Great Inagua, Bahamas 2012

After a fantastic trip to Great Inagua, 

back in 2008, I was excited to fish this amazing Bahamian island with my good friend, Walt Kleckley.

    

 Inagua does not have the long, huge, ocean-side flats, typical of  the Bahamas, but it has some expansive estuary flats that are full of bonefish.  

 

Triggerfish!

 Our first day, prior to our guided trip, Walt and I fished the nearby Lighthouse

flats, and discovered one a species high on my "bucket list": Triggerfish!

These fish were plentiful, this day, and I hooked 5 of these permit-like fish.  They are on the flats at low tide and tail just like permit.  They eat a well placed crab or shrimp fly, and although difficult to hook, due to their hard, toothy mouth, they are a terrific flats game fish, worthy of any fly fisher!

 Walt stalking a triggerfish!

A huge 2 lb. lobster made a great dinner for Walt and I!!

The sunset was especially sweet, after a big lobster dinner!

***

 Our first guided day found us motoring to a beach, and hiking through the bush...

(you can forget DIY on this island-Grin!)

 

 .....to a pristine estuary flat, exposed only during extreme high tide.  The water was only about 6" deep, and the tails and fins waving to us, were just too perfect!  I had to snap a picture, prior to making the cast.  

The bonefish in this picture were 15 to 20 ft. away!

....and after the cast, my first bonefish of the trip.

 Typical ankle-deep bonefish flat.  Sight-fishing at its best!

  

It was fun testing my new Slow Sinking Shrimp pattern.  It was deadly!  Walt and I took at least 20 bonefish, each, this incredible day!

 

 Typical Inagua bonefish: 3 to 6 lbs.

After wading for bonefish, we passed through a deep water cut, and discovered a school of mangrove snappers, swirling around a rock, in the center of the "cut", as tidal water flowed through.  I grabbed our backup rod, which was set up with wire leader, for barracuda, and it didn't take long to hook several nice sized mangrove snappers.  Unfortunately, we were quite a distance from the boat, so couldn't keep one or two for dinner.

...after playing with the snappers, I moved downstream in search of barracuda, and hooked up with a medium sized cuda that put on quite a show.  This fish was out of the water, with long "greyhound-like" jumps, more than in the water!






 Barracuda!  
What a blast on a 
Slideball Slider, 
cuda fly!








It was finally time in our trip to fish the "lake".
This is an inland lake that is fed with sea water pumped into the lake, to supply salt water to the huge brine "pans" that provide sea salt for the Morton Salt Company.
The water is moved from pan to pan, and the brine/salinity finally is raised to the point that the water can be completely evaporated, leaving sea salt behind.



Morton Salt, ready for shipment.

There are many species of salt water species that inhabit the lake, and they are landlocked.
 

It has become a massive, thriving fishery that extends many miles in every direction.  Our first species was snook, and when I spotted 4 or 5 huge snook moving up to us, I was looking at several snook in excess of 30 lbs.!  They were considerably larger than any snook I had ever seen, yet cast a fly to.
Unfortunately, as often times happens, the smallest fish in the group was the first to attack my fly.  A chunky  15+ lb. snook.  I can still recall watching the much larger (and slower!) snook move away as my fish jumped and burned line from my reel!

 Snook and Neutralizer! 

***

 My partner and I lost track of the tarpon we "jumped" one morning, along a cut, from one "pan" to another.
Typical lake tarpon.  25-30 lbs.

 

Tarpon in the air! 

Later in the week we found tarpon patrolling a channel, near the pump station, and this was perhaps the best tarpon fishing I have ever experienced.  You could see the fish rolling, as they approached, and the water was clear enough to see the tarpon the entire time you were casting!  The takes were close by and totally visible.  We lost track of the fish we jumped in this channel, with a good number brought to hand.

 

Typical lake tarpon with the canal in the background.

After 5 days of epic fly fishing for triggerfish, bonefish, tarpon, snook, tripletail, cobia, cuda, snapper, and permit, things started to get ugly!

We were aware that hurricane Sandy was making its way toward us, and decided to change our plans and fly home early.  With boarding pass in hand, and our bags on the cart, we received news the news that the Bahamian Air pilots refused to fly, and since they only fly 3 times a week anyway, we were stuck on Inagua for the next 6 days. Although there were power outages, we did have good television, and were able to watch "my SF Giants" win the World Series!  

 Of course, there is always shopping!

 Hurricane Sandy hits Great Inagua!

The power of Hurricane Sandy pounded the seawall, in front of our duplex, and eventually destroyed the wall, spewing rocks and debris up into the yard next to our building.  

