# Pinas Bay (Panama) report from January 12-14



## big blue (Jun 28, 2008)

Flew down to Panama City to visit and fish on the Green Flash, a 48' Cabo. The owner has some property in Roatan, Honduras and they went there for a couple months and found out there aren't many fish there. It's a great diving destination, but not so much for fishing. Anyway, they went on down to Panama and that's where I come in. Captain Eric was an MP at the Air Force base in P.C. when we still had control of the Panama Canal, so he knows his way around the city! Doesn't hurt that he married a local girl while he was there! That is a big, dirty, crazy city! I can tell you this, as bad a shape as America is in, we are still living a whole lot better than the people down there. Minimum wage is $.95 an hour and gas is the same price as here! Anyway, left the city and traveled 100 miles or so to Pinas Bay, home of the famous Tropic Star Lodge. We wahoo fished the first afternoon with no luck. Tucked up behind an island and spent the night. Next day continued to fish south and caught nothing but dorado(dolphin) the next day, had 5 solid fish and lost 3 more, 1 was a stud! No billfish sightings. Went in to Tropic Star to spend the night. About the coolest thing about the whole trip to me was when we tied off to mooring buoys(there is no marina), about 15 little Panamanian indian kids paddle up to your boat in pangas and climb on and sell you stuff they made, baskets, wood carvings with marlin on them, and bracelets and chains mostly. Some of them are all painted up with berrys that stain their skin, it was like something off National Geographic! Next morning we were the 2nd boat to the reef, caught small bonitos and began live baitin for black marlin. No love! We didn't hear of anyone in the fleet hooking a black(we had a local mate and he was talking to charter boats all day) Had 2 sailfish jumping and caught 1 dorado on a naked ballyhoo. Started trolling about 11:00 and pretty much continued to catch dorado. Caught 5 or 6 more that day and ran back to Flammenco Marina. Gotta stay on your toes, ALOT of stuff floating, I guess because of all the lush vegetation and all the rain. It's amazing all the ships that wait 2-3 weeks to pass thru the Canal, just sitting and waiting. The Panama Canal NETTED $985 million last year and the country is dirt poor. You think we are corrupt! Unreal all the construction in the city,alot of it half completed, noone working. Eric said alot of it is Columbian funded, just doing something with all that money! By the way, Tropic Star is only 10 miles from Columbia! Stayed a couple more days, checked out the city, went to casinos one night and had a blast(no I didn't hire one of the many working girls there, supposedly there are about 20 of these casinos in P.C.) Flew home and coming into the country thru Miami is unfriggin' believable!







The next week they went way north to the Hannibal Bank and in 4 days of fishing, went 10 for 50 on sailfish, 0 for 8 on blue marlin, and caught 1 nice bigeye tuna! Going back down mid-April and hopefully I can help them improve on the hook-up ratio. All fish were on bait-and -switch circle hooks. All in all had a good time, it reall made me appreciate the good 'ole USA. God Bless America


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## big blue (Jun 28, 2008)

a few pics on GCFC


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## Magic236 (Oct 1, 2007)

Big Blue, glad you had a good trip. Hopefully, the billfishing will be better in April....THX for the post......


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## big blue (Jun 28, 2008)

Magic236 said:


> Big Blue, glad you had a good trip. Hopefully, the billfishing will be better in April....THX for the post......


Thanks, I guess it doesn't matter where you go, fish are fish and the bite turns on and off just like here. Sure was nice to be in flip-flops in january!


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