Playa Muerto, Panama

February 12, 2014 in BLOG POST, Children Portraits, Travel

Playa Muerto, Panama

I think the best Part of heading down to Panama to go fishing is when we get the chance to go and visit the Village of Playa Muerto, Panama. (Dead Beach). The Embera (meaning people) live in Playa Muerto and getting to go and visit with them is truly something amazing. It’s hard to describe the Village; homes build mainly on stilts, open family concept with Hammocks for beds. The Darien Jungle surrounds the Village, while the Pacific Ocean provides access and food for the Embera. The white sandy beach and Palm tree's greet visitors as you come ashore. Kids from all over will come running as fast as they can to come and great you (secretly hoping you have a sweet treat for them). The people of Playa Muerto are always friendly and go out of their way to perform their traditional dances and play their traditional music.

With school supplies, stickers & candy in hand, we headed up the beach to meet with the Chef of the Village. The Chef and the Elders will generally formulate a nice little list for us of things that the village really needs, like wheels for their wheel barrel, soccer balls, batteries and various other things. Helping out is just a small part of going there to visit, but getting a chance to photograph these beautiful people is really an honor.

I have separated this bog post into two different posts, because I had so many images that I wanted to post.

Here is the first post of images. The shots where taken with a Nikon D800, Sigma 35mm 1.4 Lens (sharpest Wide open lens I have ever shot with) Some pictures where also taken with a Nikon D600 70-200mm 2.8 lens as well.

This child is wearing the traditional dye on her body. The Dye is similar to Hena, but comes from the Genip tree berry. This is not only traditional, it also helps to keep the bugs away.

Susie Handing out stickers.

This woman is beautifully dressed. The necklaces that she has on are usually passed down from generations.

Traditional Dress for the men.

The beach of Playa Muerto.

The Woman danced for us. It was very beautiful.

The Jewelry is all hand made.

This little boy was trying his hand at a yo yo that Kyp brought with him.

The men played some music for us.

For more pictures please go to Playa Muerto Continued!!!

Blood, Guts & Glory

February 12, 2014 in BLOG POST, Travel

Blood, Guts & Glory

Around 55 days of Fishing off of Pina's Bay Panama, have finally come to a close. We packed up the ships, pulled the anchors and headed on home. Overall the Fishing was not that bad through out Dec/Jan/ Feb, but the fishing was not the usual Pina's Bay Fishing that you would normally see at this time of the year. The Black Marlin didn't really show up in hordes like they normally do at this time of year, but we managed to catch a couple of those nice Black Marlin along with mostly Blue Marlin and some Stripes as well. Battle's where won and lost, full Blood, Guts & Glory stories where had.

Here is our total for Dec/Jan/Feb:

Raised over 51 Marlin

Caught 23Marlin (Mix of Black and Blue)

1 Grand Slam (Blue,Black & Stripe)

Caught over a Handful of Sails

Plentiful Tuna (1 over 200lbs) /Jack's/Mackerel

Bryan Trying his hand at filleting some Dorado.

Captain doing his thing.

Waylon getting on his first Blue Marlin!

REEL!!!!

Lots of Sails around through out Dec/Jan

Bryan on his Nice Blue Marlin

Double handing the reel to get the job done.

Jack Fishing

Waylon with his hand at Filleting

Some Nice looking Dorado in early Jan.

The Captain fillets over a 200lbs Tuna. "Is there something on my face"?

The Final 3

December 27, 2013 in BLOG POST, Travel

The final 3: The crew headed up to Pina’s Bay landing strip to gather our newest group to arrive. Art Smith and his two son’s Ian and Adam, where to be our guests for the next 4 days of fishing. We all headed down the beach to the awaiting Panga that would transfer them over to the ship. The rain was lightly falling, and somehow our fearless Panaga driver somehow managed to plow us bow first into a wave, sending a wall of water over our heads and drenching our new guests from head to toe. After some drying off and having a bit of a laugh about it, we made plans on what time we where going to pick them up the next morning from Tropic Star.

That next morning the sun was shining and the fishing was SLOW!!! Like really really SLOW! The bite had defiantly shut off for the first day and a half of fishing and we where all hoping that the days slow fishing wasn't a sign of things to come.