   

The aftermath of Sandy in our front yard

 Six days later the weather returned to normal, and we were ready to fly out!

 Great Inagua is truly a special place.  There is really nothing like this island in all of the Bahamas.  It is 50 miles long, and only a few short roads to explore the rocky interior and coastline.  There are wild cows, hogs, and donkeys throughout the island, along with vicious mosquitoes!  There are no hotels, restaurants or any "night life".  It is this fly fisherman's dream vacation (minus the hurricanes!).  The shear numbers of fish, both in the lake, and on the estuary flats, are staggering!

Many thanks to my partner, Walt Kleckley, for making this trip possible.  

I can't wait to return!

Rumble on the Tundra-Alaska 2012

This was my second trip to the Innoko River, fishing with outfitter Bruce & Connie Werba, of Alaska Pike Safaris. Bruce is primarily a hunting guide, and knows little of fly fishing, but knows the territory where big northern pike live!

Cold and rainy weather met us as we landed in Aniak, and took the short mail-plane ride to Holy Cross. Since this weather pattern had persisted all summer, my partner, Mike Scott, and I were concerned that we would not be able to fish with top water gurglers, and experience the explosive strikes we encountered in 2008. (see my blog report)

Our adventure took us 80 miles upriver, and 40 miles beyond the last village. There would be no roads, villages or people for 650 miles!!! Yes, were in the wilderness, and only able to fish this area because we had hauled in several 15 gal. drums of gas, in addition to the gas in the boat.

This river boat was made for comfort, speed, and long range! Perfect!

Our home, for the next 5 days, would be this tiny one room trappers cabin.

Room with a view!

Typical Slough

As we anticipated, cold, windy and rainy weather was our constant companion.
This meant the pike would be sluggish and tough to catch.
However, the fish still need to eat, right? Yea, Fish On!

However, once we located the pike, and discovered that they were feeding in the late evening hours, it was a matter of getting the fly down to their level with the right fly and sinking line. In addition, I had tied a new pattern, especially designed for subsurface pike:

The Pike Neutralizer

Before the trip, Bruce had asked if we would be prepared to rig our leaders for IGFA, so a large fish would qualify for a world record. This meant that we needed to take care in constructing our leaders to exact specifications. Bruce was confident that we would find fish large enough to break one, or more, records, and although skeptical, that was the plan.

I decided to start off with 20 lb. leader, rigged for IGFA, and switch to 8 lb. leader, once we found the larger fish.
Well, you might know it......the first night brought the biggest fish of the trip into the net.

29 lb. Northern Pike...
...about 2 lbs. short of the world record for 20 lb. test leader and 2 lbs. over the 8 lb. record!

Well I guess you could say we found the big fish, so I re-rigged my leader system with an 8 lb. class tippet, and made the next cast....

The second big fish of the trip....22 lbs.

This gorgeous pike was lit up like a neon light, with fins aglow!

Mike Scott with a nice 24 lb. pike!
Now, if I could get Mike to smile....Grin!

Since Mike and I were now both using Pike Neutralizers, I had to start tying more flies, to keep up with the action!

Unfortunately, due to the cold weather, there were only a short few hours, late in the evening, when the pike would eat, and we adjusted our schedule accordingly:

1. Sleep in until 9:00 or 10:00.
2. Eat breakfast
3. Tie flies
4. Take a nap
5. Start fishing around 7-8:00 in the evening
6. Finish fishing around 11:00 pm
7. Prepare dinner around 12:00 midnight
8. Eat around 1:00-1:30
9. ....and get to bed around 2:30 AM

The results were spectacular as Mike and I continued to catch fish over 20 lbs. each night................ all caught on the Pike Neutralizer!

On the 3rd night, I was able to land this huge northern pike.....

26 lbs.
...1 lb short of the 8 lb. world record!

Needless to say, we were thrilled!

The Innoko River grows big northern pike, and I can't wait to get back to Alaska and do it all over again!

Many thanks to Mike Scott for making this trip a possibility, and to Bruce and Connie Werba, who are the greatest hosts any fly fisherman could ask for. They can make a remote camp warm and functional. True professionals.

Florida's Emerald Coast-Destin 2012

Our "family" vacation took shape when a house became available in Sandestin, Florida, east of Pensacola.

Fishing for redfish from the fairway!

It didn't take long for me to research the area and discover a variety of fly fishing opportunities. Our house was located on one of the 6 golf courses, and adjacent to numerous ponds stocked with large mouth bass and panfish.

On our first evening, I broke out the fly rod and a Jungle Frog Slider, and headed for a likely pond, right out our back door! It didn't take long to bring my first 5 lb. LMB to hand, and another 4 lb. fish shortly after that. What a great start to our trip!


