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The Fishing Report

The Archive: Rio Azul, Imbabala Safari Lodge, Chile, New Zealand, Lake Tanganyika, Bassas da India, Des Roches Island, Farquar aboard the MV Illusions, Barotse Tiger Camp, Chawalo, Neptune Warrior - Trident Tested, Ngwezi Houseboat - Okavango,

Barotse Tiger Camp

The mighty Zambezi displaces about 250 000 people annually on the Barotse floodplains in western Zambia and is over 100 km wide at places during the floods. This deluge of water pouring out of the Angolan highlands and scouring all in its path is the saving grace for the big Tigers to be found here. The high water offers a respite from subsistence netting which is seeing long stretches of Africas rivers becoming more and more barren with each passing year.

Despite its distance from and obvious disregard for civilization, Barotseland holds very little in the way of game, all of which has quite simply been eaten by the nomadic Lozi people who inhabit this harsh and ever changing landscape.

What does remain, are Tiger fish in abundance and of a size to make each fishing session well worth heading out for. On fly, spinner or bait, there are big fish to be taken here…

I mean at the camp they don’t even enter fish into the leather bound book on the bar counter unless its over 10 pounds…..been wondering why we fishermen use pounds for fish and kilograms for everything else, could it be it just sounds better? Anyway, here you could do it in KGs and still get excited.

Our normal crew arrived by private plane on the dusty strip at the remote town of Lukulu after clearing customs at Livingston and a further 1.5 hours in the air. It seemed that the entire town came out to meet us, so rare is it to have a plane land out here. Our hosts for the trip and the owners of the company AngleZam, were Gerard and Graham, who are so passionate about big fish that they spent a year exploring areas on the Zambezi that were simply too far away to be overfished before settling on this spot. Of course that means from a logistical perspective that it’s no cake walk to operate. So when they picked us up in the best Zambezi fishing boats we had ever seen, for the 45 minute river transfer, we were impressed…
The real surprise however, was when we got to the camp itself. Perched on the banks of the river and shaded by magnificent trees, the main dining and social area is a large canvas structure with massive leather couches and lounging chairs, chandeliers and sumptuous carpets. What possessed these guys to lug these luxuries across a large swathe of Africa? “We like fishing, but we love our comforts” said Graham as he poured us large gin and tonics in ice filled crystal glasses. The sleeping tents are no less comfortable with everything you would expect from a top class safari outfit, including a solar powered outside shower which was difficult to leave and the fine linen on the beds.

Then there’s Henri. Originally from the Congo this large and jovial man trained as a chef in Paris and has now brought his prodigious culinary talents to his fully equipped kitchen tent on the Barotse. Using largely home grown ingredients Henri had us salivating after a long day on the river with his daily surprises and deserts which would not have been out of place in a Parisian patisserie. His Coq au Vin lives with me still.

With direction from Gerard and Graham, we fished for the trophy Tigers in a way we had never done before on the Zambezi. The trick here is not necessarily to cast to structure close to shore, but to dredge the many hidden sand drop offs and underwater rocks revealed by the depth and fish finders on every boat (also a first for us). Fast sinking lines and heavy clousers got the best results. We found that darker flies, black and grey clousers, black whistlers, and red and black worked best. Criag Thommo and Gerard on conventional gear had most success with FZ Coppers, with good fish taken on the trusty old Mepps and the new Slam soft baits from Rapala. Although we were told the fishing was slower than normal while we were there, double digit fish were caught and released every day, with the notables being 16.5 pound on fly by Gerard, a couple of 14 pounders on conventional for Thommo and Gerard, as well as a 7 pound Nembwe and a beautiful 14.5 pound Tiger from yours truly. The camp record in its first year of operations is 21 pounds.

I found the smaller fish, 6 to 9 pounds, put up a better fight than the bigger specimens with solid hook ups time after time, searing first runs and acrobatic

displays. The fish seemed to attack with such ferocity that the normal attrition rate for these hard mouthed critters was simply not in evidence here. I saw one local with a Tiger taken on hand line that could not have weighed under 25 pounds.

Our 4 days of sublime fishing were over too fast and the local camp spook known affectionately as Banja and his attendant stories around the evening camp fire, mixed with some of Arthur Bells finest 12 year old had us considering sending a message back home of bad weather or airoplane problems.

Barotse Tiger Camp is a destination for the purist angler who wants to target trophy specimens in a pristine environment (we did not see another tourist or boat). The guides and boats are superb in every respect and its hard to believe there is a better camp set up for angling on the length of the Zambezi. Logistics both of getting there and of running the camp make this trip a little more expensive than some of the more commercial options, with 5 night packages coming in at around R29k (min 6 pax for charter purposes) but the returns in terms of both size and number of fish make any extra expense seem well worthwhile.

If you are looking for the ultimate BIG Tiger fishing experience, look no further than Barotse Tiger Camp……contact us on www.wildflytravel.com for reservations or more advice.

Brad Cartwright