By Alex Willers

I am sure we all can agree that a long distance carp fishing trip is both exciting but also a daunting task , you don’t want to travel a 5 hour trip to go and blank so here are some tips I found that worked for me when I went to fish Africamps previously known as Klaserie Karavan park in Hoedspruit  South Africa. 

The dam can be found in the heart of the African bush and every night you go to sleep hearing the lions raw in the distance while waiting for the lines to run! The Dam is surrounded by 55m2 custom-made tents that are fully furnished and equipped with a private kitchen, lounge, en-suite bathroom (with private shower and toilet), two comfy bedrooms with real beds (each tent sleeps a total of five guests), a fireplace, air-conditioning and a wooden deck. There is an outdoor wood-fired hot tub next to each tent and is the perfect place to fish for big Specimen Carp. 

Bait

The dam has got barbell and a lot of kurper so for ground bait I advise in summer to stay away from a lot of maize in your ground mix as the barbell will be in your swim in no time!

My ground bait consisted of the following.

• Hemp seeds
• Tigers and Crushed Tigers add in brown sugar to the mix!
• Whole boilies  and Crushed Boilies skitzo from Pyscho baits
• Bird seeds mix
• Peanuts (make sure to cook it proper before use )
• Little bit of maize if one wants  too  – I left the maize out actually

Hook bait

I started off with plain tigers double on a hair using a KD RIG on one rod and the second Rod a plain tiger topped with a Banoffy boilie from pyscho! This way I could see what I get my first take on and what the carp want and then I would change all my rods to that hook bait that works!

The carp do take on fishier boilie but like I say the kurper and barbel won’t leave your bait alone (winter I advise fishier boilies and baits as the barbell are not as active)!  So stick to some sweeter bait in summer that did the trick for me! Also try something new that the carp are not use to, so instead of a plain signal tiger why not top it off with fake yellow maize or a pop up boilie.

Another killer bait to use if Sweetcorn Tigernuts from DB Baits, simply put 2 tigers onto a hair and you’re good to go. The key to succes was also to drop only 1 hand ful of bait on top of each hookbait drop. Do not feed too much.

Location

Do not ignore the margins in this dam the carp like to patrol up and down the margin early mornings! I got my two carps right up against the margins in knee deep water!  Also wake up before sunrise to scan the water for any carp Turing and feeding bubbles that’s normally a good sign on where to fish!

RIG

These carp are big and old and wise! So make sure your rig is 100 percent in order

Pin everything down in the water make it well camouflaged! I fished simple with a KD rig for this session.

To Book a session go to africamps.com