For some businesses in Phuket the Sandbox has proved a godsend enabling them to at least get some business from tourists. For us it has not been so lucrative but if you enter Thailand via this route, you are , in theory, free to travel anywhere around the island after an initial 2 week stay in Phuket.

Tommy Richter and his pal Lewis from Kent, UK, arrived by this route and keen to do some fishing here, having fished at a few other fishing parks in Thailand before. They were going out in the evening so chose the morning session, fishing 830-130pm . Our rates and fishing times are slightly adjusted during Covid times to give anglers a good session with real value for money.

When they arrived we had a chat and typical of most of our visitors they were friendly affable  and were impressed how easy they thought the Sandbox was. It costs a little extra upfront with paperwork and forms but if you are on a longish stay it is definitely a good way to enter the Kingdom.

The lake was all theirs ,so they decided to fish Heavens Point , one of our double pegs which keeps things nice and social. This peg is also a big favourite with anglers as it can be prolific, but I would say all the pegs are just as good, this week all have been fished with amazing catch rates.

They fished a normal set up for here, using boilies (pineapple and milk flavour) with a method ball fished about 2/3rds out and caught a 15 fish between them in the 5 hours, they had Carp, Tambaqui, Redtail Catfish, Pacu , Mekong Catfish and Lewis even had an Arapaima. Checkout the pictures for some of their best catches.

Here at TopCats we are stating to move to a size 2 wide Gape Gripz hook manufactured by Pallatrax. These were used today and the guys were super impressed, as we have been in trials so far.

Tommy is looking for a place in Samui so I am sure he will be back even if not on this trip.

As an aside to there is also a Samui Sandbox, labelled “Samui Plus”. To me this seems even easier, After 3 days in your chosen hotel you can take part in guided trips and after 7 days you are free to travel the Island as usual, which means 7 days after landing via a sealed route (from Bangkok or Singapore) you could be fishing at TopCats catching a fish or dreams.