Or maybe I should title this thread "Baby Tarpon on the Fly" in deference to KK's big tarpon, as large tarpon aren't present in this part of Mexico until May and June.

My philosophy for Mexico fishing is to take a break from our typical winter gray and rain and cold, and this year's snow and ice to somewhere warm and sunny, with an opportunity to do some fly fishing. There are an abundance of smallish bonefish, permit, tarpon, snook, barracuda, and other species on and around the flats of Ascension Bay, about two hour's drive south of Cancun. And they can all be caught on flies, or I wouldn't bother fishing. (This remark is made to confirm any lingering suspicions that Salmo is an elitist fly fisherman.)

My retired former co-worker friend and I joined a group heading to Casa Viejo Chaac in Punta Allen at the end of the 40 km long peninsula, or spit, that stretches from Tulum to PA, about half of which includes the world's winner of the "road from hell" contest. We left the hotel in Cancun at 5:30 pm, arriving in PA at midnight, with a one hour stop in Tulum for dinner. It's open to debate as to whether the final 20 km of that road can be traversed faster by walking instead of driving.

Manuel Chaac operates a comfortable fishing lodge in PA, located a couple short blocks from the roughly hewn docks where several 23' pangas are kept. The boats are powered with 40, 50, or 60 hp Yamaha 4-stroke outboards, mostly 40s for fuel economy, which turns out to be an important consideration since everything has to be trucked into PA over the road from hell, and we made daily runs of an hour and sometimes more to the better flats for fishing.

Ascension Bay bonefish run 1 - 3 pounds, and that's what we caught, although the guides claim there are larger ones around. If I were a guide, I wouldn't make that claim unless I knew I could take clients to where those larger bones are found, so who knows. I've only been to Mexico once before and fished just a small area of flats near Boca Paila, which is located about half way down the peninsula. I caught only bonefish the previous trip, so my fishing objective was to catch a few bonefish and then try to add new species to my "life list" of fish species fished for and caught.

A 15 pound snook rounded out the first day's fishing, and a 12 or 13 pound tarpon added a new species the second day. I had shots at four permit the third day, with follows by three of them, and a hookup with one about 12 pounds, but it broke off, taking a favored crab fly pattern that was in high demand and short supply. We fished with Manuel the fourth day, and he is tarpon obsessed. I hooked four but only landed one, while my fishing partner landed four. All the tarpon were in the 10 - 15 pound range, and more than enough to cause some serious line burn when they pull line after the initial hook sets; mine are just about healed.

We fished with a permit-obsessed guide named Tarantula the fifth day. He was describes by other anglers at the lodge as focused and intense, but crazed might be more like it. When he spots a permit from the poling platform on the stern of the panga, he says get in the water (quickly and silently) and beats the fisherman into the water, just dropping his pole and sliding down off the platform and over the side. His assistant, 16-year-old Elmer, retrieves the pole and clambers up to the poling platform to keep an eye on the fish. This worked really well when a cloud would block the sun, as Tarantula (Tara for short) would just have us freeze in place when he lost sight of the fish. When the sun came back out, Elmer would relocate the fish, and Tara and I would resume stalking the permit. I got lucky and got a hook-up to the first permit I stalked and cast to. My friend made four stalks that day without ever hooking up. Permit are every bit as wary as wary as the angling literature describes, and even when you do everything right with the wind blowing invariably from the wrong direction, the permit is just as likely to decide your crab imitation is a fake and turn away, in which case there is nothing you can do but begin looking for a more gullible permit.

A note here to Coley about the fish skull flies he sent me: As heavily weighted flies, I didn't get to give them a fair test. Most of the water I fished was less than 3 feet deep and often less than 2. I did get a brief chance fishing a deeper channel between flats for snook but hooked nothing. Had there been more opportunity to fish them in some deeper water I think they would definitely attract snook, probably tarpon altho the guides didn't think so. Withiout a doubt they would attract barracuda, but barracuda will hit anything that is fished to suggest a wounded baitfish, so barracuda would be a waste of a relatively expensive fly.

A couple of guys fished out off the reef at the edge of the bay where the water was deeper and more tidal current was present. However, it's totally exposed to higher wind, and the boat is bouncing around on the swells and in the waves, so casting those fish skull flies would require a safety helmet, so I think the guides would frown on using them.

We returned to Cancun on Sunday and went out Monday with another guide to fish north of town near Isla Blanca for more tarpon and snook in the mangrove lagoons. I had several shots at and hookups with tarpon but didn't land any. My partner did better and got a couple to the boat. We also caught some smaller fish. I got some kind of perch, and my buddy got a mangrove snapper, the latter species being good table fare.

I'll try to upload my photos from my camera to my computer tonight and then post some here. And I'll add some more after I get the ones my fishing partner took.

Sg

Right on. Thanks for sharing.
I've been lucky enough to try for permit twice. It was a lot like hunting.
Your description brought back memories for sure. The guide in the same breath telling you to hurry and yet be quiet!

Awesome trip report, Salmo! Permit are starting to get my attention and I'm hoping to check that box this year.

Nice report! Sounds like a great trip.

Stam,

Live crab crack the code alright, but that is cheating among the ascot crowd. Something you'll eventually evolve too, knuckle dragger. What they don't want are fake crab fly patterns, and I'm more convinced than ever that they really check out the flies to see if they are real. Make selective trout appear pretty dumb.

