Trip report & a 55lbs grouper from Qatar :) :) :)

Hello everyone;

So I went along with 2 friends of mine (but who don't free-dive or spearfish) to my favorite spot for camping (southern Qatar) on early friday (21/11) and we stayed there till saturday evening. Weather was awesome for this time of the year (minimas of 17C and maxima of 26C). So to access that camping site, I'd have to drive around 50km of highway road, and then similar distance of offroading (sand-dunes and some salt marches) and which just adds to the beauty of the trip...

Anyway, on the first day, we arrived by around 11am and settled up our camp. I then decided to take a quick dip into the water and check out some reefs and the situation there. Surprinsingly, visibility was amazing (around 10-12m), and with a pretty mild current; something unusual for that area... After being in the water for 2hrs, I already had my stringers overfilled with enough fish to feed everyone around and other ppl camping in the same area...

So we then made an amazing bbq and spent on the night then chillin, playing cards, etc... and got to meet other ppl in the same area who were line fishing for basses, mullets and small snappers and we started line fishing as well... and then went on to sleep pretty early as the next day would be the big dive....

For the next day, I planned on to dive up to different reef formation that starts by 3km till 5.5km offshore (no boats allowed in that area so a tough swim is a must!!!!).. So anyway I woke up by 6am (still before sunrise, which starts at 6.15am here) and it was kind of hard to gather the courage to have a dip in the 19C water and put on the 5mm wetsuit... Eventually I managed too and by 6.45am I was already in the water starting the long swim.... By 9.30am I reached my spot, and initially the current was pretty strong and got me worried that I didn't calculate the tides properly (eventually, as the day progressed, current became almost zero and then started again at the end of the dive that's by around 2pm).

So in that spot, which are a variety of reef formations, huge rocks, cracks in the ground, and coral reefs with depth of 5m to 12m, I saw such variety and amount of fish that I've never seen before in one spot!!! groupers everywhere, over 100 big baracudas in schools of 10-15 on the way to the spot, trevallies, turtles, snappers, and to spice it all, a beautiful 2m shark (bull) !!!!... Eventually, by less than 2hrs, all my 3stringers were stuffed; including fish that I kept on my gun as I had no place to put fish! That included a 1.6m baracuda, and a beautiful 55lbs grouper along with another 30lbs one and plenty of other ones....

Finally; sorry with the long intro and ill leave u with pix :blackeye

On the way: Dunes, marches, and salt-water lake formations...

Camp:

and buddies struggling to wake up at 6.30am:

Big grouper & exhausted after more than 6hrs in the water:

Best all !

Mishu: Well Im here, so let's do it hardcore man! Hit those reefs hard

Mongrel: Thanks for the passing by

Qatar_Hunter: Thanks bro but you'll always be my mentor ! For the suit, 3mm would be more than perfect now, but if you staying in water for like 5-6hrs continuously or more then I start getting cold with 3mm, and once I get cold, I lose my apnea and breath-hold ability... Bro you the boss, plan something and Im more than ready !

azapa said:

great trip. one burning question: how did you manage to swim back 3km towing those three stringers of fish including a 55lb grouper? I can hardly swim 1Km with 10Kgs worth of fish behind me on the float.. must have taken hours!

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Hey bro thanx for the drop by. Well I just swim it and make sure I don't get tired and lose it during the trip :t. So as a workout, i consistently run 15-20km in 1hr 30mins/2hrs to keep my stamina on (like at least twice a week)... And to tell you, we sometimes get pretty strong currents and it happened couple of time to end up 2-3km from where I leave my car or our camp site on shore. Also while swimming back, I keep the float line shorter (around 8-10m or barely to the edge of visibility) as I like to keep an eye on the catch and make sure there's nothing nibbling at my catch behind :blackeye :blackeye ... But also another reason that I like to dive to those places where Ive to do long shore swims is for the workout itself... I mean sometime running on the treadmill or around the compound where I live for like 2hrs gets very boring... whereas 6-7hrs in the water, it's like nothing! I don't feel it until Im back home where Im exhausted and need 12hrs of sleep to recover for the next day :crutch

Erik said:

Great story! Big swim and a big adventure. I didn't think there were that many fish in the Gulf; it looks like you found a good spot.
Kudos to you for the big effort and a big payoff.

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Actually the Persian (or Arabian) Gulf is a pretty fertile ground for fisheries, and there used to be even much more fish in the last decade... However, pollution, and overexploitation of fish resource have reduced this... Nevertheless, we still get good species and big sized fish (both pelagics and reef fish) such as amberjacks, giant trevallies, cobias, king mackerels, groupers, emperors, breams etc... It just depends on where you go and how you open your eyes here.