I never thought I would become obsessed with a fish. Well it has happened and this pandemic is not helping at all. Karen and I have experienced some incredible moments of fly fishing in Belize, specifically around Ambergris Caye. We love the people, the surroundings and of course the fly fishing opportunities.
Well two days stand out in our minds. Of course both days involve permit!
The first day happened two years back. I was heading out with my buddy Colin and our guide for the day was Omar. Omar is obsessed with permit. Well we motored out to a beautiful island to look for the Black Tailed Devil. We saw a pod and off we went on foot to chase them and maybe intercept one or two.
Omar saw a pod happily feeding. Both Colin and I were able to cast to the permit. After several casts. My heavily weighted Christmas Island Special dropped right to the side of the pod. I let the fly drop and then started my retrieve. The line tightened up. Permit on. It was a decent permit!
I yelled to Omar who was helping Colin. He wanted to know how much backing I had. I had 300 yards of backing. He came over to coach me as I let the permit run. I was able to turn the permit several times and off he went again and again. As the permit tired, Omar got ready to tail my biggest permit ever. I really wanted to land this one. My heart was pounding. After 5 or 6 failed attempts at tailing my adversary, Omar was able to grab the tail. Wohoo! I was pumped. We got a few shots and the permit headed off to find his mates.
Well my adrenalin was flowing. A few moments later, Karen and my buddy Doug motored in to see what was going on. They has already landed close to 30 bonefish and it wasn't even lunch time. You know I could hardly wait to tell them all about the great moment. We all continued fly fishing for permit. Later in the afternoon, I hooked a second one; even bigger than the 6 kg first one. It broke my 16 pound tippet off like it was thread. Sigh!
I can hardly wait to get back to San Pedro!
Who knew that as the sun rose, an incredible day was going to unfold.
Let's Go!
Permit on!
Omar celebrating!
Well Karen has an awesome permit story too. Karen and Taryn were fishing the channels. I was along to take photos. The ladies successfully hooked and landed lots of bonefish. About mid afternoon, a permit was not far out in front of the boat. Our guide Hilian saw the permit trailing a ray looking for an easy meal. Karen was up on the casting deck. Her chance was going to have to be a back hand cast into the wind. Well Karen got a cast off just behind the permit. As her shrimp pattern sunk, the permit turned and attacked the pink gotcha! Game on. The line and backing ripped off of Karen's Hatch 7 Reel. Hilian turned the boat to give Karen her best chance of landing a 6 maybe 7 pound permit!. The permit slowly tired, Hilian jumped out of the boat and he was able to tail Karen's biggest permit! A backhand cast into the wind. Who knew that this incredible moment was in the cards. What fun!
We need to go back!
...and soon!
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