Providence Atoll
After fishing in Oman, our group flew south beyond the equator for a return visit to Providence Atoll in the outer Seychelles. Fishing here in 2023 had been so exceptional that many of us came back to chase the dragon. However, as we greeted the previous week’s anglers I noticed some long faces. While they had some quality catches, the fishing was slower than usual. The wind was blowing from unexpected directions, pushing more water on the flats than the tidal predictions modeled. Maybe it was because of a dying El Nino weather pattern or an altered baitfish distribution across the atoll? Regardless, the changed fishing conditions at Providence this spring would provide both challenges and opportunities.
The isolation of Providence Atoll is a welcome communications-free bubble of saltwater fly fishing.
It's the prospect of catching a powerful >1 meter giant trevally that attracts most fly anglers to Providence Atoll, especially on the spring tide weeks. They are the prime motivator for the guides too. During an evening conversation on the Maya’s Dugong mothership, several of us tried to articulate why we are so passionate about catching GT on a fly rod. The blurring speed and ferocity of a GT blitzing a stripped fly was a top reason. Another was the raw combative power and tackle busting maneuvers of a big GT in the first minutes of the fight. After long days hunting the flats for the chance at a trophy fish, the adrenaline hit when leviathan GT are coming your way cannot be easily described. Fear and doubt rush in and the trained muscle memory of the casting stroke, fast tempo strip, and hookset must take over before the opportunity vanishes. If it had a soundtrack Le Castle Vania would be it.
Even on the good days shots at big GT are limited. My fishing partner Bryan and I were not seeing the usual congregations of stingrays and nurse sharks swimming the flats and channels. These are the feeding partners of the GT, and we weren’t seeing them either. Our arms and legs had become stiff from the monotony of waiting. Then a bull shark entered the channel we were watching and swam in close to investigate Bryan’s legs before it retreated. Wrong species of shark! Our guide Tim Babich kept us focused and entertained as we searched the water for a trevally’s profile.
Staked out in a deep drainage channel, scanning for stingrays, sharks, and cruising Giant Trevally.
Then Tim’s tone became urgent, “Two GT just swam behind the coral head upstream of you DimeBrite”. I used my rod tip to make a baitfish splashing noise to entice them into casting range. It actually worked. The pair of big GT glided up to the surface from behind the bommie. I laid out my cast down current of them and began stripping the brush fly. Two massive bow wakes with giant black eyes rose up behind the fly, heading straight toward me. The largest GT opened its huge mouth and I watched my fly swirl around inside it like a flushing toilet. Before the hook could stick, it made eye contact with me and turned upcurrent with my fly ejected out behind its tail. The second GT immediately ate it and turned to follow its companion, giving me the angle for a solid hook set. It blazed up the channel tearing out backing, and I felt a pop in the cork handle of my rod as it bent deeply under the strain. I shot out of the water into the boat so we could maneuver my line around the coral hazards the GT rocketed through in its panic. Once in the clear, I put heavy pressure on the fish until it finally broke at the edge of shallow sandy shelf. It taped out at 106 cm, ~ 54 pounds, and was my best GT of the week by far.
Landing a nice 106 cm Giant Trevally with head guide Tim Babich.
A pleasant surprise during our week was the number of high quality bluefin trevally (70 – 80 cm) the group encountered. The bluefin were closely associated with packs of aggressive bohar snapper around coral reef edges. I landed a personal best bluefin that fought longer and harder than most of the GT I encountered.
A very nice Bluefin Trevally that chased down a brush fly on the two-handed retrieve.
Another positive was the ample opportunity to target bumphead parrotfish, even with the higher water levels of the full moon tides. Several anglers in the group landed bumpies, including my fishing partner who hooked up two on the same afternoon.
My fishing partner Bryan with an outstanding Bumphead Parrotfish caught on a 9 weight with an Alphlexo crab fly.
We rarely fished for coral dwelling species, but I had the good luck to sight cast to a black-saddled coral grouper. These are really striking fish that I’ve only seen once or twice before. It was a juvenile, but they can grow to well over a meter at maturity.
A pale color phase Black-Saddled Coral Grouper (Plectropomus laevis).
