Panama – Monster grouper and more

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By Andreas

Everyone has their own dreams and expectations when they book a dream trip. This trip had it all: Excitement, incredible strong fish, big fish, tough fights, numerous species, excellent cooking and lots of fun at the lodge. Like my fellow travellers I had really looked forward to this trip but not in my wildest dreams had I imagined what we would have to endure to get there…

We were three Danes that were supposed to meet six Swedes in Amsterdam’s airport, at the gate of the Panama flight. When we were about to leave sunny Copenhagen we were told we couldn’t take off due to severe fog in Amsterdam. We finally left but not without being so delayed that we ended up missing our onwards flight to Panama. So while the six Swedes followed the original itinerary, checking in at the airport hotel in Panama City and transferred to the lodge the followed morning, well rested I might add, we were struggling: First to get a hotel in Amsterdam, then to get a flight to New York – but not before getting the needed ESTA approval for entering the US – and since to catch the flight from New York to Panama where we transferred directly to the lodge which we reached two hours before breakfast on the first day of fishing! And yes, we were a little bit tired.

The fishing was very varied during our seven days on the Tuna Coast. We fished offshore for yellowfin tuna, snapper, grouper and amberjack and closer to shore or on the large plateaus surrounded by deeper water in search of big roosterfish, cubera snappers, jacks and several other species.

When jigging Savage Gear’s Cutbait Herring (465 grams) did particularly well. Big broomtail groupers, cubera snappers, red snappers and amberjacks couldn’t stay away from the lively soft baits. Unfortunately, the effective soft baits didn’t last too long in the toothy mouth of an angry predator but that’s another story.

One of this week’s top fish was a huge white belly grouper of around 60 kilos that took one of these soft baits in 90 meters of water. Daniel Kedestig caught the monster and it gave him one hell of a fight. The same Swedish boat had fantastic fishing at the same spot for big snappers and amberjacks and lost another VERY big fish five minutes into the battle.

The (tired?) Danish boat team caught four nice broomtail groupers on their first day, also on the Cutbait and in just two hours of fishing. The colour of the bait didn’t seem to matter as long as it was jigged slowly along the bottom. Kim Jensen caught the second biggest grouper at around 23-25 kilos and yours truly caught one of between 21 and 23 kilos. Tobias Bragd landed the biggest rooster at 25 kilos+ and he also took care of the biggest yellowfin tuna and the biggest amberjack – both in the 20-25 kilos range. Several big black tip sharks were landed, the biggest was an estimated 65 kilos and was caught on a popper (!) by Martin Berggren.

Gigantic needlefish up to 6-7 kilos were caught as well as nice jack crevalle and bluefin trevallies up to 10-11 kilos. Daniel Kedestig took the biggest cubera of the trip, a fish around 25 kilos that ate a popper and fought like mad. There were also a few cuberas caught on jigs and stickbaits and the many welcome bonus catches included barracudas, scierra and Spanish mackerels, pompanos, bonitos, skip jacks and dorados, most of which were caught on small stick baits and poppers. On my next Panama trip I will surely carry a collection of smaller stick baits in white and silver.

Dumbell and Halco Roosta Haymaker in larger sizes were top-poppers for cuberas and for fishing the offshore plateaus. Smaller white and silver stick baits from Orion, Rapala (X-Rap) and others were top inshore lures for roosterfish, cubera, and needlefish and even for tunas offshore. We didn’t catch huge numbers of fish daily our three boats caught several big fish every single day!

The weather was very pleasant through the entire trip – most days were a mix of clouds and a little sun and on two of the days we saw some serious showers. Most days there wasn’t much, if any wind to start with but during the afternoon it usually picked up a bit.
The lodge was as always performing 110% – our favourite mixed drink this time was the Piña Colada made from freshly blended pineapple, local rum and coconut crème. Evening meals consisted of delicious fish dishes, sea food platters and tender steaks prepared in the best possible way by the French chef.

The end to this great trip was obviously that our flight was delayed on the way back and that we landed, on the third attempt, in the worst Danish storm ever…
Despite the challenging flights I just can’t wait to go back!

Thank for a great trip, guys!
Note: Andreas travelled with www.getawaytours.eu where this article has been published first. Check out their website if you want to get away yourself…