Crocadile Bay Costa Rica

[sageboy]

Heading down in about a month and never been before. Staying at Crocodile Bay Lodge with a Strike boat and guide for a couple of days. Looking forward to catching rooster fish on light tackle. Anyone been or have any tips, they would be appreciated.

Thanks - Bob

[Jimmy Harris]

Hey Bob.

I went a few years back with a sort of fact-finding group from Orvis. It's an Orvis endorsed destination. Very nice accomodations and great food. The issues when we went down (and I feel certain they have remedied) were:

1-The afternoon we arrived and planned to fish, we learned that the shuttle flight had been overloaded and they left some of our luggage in San Jose to be brought in the next day. Guess what was in the luggage left behind. All our flyfishing gear. We had two flyrods between 12 anglers on three boats. I did, however, land about a 60 lb. sail on a 10 wt. that afternoon. That was cool.

2-The guides there simply did not know what to do with flyfishermen. The overwhelming majority of their clients fished those big stand-up rods. I can tell you, fighting a sail on a fly rod is much different than on a stand-up rod. We lost numerous sails due to this fact. The boat captains simply did not know how to handle the boat if the fish sounded. With the stand-up rod, you can just keep cranking. With a fly rod, you don't put much pressure on a big fish that is 100 feet straight down beneath the boat.

3-On the last afternoon of the last day, after myself and several others had hooked and lost quite a few sails, the captain comes down off the tower, looks at my fly and says, "Too small! Your hook too small." I thought, "Your mate tied the darn thing on for me!" He climbed back up the tower and turned the boat toward the marina. My trip was over just as I discovered I was fishing with a fly that was too small. I'm guessing that over the past couple of years they have improved in this area or Orvis would not have signed on with them.

I would go back. Sailfish everywhere, whales, flying fish, flying rays, beautiful rugged coastline, roosterfish if you can break away from the sailfishing. I would know more now about what to expect from the guides. Easy to get there from Atlanta.

Have fun!

[sageboy]

Thanks Jimmy. You’ve got me excited. I’ll give you an update on the place when I get back. I’m the only fly fisher in the group, so I imagine I’ll wind up using spinning gear for most of the trip. I will be taking my 9 wt with me though. Bob

[Jimmy Harris]

Be careful with that 9 wt. You may bring it back in splinters.