Luckily for us the slow fishing was short lived. In the 4 days of Fishing Captain Wade raised 5 Marlin and caught 3, plus lots of Tuna and Sailfish. Each one of our guests had to chance to reel in a Marlin and we ended the 4 days of fishing by finding a nice Tuna bait ball. Congrats to the guys for catching their first Pacific Blue Marlin!

Here are some images from the last trip of our 2013 Season.

Chartered Plane Flying into Pina's

Art and his boys, Ian and Adam.

Art Fighting the big one!

Herby getting us some live bait!

He has a terrified look on his face!

Adam with a nice sized Dorado!

Ian Hooked onto a Nice 400lbs plus Blue Marlin

Ian's Fish came up Tail Wrapped and the Boys desperately tried to revive it for over 20 min. The Old Girl just didn't make it.

Captain Wade, gives a "Thumbs Down" to Losing this fish.

Poor Girl, but she will be feeding a lot of mouths tonight.

Captain Wade Tapes her out to be 480lbs Blue Marlin

How to Transfer a very very Large fish 101!

We needed the Crain to be able to lift the fish on board. You can see we have a fairly large crowd of Pina's Bay people gathering on the ship to see the fish.

Just a quick pic before the Pina's Bay people fillet her up for lots and lots of families

Some of our on Lookers. We had over 20 people paddle over to the ship to get a glimpse of the enormous fish.

Each chunck was HUGE...deffinatly a lot of hungry tummies will be full very soon!

One of our Boys Arie, helping out with the portion sizes.

The Canoes are parked and everyone is aboard the ship to see all of the action unfold.

A Local Pina's Bay man was in charge of the portion sizes. They even took the empty carcass at the end for soup.

Adam fights a Sailfish.

Nice little Tuna

Adam Hooks into a nice Blue. Just minutes after his father, Art releases a Nice Blue himself.

Nothing like a good fish fight in the rain!

Johnathan leaders the nice Blue Marlin....where are your leadering gloves Johnathan????

The beautiful Picaflor run's home underneath a very impressive Rainbow.

Little Neighbours

December 26, 2013 in BLOG POST, Children Portraits, Travel

Little Neighbours The best part about anchoring the ship in Pina's Bay, are all of the wonderful people that would paddle over to check us out. The Mama Nido became the hang out spot, the coolest place in the bay, the place where everyone wanted to be. Not a day went by in our 20 something days at anchor where we didn't have more than 3-10 different Little Neighbors all the time just hanging out. The kids would be hand lining for fish off of the back swim transom, everyone smiling and having a great time. Or swimming around the ship, laughing and giggling.

Every day after fishing, we would pull up to the Mama Nido and all eyes would be focused on our crew to see what they might pull out of their fish coolers. Our boys would often save extra pieces of Bonito or other fish, to give to our Little Neighbours, so they could use it for hand lining.

The back of the Mama Nido became a Canoe parking lot and a safe haven for people to congregate on when a big storm was rolling through.

Here are some pictures of our Smiling Little Neighbours. We are headed back down to Pina’s Bay next week and I can’t wait to capture more of them!!!

Hand Lining in the early Morning Hours

We unfortunately had a Blue Marlin die on us, but that one fish most likely fed over 20 families from Pina's Bay.

A whole group of our Little Neighbours, just hanging out!

The Kids are pretty shy at first, but then they seem to love the camera!

Chasing Records

December 25, 2013 in BLOG POST, Travel

Chasing Records

The Hooker was nursing a broken Turbo Booster, so the beautiful Picaflor was to be our trusty ship for 9 days of Record Fishing with Gary Carter in Pinas, Panama.

With Captain Wade leading the charge, Gary and the Picaflor managed to raise 17 Blue Marlin, Caught 7, broke 2 record fish off the line; and caught plenty of sailfish and Tuna. Even though he didn’t yet get his record on this trip, the fishing was hot and the Weather was a bit variable. Gary was using light pound test line, 8lbs, 12lbs and 30lbs line. He was trying to get the 8lbs Blue Marlin Record, 12lbs Blue Record and 8lbs Dorado Record as well.

In the releases that Gary had, he managed to hook 2 different fish on 8lbs test line. Both fish were too small for the record of 315lbs, but he came close with both of the fish approximated weight around 280lbs or so.

Here is a Selection of Shots from our 9 Days of Fishing with Gary. Record Fishing was pretty neat to watch, the patience and skill it takes to be able to handle the fish is truly an art!