The past weekend me and Andre took the long road to Bloemhof dam where the SA’s for the ladies are currently in progress.

I wouldn’t exactly describe fishing as a spectator sport and indeed no spectators are allowed near the competitors during the competition but we had a quick visit to the Bloemhof dam a few days before the competition started.

A few days before the competition are used for practising and testing different baits. Younger people who never had the chance to learn about fishing are also introduced to the sport during this time. The National Lottery sets apart some money for developing the different South African sports and angling is no exception. I am not sure how this works and who gets chosen for development but this blog is about fishing and not politics.

We fished the Bloemhof dam on Sunday morning and in the two hours we had before we had to hit the road back home again we caught a total of 8 fish, which mainly consisted of muddies and small grass carps. The muddies definitely likes the sweet stuff, but this is no secret for those who fished for muddies before. Upon changing to stronger flavours we started catching grass carps. Bloemhof dam is a beautiful large dam just outside Bloemhof. It has plenty of fish and although the road from Gauteng is a long one and they currently have three stop-and-go’s just before Bloemhof, it is definitely worth visiting!

Andre Joubert drowned Sunday afternoon near Villiers while swimming in the Vaaldam. Around 11:00 Andre posted the following status update on Facebook: “Sitting next to the vaal catching sum AWSUM sized fish!!!!!!!!!!!!! couldn’t be betta!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!”. An hour later he drowned.

We post this article to once again stress the importance of safety at our fishing venues. Please be careful. Soos die bekende afrikaanse spreekwoord lui: “Liewers bang Jan as dooie Jan”.

To read the original article as it was written by Beeld, click here

We had allot of queries on the various fishing resorts around the Vaaldam and we eventually managed to free up a weekend in July to drive down to Rooiwalle, one of the many Vaaldam resorts in the Free State province of South Africa. I arrived late on a very cold winter morning and scouted the bank and surrounding areas for any sign of fish swimming around in the shallows. Except for a few birds and a stray dog, I had the bank to myself, Willem would only arrive later that evening and I took the time to walk around, paying close attention to the natural structures and activity in the water. I started preparing our target areas with a mixture of kidney beans and sweet corn., but with a temperature of 5 degrees Celsius I wasn’t expecting to much excitement in the hours to follow and started setting up the camp site. It was 13:30pm and the long wait started. Sitting back in my blue camping chair with a warm cup of coffee in one hand , I waited… and I waited … I finished my coffee… drank another cup of coffee … and waited. Without realising 3 hours passed. By now it was 16:00pm , Willem haven’t left Pretoria and my only hope was that I could at least interest a few carp with the plain white dough and banjo floats used as hook baits.

Willem arrived at 21:00pm and it was good to have someone to talk to. With a beer in hand and the fire warming up the camp site we discussed the strategy we would follow in the next few days. I was just about to share my failed attempts of the day when the reel on my left rod started running. 2 minutes later I posed with a small carp, feeling the relieve of not blanking in the middle of winter.

In the days that followed we targeted our prepared areas and caught a total of 6 fish in temperatures ranging between -4 and 6 degrees Celsius at a distance of 50 to70 meters , all at night.

I received an e-mail yesterday with some air photos of the Vaal Dam in it’s current full (or over full) state.

We planned to do some river rafting last weekend on the Vaal river in the Parys area, but the trip had to be postponed until the weekend of February, 27th due to the water levels of the river. News reports also urged people to stay away from the river and all docked boats had to be removed.

Vaal Dam

On Monday (Feb. 1, 2010) the Vaal dam was 108 % full with the Bloemhof dam standing at 120%.

Vaal Dam Gates

The department of water affairs did announce however that the levels are dropping and that more gates will be closed today but also warned that people should still not take part in recreational activities in the dam.

Vaal Dam Sluice Gates

Unfortunately I was unable to trace back to the original photographer of the photo’s provided in the mail. The facts regarding water levels used in this post comes from an article posted in Times Live. To read the article containing more factual information please click here.

We plan to fish the Vaal river and maybe the Vaal dam as well on the weekend of the 27th if water levels allow us to take part in our planned rafting trip so keep an eye out for the report and consider subscribing to our e-mail updates if you have not done so already.