i have the pleasure to fish and be surrounded by great fisherman and friends,
Mogi-san and Aramaki-san along Beerman Okubo-san joined me on trip to Paradise lodge in Panama,
i choose Chad's lodge as i fished with him last year and i had a great time not to mention his customer service,
the guys flew from Japan and landed for 5 hours in New York and then off to the promising land (Panama),
after the 4 hours drive we made it to the lodge at 3:00AM took 3 hours sleep and off to the chase,
the presents of the birds and the porpoises was insane at a certain time during the day but all what we are getting is the 20lb 30lb fish,
Mogi-san finally had a nice fish on a carpenter Gamma lure estimated in the 120lb range, it took him 15 minute to land the fish,
right after that our Captain Chicho receive a call on the radio of big fish 10 miles away, he said that big tuna might pop up later but the guys are getting them on bait,
so we end up giving a shot to try the bait, and boy did we miss anythings.
first guy that jumped in to the rod was Aramaki-san, fought the fish on the black magic belt and had it to the gaff in less then 20 minute, estimated at 170lb,
10 minutes pass by and 2 rods off they sound, Mogi-san picked up one and i picked up the other rod,
from the fight i thought that the fish is small but later it turned in to be a good class fish that every fisherman dream to catch.
i have to admit that this is my first fish caught on bait, i took the rod as no other fellow fisherman wanted to fight it,
Mogi-san and I fought both fish on regular fighting belt with no harness,
i landed my fish in 11 minutes and we had all the fight on video, the fish estimated at 250lb,
Mogi-san landed his fish after me and end up breaking the rod, it took him 13 minutes and his fish estimated at 220lb,
i hope tomorrow will be another day and the bite will be wide open as i really want to catch them on popping gear,
i will keep on updating you guys from the lodge and as soon i load more picture from Mogi's camera i will post them.
DAY 2
Adrian and Jared had join us today at the lodge,
Unfortunately we had a slow day today,
many small fish been caught that made us hesitate for a second to make another cast, but that did not stop us from casting
we had a good shot at some point and i came in tight on a descent fish to loose it after 15 minutes, i had the main leader and the twisted leader flat,
the line was wrapped around the fish,
the present of tuna is visible but are a bit shy from showing up on top water.
after that we made the call to try the inshore but had no luck,
well long day and hopefully tomorrow will be better.
Last day
Despite all the rain that is been falling down in the past 2 days we end up doing OK,
today i encounter one of the best fight that i ever seen,
Berman Okuba-san showed us his talent,
you guys should admire to see what i saw today,
Epic is not even the right words, i need a historian to write down what i saw today,
a 2:15 minutes fight on Carpenter Black Current 66M with PE3 Sunline and a 60g Shout jigs and hook,
UNBELIEVABLE achievement,
i am so happy to be around and register these moment,
we barley saw Tuna today and decided to start jigging and popping at the bank,
all of a sudden Beerman Okubo-san get hooked up and the fight is on,
for 1:15 minutes he fought the fish with no harness and then decided to put it on,
i had never seen a rod like that before and trust me i saw lot of rods and i used countless amount of them.
i am very surprised to see how the rods took the abuse without breaking,
no wonder why Carpenter is the leader in Japan,
do i have to mention the size of the fish, i guess not
enjoy the picture.
Sami
