5 Abroad: Gone Fishin’

Over the Christmas break, we took the kids fishing at Kebun Wisata Pasirmukti. It is an agrofarm that is located about 1 hour outside of Jakarta. Fishing is something that we all enjoy doing as a family, and it was something that we had not done since we moved to Jakarta. I read about the agrofarm in the Family Guide to Jakarta. It said that you could fish in the stocked ponds.

We took the kids on a Saturday. The entrance fee was Rp. 15,000 per person. The fee includes a free complimentary juice from the onsite restaurant. We made our way to the fishing area. The fishing fee was another Rp. 15,000 per person. This fee includes a fishing pole and bait. There are also baskets that you can put the fish in and nets you can use to scoop out the fish. If you want to take the fish home, you pay for the weight of the fish that you are taking home. We threw back the ones that were too small to eat and kept the larger ones.

We noticed that some people had the fish cooked at the local restaurant. We put ours on ice and took them home. The kids really enjoyed being outdoors. The girls gave up on fishing after awhile and just enjoyed throwing bait in the pond to feed the fish. We will definitely be going again.
I forgot to mention that there are people on hand to help you take the fish off the hook if you are squeamish about that. Also, they will clean and scale the fish for you. I think the cleaning was complimentary after you paid for the fish. We just tipped the guy that cleaned the fish for us Rp. 20,000. That is one part of fishing I do not enjoy…cleaning the fish…yuck!

Fishing for Gurame at one of the ponds. We had no luck so we switched to the second pond.

Colorful baskets that you can use to put your fish in. There is a nail on each of the little fishing huts that you can attach the basket to so that you can keep your fish in the water until you are ready to go.

Fishing!

Lovely bug that we found floating in the pond. DH scooped him out with the net so we could get a good look at him. Check out those mouth parts!

The final fish count. We ended up with 7 decent sized Bawal Hitam. Incidentally, they are not supposed to be as good to eat as the Bawal Putih or the Gurame, but we thought they were still good. They do have a lot of small bones so you do need to exercise some caution when eating this kind of fish.

Some views of the fishing area. It was really nice to be outside. The small huts provide shade and a place to sit.

The kids wanted to watch the fish being scaled and cleaned. I opted not to watch that part. I am a bit squeamish when it comes to blood and guts.

Price list. We paid Rp. 80,000 for the 7 fish that we caught. It’s probably not much cheaper than buying the fish at the market, but it certainly was a lot more fun!