We were told to have breakfast at 8am and be ready to fly by chopper at 10am (Again not really on time). Some of us decided to leave some bags at the hotel and “We thought” that the temperatures were not so bad we could leave some of our warm clothing as we were going to the desert – it must be warmer there in the day – little did we know what was in store for us......

So the chopper landed and we had a 400km flight that took us about 2 hours flying in a huge Russian chopper that was noisy and rather rickety. Initially we flew over the outskirts of town which eventually turned into pasture that turned into desert and eventually this turned into swamp and this swamp we flew over for than an hour – from above it looked much like the Okavango delta just lacking the herds of animals and palm trees. This is one of the tributaries that filled Lake Balhash. The area is relatively uninhabited with a few sparse settlements here and there – usually along the main waterways. Most of the flowing water was a milky colour much like Vaal river here in South Africa as for other parts it was crystal clear. Birdlife was relatively low and judging by the amount of shotgun cartridges on the islands – I was lead to believe that they too get hammered a fair bit.

This was our supposed to be first day of practise but the chopper had to return to collect the rest of the competitors so we were just to hang around the camp till the rest of the party arrived. We were shown to our accommodation where we were quick to raise and fly the South African flag, Our accommodation consisted of an igloo style structure covered in a heavy canvas cloth material and this was to be our home for the next three nights. We were also met by the camp owner/ manager and from whom could speak a bit of German – so this helped us in some way with our communication problem as German is far closer to Afrikaans than to Russian. To cut a long story short the helicopter got delayed and at about 4pm they said that 2 of our party could go on the water to catch fish (Practice) so Oom Johan Steyl and myself were the ones to hit the water whilst the other remained in camp. Our guide took us to a few spots and boats consisted of a small flat bottomed skiff fitted with a 15hp motor (There were some with 30’s but you had to be lucky to draw one of these for the comp.)  We did not have much fishing time so we managed to pull a few ASP (Zerich) these probably resemble our yellow fish closely but have bigger mouths and are very pale in colour with a huge propeller on the back. They apparently get very big but we did not see any much over 3kgs.



We arrived back at camp to find the others excited to hear what we had achieved and we had high spirits as we thought these fish were not that difficult to catch. One of the things about staying in this camp is that the food was out of the top draw. Simple home style food that had such incredible flavour. Food was often 3 courses and the soup was out of this world and all the SA boys appreciated the good food. Next morning there appeared to be a weather change as it was overcast and bitterly cold. As we were a team of 5 people on the practise day we had to fish one boat 3 up and another boat with two. This day I fished with Leander and with Emile and we had some good giggles – we decided to push the limits and fish on the boundry of the fishing area – this was a 30 min boat ride through swamp and quite the experience but this is too  where the rain and cold started. Now here’s the tough South Africans in their Drymac’s and tracksuits braving 10 deg C weather with a windchill closer to 5. Well what can I say we almost died we lost just about all feeling in our hands – trying to do a scissor action using your index and middle finger was near possible – it was just too painful. We were able to catch some bersh (Another stripy type of fish that resembled a flathead from the salt – just somewhat more colourful) for me this was not a very exciting fish to catch as when it hooked it just went stiff and came to the boat like a plastic packet.

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We found the bersh to be a bottom dwelling species that liked deep holes in the riverbed and one would use plastic paddle tails on a heavy jig head  and hop it along the bottom – bites were very subtle. Asp on the other hand loved drop off’s and fast flowing water – they were a really fast fish and one could really wind in the lures and still get smashed. This is where we started to learn the limitations of our tackle. Most of the guys were using 9ft rods that were very supple (We donot have these types of rods in SA) they also exclusively use braid on their reels which is somewhat of an unused line used by artlure anglers in SA. Luckliy just before I left SA I borrowed 2 9ft air’s from a close friend of mine and these stood me in good stead for the trip. Anyways we came off the water frozen to the bone and soaking wet – it was very painful.