With bike trails everywhere, we rented bikes and made a run everyday, exploring this beautiful area. It was just a short ride to the ocean-side area to check out the beach. It is no wonder this area is called the "Emerald Coast".


I had made arrangements with a local guide, Tom Campbell, to fish redfish and tarpon, and early the second day we were motoring to the grassy flats.
Tom explained that conditions were very tough in the spring. Very clear water, and spooky fish make the local redfish a great challenge, and with only a few shots, only 1, 6 lb. fish was coaxed to the fly that morning.

Once again, the Neutralizer was effective on these spooky reds......!

.....and even

.....fooled this nice speckled trout, hiding in the weeds!

In addition, Tom informed me that he had just sold his Hells Bay flats skiff, and we would be using a backup boat the remainder of the trip. However, what appeared to be bad news ended up providing a number of opportunities, totally unexpected.

The "new" boat required some work, and Tom was quick to help me locate another guide to help fill in the open dates. However,Tom was able to get the backup boat ready and he wanted to try some night fishing, under the dock lights. We met up one evening and headed out to a couple of underwater lights, that had been producing good numbers of trout and redfish. I fished a number of shrimp patterns that worked very well for these scrappy trout, however, it was a small, all-tan gurgler, that was responsible for the largest trout, over 20"! This new night fishing experience was a lot of fun.

Since Tom was not confident with his backup boat, he connected me to another guide who had some days available. He had a bay boat, and was anxious to could get me out on the ocean side for some blue water action.

I met guide Kyle Pitts for a 1/2 day run to check out a couple of wrecks, and after netting some live bait, we were on our way.

The GPS tracked us right over the first sunken wreck, and it didn't take long for Kyle to get the small amberjack to the surface, whipped into a frenzy, and eager to eat my fly. It was not exactly the type of "sight fishing" I prefer, but it was a lot of fun anyway.


Even though these fish were only 8-10 lbs., the 8 wt. was just not enough stick to subdue these powerful fish, and I quickly switched to my 10 wt.

Here is a short video that shows the small amberjack attacking our bait.....

....and finally my fly!

Here is a sequence of pictures showing the amberjack attacking my fly:

If you look close, you will see many other fish trying to get that fly!

These fish were a lot of fun, and after 6 or 8 fish, Kyle suggested we make the run to the second wreck, and see if we couldn't chum up some bigger fish.

This proved to be a good move. Within a few minutes I could see "color" in the clear water, below the boat, as the big amberjack headed for the surface to eat the live bait.

When the first amberjack exploded on the bait, it was like a hand grenade going off, and when the fish finally surrounded the boat, I was impressed with the size of these big amberjack. Most were 3-5 ft. long, and I immediately was concerned that my "big" 12 wt. might not be enough stick to control these "reef donkeys", as they are referred to. Kyle instructed me that the wreck was about 60 ft. deep, and that I had to apply enough pressure to keep the fish from getting back to the wreck, and cutting me off. Right!

It didn't take but a couple of casts and a big amberjack ate my 4/0 Seal Sardina fly, and bolted down to the wreck! With my back against the center console, I cranked the drag down on the big Nautilus reel, and held on. Fortunately, everything (including me!) held together and we were able stop, and drag this fish away from the wreck. 20 minutes later we released this beautiful 35 lb. amberjack!

Seal Sardina

With the big fish still nearby, Kyle went to work throwing the live bait, and getting them back around the boat. On the first cast another big fish banged the fly, but came free.....however, the fly was immediately eaten by another amberjack, and we were off and running again. Unfortunately, this fish could not be revived and we were forced to bring it home for dinner. Since my wife, Eloise, had here two sisters and 2 nieces coming to visit, I felt better about keeping this fish. Indeed, this fish provided 2 dinners and a breakfast for the entire family.

This amberjack was a bit smaller, around 30 lbs.

Our next day, was a full day chasing tarpon. It was awesome. With crystal clear water, and good light, we were able to spot tarpon migrating along the beach. However, after a number of refusals we were forced to lighten the leader, from a 60 lb. bite leader, to 40 lb. The response was very positive. The next tarpon charged the fly eagerly, however, the fish somehow missed the fly. Near the end of the day, as the action slowed, I had another great shot at a pair of huge tarpon, and sure enough, the second fish closed on the fly and we were solid to our first Panama City tarpon. 2 jumps later the fish broke off the fly, and given the light leader, we were still elated that we could get one in the air, and bring success to our day, and the perfect end to a great trip!

Many thanks to Tom Campbell and Kyle Pitt, for working hard to get me into a variety of fish, and new experiences, making this trip a total success!