RICHTER, GONZALEZ & SKEWIS GROUP
Bobby and Freddy on a double header of tuna.
Robert and Ron
May 22-26 Bobby Richter brought in the above group of Freddy Gonzalez and brothers Robert and Ron Skewis. 5 Days of fun, plenty of laughs, great fishing and cold beers.
Over the 5 days of fishing we got them into some pretty good days with a total of 171 sailfish raised and the guys released 73 from 137 bites. A few sancochos there, but the only way to learn dead bait fishing with circle hooks is to have a go which is what the brothers did. Their first time it, and the progress was good to see…
Despite a couple of backlashes here and there…..
A few nice mahi mahi as well as a pair of big ones….
And we got into the tunas one afternoon landing 7 nice fish to 50lbs making for great snacks and lunches on the boat and a superb dinner back at the Lodge….
Plenty of laughs with these guys resulting in great fishing. they’re all looking fwd to returning next year. That says it all.
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We also had 3 blue marlin up in the spread with one jumping off, a classic sancocho (missed bite) on another and a big fish that did not bite.
With Freddy leading the charge!!
MEREDITH McCORD & COLLIN HUFF
May 28th through June 2nd great to see Meredith back on Allure II for the second time this season bringing along Collin Huff for a trip specifically focusing on blue marlin on the fly.
It took a couple of days to find them and in the meantime Meredith released a few sailfish on the light 8lb tippet and a few on the 20lb checking the amount of pressure the tippet would take….
Before we got into the marlin….
And on the 3rd day we found an area on the east side of the Champerico pocket holding a few blue marlin and had excellent fishing the last 4 days. We raised 12 blues and teased in 10 fish getting 7 good bites with 6 fish well on and hooked. Check this out, some amazing bites on the fly. With some of the fish just being too big for the 16lb hard tippet material we were using….
Some of the fish broke off in a matter of minutes, some 45mins and a few mammoth battles with one lasting 3hrs 47mins going through from 4:52pm through to 8:39pm before the fish jumped, turned on a dime, charged the boat and the tippet parted. It was a large one in the 400lb class….
All in all some excellent fishing, though, proving what a challenge these fish are on the fly rod with 12″ of shock leader and 15″ of 16lb hard tippet. Meredith did get the release on a nice solid fish of over 250lbs with the other marlin winning the fights, some tough brutes, the majority going deep and dirty. Memories to last a lifetime though!!
Yeah, a bit too large for the fly………
ADKINS GROUP FISHING THE PCCA
June 3-4-5 Bill and Vicki Adkins with Jessi and Pat Jenison fished a practice day on the 3rd and then participated in the Virtual PCCA Tournament powered through CaptApp.
Fishing against teams from Guatemala through to Panama. The CaptApp verifies catches using time, date stamped video and geo-location that does not need wifi/cell signal until you download videos to the judges at the days end. A great concept enabling teams to fish against each other through Central America.
Our first day out on the 3rd was a practice day and we found some fish over a large area raising 17 sailfish releasing 10 from 15 bites and Bill released a tough blue in the 400lb class that stayed down. He did a great job as the fish was a stubborn one…
Over the 2 day PCCA Tournament the team fished well, missing few fish while releasing 17 sailfish and 3 marlin. Enough to win them the Overall Regional Marlin and Sailfish divisions, clean sweep for them!
Congratulations to them. A deserved win, they fished well and had a blast at the same time, what it’s all about!
JAY STUCKEY & BRIAN DUPONT
Jay with his grandson Brian
July 6-7-8, with the blue marlin bite as good as it was Jay and Brian dropped everything to get in on it after hearing the first hand reports. We concentrated purely on marlin with 4 marlin teasers and 1 lure in the shotgun position….
The bite started strong and dropped off some, we put in the hours over 3 days raising 19 blues and releasing 10 from 16 bites. They released one double header and dropped one out of another double after having them both on for 20mins, the lure hooked fish threw the hook. This all happened on their first day out when they released 7 blues out of 13 bites!
Out of that 6 were released off the teasers, a couple of incredible teaser bites that switched to the pitched mackerel. The Bonze Lures Violator was on fire.
We had the pitch rod ready for the sailfish that came in on the teasers and released 5 from 8 bites on them…
We did have one of the blue marlin charge the boat at an incredible speed, not jumping, and despite our best efforts gunning the boat to keep out of the way it hit the stern low below the tailpipe and carried on. We had no idea until we released it that it had left the majority of it’s bill in the boat…..it swam away strong after the release.
Back a the slip at a standstill we were taking on some water. After sawing the end protruding on the outside, we sealed the hole with 5200 silicon and were back fishing the next day…..
All in all a fun trip as per usual with these guys, just don’t leave the dock without the 5200!
GAVIT FAMILY
Bill, Kristen and Glen Gavit
June 18-19 Great to see Bill and Glen back here in Guatemala finally bringing Kristen, who showed them up on the fishing front. First fish into the teasers and she pitched the bait, got the bite, and the release. Job done.
We had good fishing over their 2 days on the water. Knocked the rust off the first day and by the second day they had excellent averages. For the trip they raised 47 sailfish releasing 27 from 38 bites.
We also raised 4 blue marlin into the spread, got the bite out of one on the flatline bait that we missed, the other 3 despite showing promise, never switched to the pitch bait. Got into a couple of nice mahi as well. All in all good fishing for the Corpus Christi Gavit family who have been fishing out of Guatemala for decades…….literally.
FRIJOLE & SPEYRER
Chris Bean AKA Sñr Frijole with Kyle Speyrer.
June 20-21 Sñr Frijole who was our first client in for ’21 with his nephew, coming in Jan 1st ended out our COVID ’20-’21 season before we hauled the boat for much needed maintenance. First fish of the day for them was a solid blue marlin which came up hot on the old reliable Bonze Lures Violator. Great switch bite and we were on:
This fish was one tough SOAB. We were on it for near 2 hours, trying different angles and in the end planed it up on full strike with 35lbs of drag on the 50lb line. Got a couple of wraps on the leader and broke her off. Down and dirty the whole fight.
Bit tough on sailfish for the rest of the day though we got into them good the following day with 27 raised for the trip and 14 releases from 25 bites. Plenty of mahi out there as well.
And the fellas went home with a cool bag of vacuum packed mahi fillets.
Well that’s a wrap for the COVID ’20-’21 season. We’re grateful to all our regular friends/clients and the several new punters for coming down and supporting the OASIS family through these uncertain times. We ended up fishing 102 days on ALLURE II since re-opening Dec 12th. Add on days fished aboard INTENSITY and CAPT HOOK and we made a season out of it. We had some great fishing with the highlight being 521 billfish releases for the Gast Group:
It was overall a solid season and thanks to all for coming down and experiencing it. We had the CDC rulings to deal with the return compulsory pre-flight testing though we never had a positive COVID case with neither staff nor clients. On that front we are extremely grateful to the generosity shown by all that stayed at the Lodge with the donations made for the Puerto San Jose, Centro de Salud. Some of you were incredibly generous. An amazing $7190.00 was raised for the reconstruction of the eastern wing. It has been re-roofed, new guttering and we are reconstructing rooms, with new walls, windows, doors paint etc. It is a slow process though we will share photos upon completion. Thanks again, the Dr’s, nurses, staff and the people of San Jose are super grateful for the much needed work/repairs.