The most unusual aspect of the GT fishing in our week was the number of refusals. I made good presentations to at least five big GT that briefly chased the fly before turning away. Twice I stalked large jet black GT resting in sand holes, putting the fly two rod lengths in front of them, and observed them instantly change color to silver/blue once I started stripping. Other anglers in the group had similar experiences. I'm guessing these fish had a secret to us food source that made them content and lethargic. The smaller stingray associated GTs were always willing to play though. While triggerfishing, I sniped a GT off the back of a stingray using a small Alphlexo crab. When I hooked the GT the stingray fired its barb up into the air, yikes!
A giant trevally tracked down while it associated with stingrays feeding in the shallows.
Sand holes and turtle grass ridges near Cerf Island are a refuge for GT and other predatory fish like Napoleon wrasse and Bohar snapper. Wade fishing here was a challenge and a thrill.
A feisty giant trevally caught while standing on a big coral head.
The Cerf islets on the extreme southern end of Providence Atoll have great fish habitat along its flats, shallow cuts, and outer reef edges. The islands are incredibly hot, and fly infested but are widely used by nesting seabirds. This would be a sadistic place to film an episode of Naked and Afraid. The numerous lemon sharks here are aggressive and actively patrol the shallows up to the beach line. A big one chomped my partner’s struggling bluefin trevally in half. I tried repeatedly to get a lemon to eat a fly but didn’t seem to get the fly color or retrieve depth right. The tides in this area must be respected or else a boat will become stranded for hours on flats such as The Citadel.
Hunting GT from a photogenic beach on the Cerf Isles. This islet has swarms of aggressive lemon sharks and nasty biting horse flies.
As the full moon tides faded to a lower exchange coefficient, I was praying to encounter my first bonefish at Providence. On the afternoon of the fifth day, I finally spotted a handful of singles and doubles feeding on the flats near Sandy Knoll. They stood out in the sunlight like pure aquamarine gems, marked across the back with nine bars. I quickly landed three before hot water pushed onto the flat and they vanished again.
A brief Providence Atoll bonefishing session produced some above average specimens.
Watching out for marauding Giant Trevally on Sandy Knoll, with north Providence Island in the background. This tiny spit of land hosts numerous grey heron, crab plovers, and crested terns.
Abundant fish, sea cucumber, and sea turtle populations of the outer Seychelles atolls continue to attract poachers from nearby Madagascar. It is a risky open ocean run of ~250 miles using wooden boats that are barely seaworthy. Guide Paul Boyers gave us a close look at the most recently wrecked poaching vessel that became stranded this year. It highlights the need to patrol and protect these vulnerable atolls.
The “Ronie”, a shipwrecked poaching vessel from Madagascar. It is now a roosting spot for grey herons.
Our final was a shot at very big GT that frequent a deep channel on the wild east side of the atoll. The tides were now smaller, so we only had a few hours to get in there and back out to open water. Guide Tim Babich explained he was trying to figure out how to target this gang of 120+cm GT. I saw an enormous bull or tiger shark swim under the boat as we entered the deep cut. Tim warned us to be ready in case the pack of trophy GT were following to investigate the commotion of our outboard motor. Indeed, at least 25 huge GT soon entered the cut, swimming fast along the far edge out of casting range. I was dropped off like a chess piece onto different coral heads and turtle grass ridges to ambush the GT while my partner stayed with the boat anchored in the channel. This area had dozens of large coral bommies that looked like fly line tomb stones if I hooked a big fish. In the distance I saw my partner casting off the stern to what I later learned was a monster GT. His presentation was good, but… the GT refused to eat the fly. Soon afterward, we had to evacuate to deeper water with the fast dropping tide. We all got out to push the boat over dozens of turtle grass ridges. With deeper water in sight and only two more ridges to cross, Tim showed us his “ramping” technique. We stood a safe distance away, as he motored at high speed onto the turtle grass while tilting up the outboard at the last second to save the propeller. It worked. We had a clear path to the sanctuary of the Maya’s Dugong.
The return of the boat is a welcome sight after standing alone on a slippery coral head in a sharky channel.
While we didn’t land a big GT that day, it typified how fishing Providence Atoll is a continual exploration of a very wild and challenging place. There are no routine days here and the incredible is just a fly cast and a solid hookset away.
