Panama Fishing Report - Family Fun in the Gulf of Chiriqui! - January 4-7, 2011

[PDP Panama]

The Widner family from Galveston,Texas joined us at Propoiedad de Paradise Lodge, Isla Paridas for a few days of fishing and fun here in the Gulf of Chiriqui, Panama last week. The whole family enjoyed the calm seas and great fishing we had out on the TOP Cat at Hannibal Bank, Isla Montuosa, and Isla Ladrones.
We were able to raise quite a few Black Marlin as the bite out at Isla Montuosa, the week preceding the full moon, was epic. The first day, not five minutes into fishing, we had a monster nearly spool Wray's reel and spit the hook! An hour later another monster came and ate the short bait. As she swam past the back of the TOP Cat I noticed that she was a long as the beam of the boat! At least twelve feet long and at least 750 pounds! She ate the short bonito first, spit it, then went and ate the bridled Blue Runner on the left rigger, I grabbed the left rigger rod and put the reel into free-spool as Johnny manned the short bait. Just as we thought she was going to eat my Blue Runner she spits it and goes back to the short bonito! Johnny's ready and lets her eat for a good 8 seconds before he puts the Tiagra to strike, reels hard, and has her hooked good as she jumps and thrashes peeling line of the singing reel. And hour and a half into the fight we had our shot as Wray got her close enough and had the wind on into the reel. As Johnny the mate grabbed the leader the fish exploded into the air and ran off another 200 yards of line! Three and a half hours later Wray was exhausted. The big fish decided to sound down underneath the boat and just sat there. We put the 5/0 Tiagra spooled with 80# line into the rod holder and tried for another 30 minutes as we got inch by inch a few more feet until the line finally snapped. What a fight! We had a couple of more chances on the Blacks as we had a few more up in the spread the following couple of days but none would eat. We got a nice Pacific Sailfish and missed two more as we concentrated on trying to get another shot at a Marlin for Wray.
In the afternoons we concentrated on different action to get the kids involved and caught a wide variety of fish including Cubera Snappers, Wahoos, Mullet Snappers, Amberjacks, and Dorado. Enjoy the pics!!

[Jay W]

Awesome trip and pictures Shane. Glad it was him and not me on that rod for 3+ hours. Are you still using your Playsport for your pictures if so that thing is sweet.

[PDP Panama]

Awesome trip and pictures Shane. Glad it was him and not me on that rod for 3+ hours. Are you still using your Playsport for your pictures if so that thing is sweet.

Thanks Jay. Yeah it was pretty dissapointing not subduing that beast and getting him boatside to say the least. I did get some good video that I'll post soon though. Check out the new video we just completed with the guys from Addictive Angler that visited last month I took with the same Kodak PlaySport..........

[Jay W]

Kodak needs to send you a new one and become a sponsor of yours. That camera has captured some amazing sights over the years. That thing is bullet proof.