Bikini Atoll

Floating on Water (click image for detail)

Call it luck or being in the right place at the right time. Either way, the scuba magazine I grabbed in an airport showed beautiful pictures from Bikini Atoll and planted a seed that resulted in a fishing trip of a lifetime.

I first wrote to the consulate for the Marshall Islands and asked about the possibility of fishing Bikini Atoll. To make a long story short, they said to contact the dive operation there, and with the help of Field and Stream Magazine, the first sport fishing trip to Bikini Atoll, in 50 years, was about to begin.

It took four days to get from Portland, Oregon to Bikini Atoll but the week of fishing was worth it. We caught many species of fish that I could not identify along with bonefish, trevally, mahi-mahi, snapper, wahoo and grouper. The really big trevally either broke off or spooled us. A marlin also spooled us while we were trolling for wahoo. There are lots of flats but not lots of bonefish on them. I would say that most of the bonefish are in 10 to 30 feet of water in the lagoon. There are lots of trevally, swallowtail dart, snapper and other fish on the flats besides bonefish. The handsome swallowtail dart is really a nice fish. It has a troutlike mouth, it is shad shaped, has fins like a permit and takes bonefish flies, small poppers and streamers.

Bikini Atoll, as most people know, was the site for some early atomic bomb testing. Yes, it was nuked. It glowed red-hot for years. It was killed, it was dead. 50 years of Pacific Ocean tide and wind have brought back the atoll from a ground zero experiment to a home for thousands of oceanic birds, turtles and millions of fish. Welcome back !!

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