Planning a tentative vacation to Hawaii. Any good fishing prospects?

Where is our man Stan? He's our go-to guy in Hawaii.

I know my question is very broad and vague. Right now the trip is more of an idea than an actual plan.

Basically, if around either Honolulu or Maui, can I realistically fish by myself or should I seek a guide?

If by myself, what can I do to give myself the best odds?

If you goto Oahu, check out Hawaiibassfishing.com

I fished with Stan's son, such a great guy, and I was able to achieve a life long dream of a Peacock Bass. On a hand tied fly to make it even better. They also do salt water trips (bonefish included).

Captain Mike Hennessy is a class act who consistently catches large...I mean huge...Bone Fish on Oahu. The flats there are deep flats, and fishing from boats is pretty much a necessity for serious sport fish. But I've fished there from the beach and caught plenty of fish many times. So it sort of depends on what you want to catch.

http://hawaiionthefly.com/trips/hawaii/

I grew up in Aiea and lived on Pearl Harbor with the Arizona Memorial out my window. I taught myself to flyfish with a rod and reel I bought for $30. Level line and all. In 20 years I was the only flyfisherman I ever saw out there.

As for good places to fish: There are flats in several areas around the island that have very good bonefish, (oio) and Weke Ula (Goatfish). Both of these fight like crazy and any bonefish flies will work.

My favorite however, is finding an inshore bait ball of sardines and throwing streamers. You can drive around the island until you see a dark patch of water and/or birds. The dark patch is the school of sardines and if you watch for a while, you'll see Ulua (Jack Crevalle over 10 lbs(, Papio (Jack Crevalle under 10 lbs) and Barracuda tearing through the school. Thats a no brainer. Just throw and retrieve fast and repeat.

Almost any flat or stream outlet will be good for Barracude and stick fish up to a yard long. There is a Power Plant in Pearl City on the Pearl Harbor bike trail that has a warm water outlet that is great for fishing.

My favorite place on the island though is the boat pier on Hickam Air force base. Off to the left of the boats is a sand flat that goes out 1/4 mile and then drops off to hundreds of feet. Awesome fishing for everything up to Tiger sharks there. Treat it like a florida flat.

On a side note: After leaving Hawaii I moved to Alaska nd spent 11 years getting better at flyfishing. When I left Alaska I sold all of my Fly gear because... Asia. Now Im wanting to fly fish again but have no gear and can't afford Orvis/Sage etc top of the line stuff.

Any reccomendations?

TFO puts out some decent rods for an affordable price, and the Orvis Clearwater rods are a lot of rod for the money. I use both and am quite satisfied.

Hi Tuck
I usually hit the flats around Hawaii Kai when we go to HI for vacation
Interested in the flats around Hickam....do u need to have military ID or can anyone access?

COFF
These guys are local and only fly shop on Oahu
Good idea to book a wade trip and have them show wade flat locations. Then u can venture out on ur own.

Nervous Water Fly Fishers

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Blog is good read also

When i lived there I got on with friends who had access. Someone told me that you could tell the gate you were going to Hickam Harbor and they would let you in, but I cant testify to that.

Hawaii Kai or the Kahala area is good, but not as Florida Flat-ish.

One of my favorite things to do was to go to Shark's cove snorkeling, and troll a fly below me. You could watch the fish hit and then fight them entirely while underwater!

Okay, now that I have to try!

I fished Oahu and caught my first bone - wrote up a small blurb about it here - and I have to say that Clay at Nervous Waters Fly Shop was super helpful and a first class guy. I also keep in touch with Capt. Mike Hennessy who is an excellent guide if that's the direction you want to go.

I read your Bonefish story and enjoyed it a lot!

In Hawaii, at least when I was living there, Oio were not sought after fish because they were considered hard to clean and cook. The Weke Ula, (Goatfish), was the flats fish everyone was after. Small Weke are called Oama, and are excellent bait fish.

We had a really weird way of cleaning the bonefish. We would chop off the tail and then work a coke bottle or rolling pin from the head to the tail compressing the meat out. Then we'd make fishcakes out of it.

Everything is edible in Hawaii. I've seen samoan classmates bringing salmon skin to school as a snack.

Oh yeah, and Tuna fish pizza for school lunch.