Fishing Tournament Experience

Along with my wife and two other friends, we joined the 1st Cebu Pond Fishing tournament at Porter's Marina last August 5, 2012. 

It was our first time so we were very excited and woke up very early. The tourney date coincided with the Ironman tournament but it was good for us since we live in the northern part of Mandaue City and our route wasn't affected at all. My friend had to get out from Mactan the night before because of some vehicle route closure. The saying that, "if there's a will, there's a way" is very true to this friend of mine and for other tourney participants who suffered the heavy traffic before reaching Porter's.


Anyway, schedule adjustments were made and so the tourney commenced at 9am, instead of 8am, and was supposed to end at 1pm. We didn't get a cottage because we're saving money to pay for our catch - just in case we haul a 2kg lapu-lapu. It was windy that day so I didn't feel the sun's heat.

An hour passed and we began to hear shouts and laughter from other participants. The four of us hadn't caught any yet. Then our friends caught small tilapias. My wife also caught a small lapu-lapu. I still had none. I heard that some participants got lots of catch at the other side of the pond. So I also went there to get a slice of their luck.

There was a ray of hope seeing my floater move only to return to the surface at a wink of an eye. The Taiwanese (or Japanese, I'm not sure) contingent had a heyday. It seems like their hooks are fish magnets, pulling bangus one in every 5 minutes. The Pinoys who threw their lines beside them were not lucky too. I could only shake my head in disbelief, and returned to my original location.

30 minutes before tourney ends, I was pulling my catch, only for it to break free. Thrice it happened. I'm sure one of them could have landed me a prize for the biggest bangus. But nah!

At the end of the tourney, our group caught one 200g lapulapu, and two palm-sized tilapia. It was not even enough for lunch. We stayed on and skipped the awarding ceremonies. My goal now is to catch fish for lunch, which I did 30 minutes after the lapse of tourney time.

We had late lunch. Porter has very good cooks and I really enjoyed our sumptuous meal. From the restaurant, I kept glancing at the pond and thought of the bangus that got away. My wife suggested that we continue and catch more fish.

At 8pm, we called it a day as we hauled another 3+ kilos of bangus. But I began to feel burning pain on my arms and legs. Sunburn!