One day of blue marlin fishing

 

December Report from the Seamounts:

 

December Report from the Seamounts:

We released our first blue marlin with the sun only three fingers over the horizon of Costa Rica’s seamounts.  After chugging all night, we had hopes of great things that can happen during the hours on either side of twilight.

Prior to departing the afternoon before, Capt. James and crew introduced our clients to a  blue marlin, sailfish and a bunch of tunas.   Had we traveled all night for something that can be found right out front?    

 

That question was answered halfway through my first cup of coffee when something sipped the ballyhoo on the right long and the line fell out of the clip.   When everything came tight with a 300 plus pound blue marlin jumping into the sunrise it was absolutely certain that we were in the right place at the right time.  

 

 Halfway through gallo pinto, local salsichas, and scrambled eggs another smaller blue was on the left teaser and eagerly switched to a bonito pitchbait.  An hour after this release, a triple header of blue marlin was chewing baits in the spread.   We hooked two, but only landed one of them.  

 

By 10 am we had seen 9 marlin, gotten bites from 7 and landed 5.   The afternoon bite slowed a bit, but we did catch a couple more.    The nighttime show on and above the water was amazing.   We caught a couple of buckets of calamari under a moonless sky, bright with stars, both fixed and falling.    

 

No bites from the swordfish on our overnight drift of about 12 miles.  The water pushing us along was at least 5 degrees cooler and greener from when we pulled lines out the evening before.   Nonetheless we put out our marlin spread and headed back to the underwater mountain tops.   Apparently the marlins from the day before had moved on and so did we.  After three hours of pulling lines during prime time without seeing a billfish we loaded the live well and bait tubes in search of a school of tuna on the ride home.   We found them.

 

Nothing in fishing is certain, not even in Costa Rica and not even at the seamounts or any other must do destination.   For this reason we recommend booking multiple days.   We got lucky.

 

Costa Rica: OPEN for business

 Great trip down.  No lines.  No hassle.  No traffic. 

Off the hook tuna fishing and some marlins around.   Pat caught two and I got mine, plus some sails and a bunch of dorado.   

some pics from this weekend.