After fishing in Oman, our group flew south beyond the equator for a return visit to Providence Atoll in the outer Seychelles. Fishing here in 2023 had been so exceptional that many of us came back to chase the dragon. However, as we greeted the previous week’s anglers I noticed some long faces. While they had some quality catches, the fishing was slower than usual. The wind was blowing from unexpected directions, pushing more water on the flats than the tidal predictions modeled. Maybe it was because of a dying El Nino weather pattern or an altered baitfish distribution across the atoll? Regardless, the changed fishing conditions at Providence this spring would provide both challenges and opportunities.
The isolation of Providence Atoll is a welcome communications-free bubble of saltwater fly fishing.
It's the prospect of catching a powerful >1 meter giant trevally that attracts most fly anglers to Providence Atoll, especially on the spring tide weeks. They are the prime motivator for the guides too. During an evening conversation on the Maya’s Dugong mothership, several of us tried to articulate why we are so passionate about catching GT on a fly rod. The blurring speed and ferocity of a GT blitzing a stripped fly was a top reason. Another was the raw combative power and tackle busting maneuvers of a big GT in the first minutes of the fight. After long days hunting the flats for the chance at a trophy fish, the adrenaline hit when leviathan GT are coming your way cannot be easily described. Fear and doubt rush in and the trained muscle memory of the casting stroke, fast tempo strip, and hookset must take over before the opportunity vanishes. If it had a soundtrack Le Castle Vania would be it.
Even on the good days shots at big GT are limited. My fishing partner Bryan and I were not seeing the usual congregations of stingrays and nurse sharks swimming the flats and channels. These are the feeding partners of the GT, and we weren’t seeing them either. Our arms and legs had become stiff from the monotony of waiting. Then a bull shark entered the channel we were watching and swam in close to investigate Bryan’s legs before it retreated. Wrong species of shark! Our guide Tim Babich kept us focused and entertained as we searched the water for a trevally’s profile.
Staked out in a deep drainage channel, scanning for stingrays, sharks, and cruising Giant Trevally.
Then Tim’s tone became urgent, “Two GT just swam behind the coral head upstream of you DimeBrite”. I used my rod tip to make a baitfish splashing noise to entice them into casting range. It actually worked. The pair of big GT glided up to the surface from behind the bommie. I laid out my cast down current of them and began stripping the brush fly. Two massive bow wakes with giant black eyes rose up behind the fly, heading straight toward me. The largest GT opened its huge mouth and I watched my fly swirl around inside it like a flushing toilet. Before the hook could stick, it made eye contact with me and turned upcurrent with my fly ejected out behind its tail. The second GT immediately ate it and turned to follow its companion, giving me the angle for a solid hook set. It blazed up the channel tearing out backing, and I felt a pop in the cork handle of my rod as it bent deeply under the strain. I shot out of the water into the boat so we could maneuver my line around the coral hazards the GT rocketed through in its panic. Once in the clear, I put heavy pressure on the fish until it finally broke at the edge of shallow sandy shelf. It taped out at 106 cm, ~ 54 pounds, and was my best GT of the week by far.
Landing a nice 106 cm Giant Trevally with head guide Tim Babich.
A pleasant surprise during our week was the number of high quality bluefin trevally (70 – 80 cm) the group encountered. The bluefin were closely associated with packs of aggressive bohar snapper around coral reef edges. I landed a personal best bluefin that fought longer and harder than most of the GT I encountered.
A very nice Bluefin Trevally that chased down a brush fly on the two-handed retrieve.
Another positive was the ample opportunity to target bumphead parrotfish, even with the higher water levels of the full moon tides. Several anglers in the group landed bumpies, including my fishing partner who hooked up two on the same afternoon.
My fishing partner Bryan with an outstanding Bumphead Parrotfish caught on a 9 weight with an Alphlexo crab fly.
We rarely fished for coral dwelling species, but I had the good luck to sight cast to a black-saddled coral grouper. These are really striking fish that I’ve only seen once or twice before. It was a juvenile, but they can grow to well over a meter at maturity.
A pale color phase Black-Saddled Coral Grouper (Plectropomus laevis).
The most unusual aspect of the GT fishing in our week was the number of refusals. I made good presentations to at least five big GT that briefly chased the fly before turning away. Twice I stalked large jet black GT resting in sand holes, putting the fly two rod lengths in front of them, and observed them instantly change color to silver/blue once I started stripping. Other anglers in the group had similar experiences. I'm guessing these fish had a secret to us food source that made them content and lethargic. The smaller stingray associated GTs were always willing to play though. While triggerfishing, I sniped a GT off the back of a stingray using a small Alphlexo crab. When I hooked the GT the stingray fired its barb up into the air, yikes!