Again we were treated to an awesome meal and we found out why the Russian’s like vodka so much – it makes for excellent “Antifreeze” and throughout the comp the South African’s put it to good use as we did not have much other choice. Admittedly Russian Vodka is a far better quality than what we get in our country.  Anyways that evening was the captains meeting and this was rather interesting as again communication was a little difficult but we quickly understood what was required and we were all eager and ready to kick off the next morning – We would be fishing from 10am to 5pm –rather a short day in comparison to what we are used to here in South Africa but I think in many ways we were somewhat grateful as it allowed the outside temperature to warm up somewhat.







My first day was to be spent with Oom Johan Steyl and the start was quite interesting as unlike our kick-offs that are organised and boats are released in order this was a mass start and with 12 boats in a narrow stretch of water was somewhat harrowing considering that these were flimsy little skiffs and I confess I rode the first 10mins suffering from white Knuckle syndrome (Gripping the side of the boat very tight) Anyways I was the first to boat an ASP at about 11 am and managed to scratch one here and there but fishing was proving to be very tough... We managed to find a hole that contained some bersch and here we managed to pull about 6 or 7 of these little fish out. Then we moved down to an area where we had some good success on one of the practice days. – there was a Kazakhstan team boat already there but we anchored a little way off. Two casts produced two fish for me – then the “press” arrived in a convoy of 3 boats and all these three boats did a circle right atop the piece of water that I had just found to be productive – well needless to say that killed the spot and after an hour of thrashing the water further we gave up and moved on....

 

 

What was interesting and very good is that our skipper had a digital scale and a weigh sack with him and as the fish was landed he weighed it and released it instantly – I was impressed with this as these guys had much consideration for fish anther of the rules was that we may only use barbless hooks exclusively.

At the captains meeting that evening it came to light that we were getting a serious hiding – as I mentioned earlier we had totally the wrong tackle but at least we were not last and we were not far behind the two teams in front of us. The following day I would be fishing with Steven Wright from Southern Gauteng.

Anyways we woke up it was still overcast and very cold again we got ready to hit the waters at 10 am and before we knew it we again had white knuckles and were off again. This time the anglers were a little less friendly as competition was in the air and some of the teams wanted to put the points on the board. Our spots from the previous two days proved to be somewhat hammered and we covered water in order to find new fish and un tapped water. We found on this day that the fish were holding on the colour line where the milky water mixed with the clear water but none the less we still battled there was also quite a strong very icy wind blowing so we froze again. All too quickly the day was behind us and we were sitting in the warm mess area having hot drinks/ vodka and warm food. For the teams that had done well there was an element of celebration in the air and our friends the Ukrainians were very joyful as they had a huge lead on any of the other teams. So in the spirit of good sportsmanship South Africa celebrated with them and I think there were many friends made for life – even though we could not communicate much with them.

Again we climbed into a freezing room and got some shut eye and all too soon we were being woken at 6am as we were flying out by chopper at 8am. So we packed up our kit bid a farewell to the camp and the staff and we were well on our way back to Almaty. That afternoon we hung around the hotel packed and sorted our kit for the trip back and got ready for the closing ceremony. That evening we turned up dressed in our “Step outs” and we had a thoroughly good evening -Kazakhstani’s are excellent hosts and we ate till we could eat no more. Sadly for us our friends the Ukrainians had a early flight out of Almaty and so we made good friends with the Russian Team and the Krygiristani’s and we had a really good night – we made sure we were tired for the almost 20hour trip home.

For me the tour was excellent – although we did not have great success we are now better prepared for what needs to happen when we next fish in a N.Hemisphere competition. But I think in terms of being ambassadors and good sportsmen – the Team really put South Africa on the map for the world champs. It was a privilege and an Honour to fish with my team mates from SA – thanks gents.

To the new friends we made – thank you no obstacle no matter how big got in the way. To the Organizers – thanks for an awesome event. To the new friends and faces made in a land very different to what we call home we look forwards to hearing more from you.

To all those who helped me make the dream of representing SA at the world champs come true – thank you each and everyone in all the ways you contributed – thanks again

Ryan Clark http://www.africanallure.co.za