Now to see if I've had too much wine with dinner to upload my pictures.

Sg

Welcome back Salmo!

Awesome story of an awesome trip. Glad no one got cracked in the head by a fish skull. Hope you had a grand time and lookin forward to the photos.

I've had the pleasure of landing some really nice permit. I've also had the pleasure of watching them as they looked at a very nice crab imitation and wouldn't eat. Strip a couple inches and the fish would follow it with magnifying glass making sure it was a fake. Strip again and Mr. Scrupulous would pull out magnifying glass again to count the thread wraps, bend of the hook, barb/no barb, etc. Another strip and the fish would hover 1/2" from the fly making mental notes to ensure it would never inhale anything that wasn't real meat with no hook attached.


Humbling.

cool report Salmo , where are those photos?

Mingo,

I got the photos resized and uploaded to Bob's PP photo uploader, but I can't find Parker's instructions on the next step for posting them into this thread. So close, yet so far. It must be obvious that I don't post many pics.

Sg

You didn't need to even upload them to post them here....you could have used the "file manager" option just under your posting window and added them that way.....but they have to be within the size limitation. You can do 5 files/photos per post that way and just added another post if you wanted more photos added. That is what I did with the joke ads I put in the Joke Thread............

give it a shot!

Just put them all on Photobucket, then do whatever you want with them...it's free, doesn't use up Bob's server space, and you can post as many as you want, as big as you want...no resizing required.

Fish on...

Todd

Sorry Mingo, I don't see anything labeled "file manager option" or similar anywhere on my screen, let alone under my posting window. Bob must have my membership restricted for the technologically challenged.

Although I posted photos before, I can't find the instructions I got from Parker that connects the emails I got back from Bob's photo uploader.

I'm thinking about trying Todds' Photobucket suggestion except for his vague "do whatever you want with them" as it lacks the apparent step by step instructions on how to do whatever I want with them. Those of you who post a lot of photos definitely have a method easier than what I have used. The process I've used, written out in detail by Parker, is flat out a total pain in the ass, requiring 5 to 10 steps per photo posted. It's a huge disincentive to try and post photos. It amazes me that photos can't be posted the same as attaching a photo or other file to an email - click, click, done.

KK, maybe, maybe not. I haven't totally given up.

Sg

Hey, Leave me out of it "Homes".What's up with this photobucket thing????.Good luck,
SZ

Some day,maybe.

OK, I found file manager after uploading the photos to Photobucket. Clicked on file manager and browsed and added photos, clicked on "done adding files." Then WTF? Nothing happened. The photos didn't appear in the full reply screen, nor any codes representing the photos. Nutin' happened.

Next suggestion?

Sg

Can't seem to enter captions between the pictures. The croc skull is impressive. Fortunately I never saw any, which is good since I spent a lot of time wading around in the water. I think this is the only bonefish I thought to take a picture of. And the third one shows me playing a tarpon from the panga.

OK, so they don't appear in the reply, but do show up when posted.

Here's a couple more: One of the baby tarpon, they ranged from about 10 to 15 pounds but are a lot of fun even though they don't make very long runs.

Standing in the ocean playing the permit, but really there's an island about 200 feet behind us. The permit was by far the most fun, you hunt them, stalk them, cast to them, and hope they don't figure out your fly is a fake. That was the only fish that got into my backing all week. What a bunch of crap - they tell you to have at least 150 yards of backing, with 250 even better. The permit took less than 40 yards of backing, still nice. Very powerful, when they run, you can't stop 'em. Same with tarpon - the line burned two fingers, ouch!

Welcome to 1984, Steve!

(You don't have to use the file manager when using photobucket, just hit the "full reply" button, and use the "insert photo" button on the top of the reply box, which, incidentally, does not say "insert photo" on it until you roll your cursor over it )

Fish on...

Todd

P.S. Nice fish!

1984, BS! We got our first PC in 1985, and nobody had home internet until 1995. So there! I'll add however, that these photos got here by accident. I still don't see how to use the photobucket thingy.

Sg

I'd write out a tutorial for ya...but I'm not nearly that bored today. Sorry.

Fish on...

Todd

Hey Stam, I posted photos before. I just misplaced the instructions and started over at square one. Yeah, the Caribbean is nice for a short visit. Maybe I could adapt to the humidity, but so far I'm not quite that interested. If it comes to that, I'll definitely consider snowbirding there when I retire. There's less and less winter steelheading to keep me here through the dark months.

The long expansive flats, sand, and marl are amazing. I was thinking as we were running out to the fishing grounds one morning that I could probably fall out of the boat and eventually walk and swim my way back to Punta Allen if I didn't get eaten by a croc or 'cuda first. Unfortunately no bikinis around PA; have to get around the tourist resorts for that, at which point the scenery takes a decided upswing.

Got some outa' sight Anejo Esperante tequila I brought home. Funny, I never had a whiff of tequila or a margarita until about 9 or 10 years ago. Since our last trip to Mexico in 05, I've grown quite partial to the stuff. It probably goes well with ascots.

Sg

Damn fine there Salmo. That permit sure is a gorgeous fish.

Tequila. Like a lot of things, the difference between the good, the bad, and even the OK is huge. Glad you had a good trip and thanks for the photos.