A giant trevally tracked down while it associated with stingrays feeding in the shallows.
Sand holes and turtle grass ridges near Cerf Island are a refuge for GT and other predatory fish like Napoleon wrasse and Bohar snapper. Wade fishing here was a challenge and a thrill.
A feisty giant trevally caught while standing on a big coral head.
The Cerf islets on the extreme southern end of Providence Atoll have great fish habitat along its flats, shallow cuts, and outer reef edges. The islands are incredibly hot, and fly infested but are widely used by nesting seabirds. This would be a sadistic place to film an episode of Naked and Afraid. The numerous lemon sharks here are aggressive and actively patrol the shallows up to the beach line. A big one chomped my partner’s struggling bluefin trevally in half. I tried repeatedly to get a lemon to eat a fly but didn’t seem to get the fly color or retrieve depth right. The tides in this area must be respected or else a boat will become stranded for hours on flats such as The Citadel.
Hunting GT from a photogenic beach on the Cerf Isles. This islet has swarms of aggressive lemon sharks and nasty biting horse flies.
As the full moon tides faded to a lower exchange coefficient, I was praying to encounter my first bonefish at Providence. On the afternoon of the fifth day, I finally spotted a handful of singles and doubles feeding on the flats near Sandy Knoll. They stood out in the sunlight like pure aquamarine gems, marked across the back with nine bars. I quickly landed three before hot water pushed onto the flat and they vanished again.
A brief Providence Atoll bonefishing session produced some above average specimens.
Watching out for marauding Giant Trevally on Sandy Knoll, with north Providence Island in the background. This tiny spit of land hosts numerous grey heron, crab plovers, and crested terns.
Abundant fish, sea cucumber, and sea turtle populations of the outer Seychelles atolls continue to attract poachers from nearby Madagascar. It is a risky open ocean run of ~250 miles using wooden boats that are barely seaworthy. Guide Paul Boyers gave us a close look at the most recently wrecked poaching vessel that became stranded this year. It highlights the need to patrol and protect these vulnerable atolls.
The “Ronie”, a shipwrecked poaching vessel from Madagascar. It is now a roosting spot for grey herons.
Our final was a shot at very big GT that frequent a deep channel on the wild east side of the atoll. The tides were now smaller, so we only had a few hours to get in there and back out to open water. Guide Tim Babich explained he was trying to figure out how to target this gang of 120+cm GT. I saw an enormous bull or tiger shark swim under the boat as we entered the deep cut. Tim warned us to be ready in case the pack of trophy GT were following to investigate the commotion of our outboard motor. Indeed, at least 25 huge GT soon entered the cut, swimming fast along the far edge out of casting range. I was dropped off like a chess piece onto different coral heads and turtle grass ridges to ambush the GT while my partner stayed with the boat anchored in the channel. This area had dozens of large coral bommies that looked like fly line tomb stones if I hooked a big fish. In the distance I saw my partner casting off the stern to what I later learned was a monster GT. His presentation was good, but… the GT refused to eat the fly. Soon afterward, we had to evacuate to deeper water with the fast dropping tide. We all got out to push the boat over dozens of turtle grass ridges. With deeper water in sight and only two more ridges to cross, Tim showed us his “ramping” technique. We stood a safe distance away, as he motored at high speed onto the turtle grass while tilting up the outboard at the last second to save the propeller. It worked. We had a clear path to the sanctuary of the Maya’s Dugong.
The return of the boat is a welcome sight after standing alone on a slippery coral head in a sharky channel.
While we didn’t land a big GT that day, it typified how fishing Providence Atoll is a continual exploration of a very wild and challenging place. There are no routine days here and the incredible is just a fly cast and a solid hookset away.
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...just another outstanding travelogue that we’ve come to expect from 
I had to use basic rock climbing moves to navigate exposed passages around massive granite boulders and the chasms below. The intense heat radiating from the sun and rock made my hands slick with sweat and I became lightheaded at times. Any shade and ocean breeze was a godsend. It was worth the effort though because each step revealed the island’s amazing natural beauty. While resting on a ledge overlooking the shallow flats below, I spotted a bluefin trevally hunting in the breaking waves. Then I watched a large bonefish methodically feed its way across a small coral ruble flat. Without my fly rod in hand, I was content to just observe them. 
