Rumble in the Jungle Amazon 2023 "If you don't ask, the answer is always no."

 So, bummer.  My roomie coughed, hacked, tossed and turned all night, and looks awful, like death warmed over this morning.  There's a chill in the air, it's raining hard, and he won't be fishing today.  It's bad to lose a day in the Amazon, but today is possibly the worst one to miss.

Today, we (more correctly, I ) will be fishing Caboclo.  He's been on guiding here for over a  decade, he's singly focused on hunting for big fish, and he has a lagoon on his beat that is, year in and year out, a giant fish magnet.  There's seven guides and seven beats, but there is about a 75% chance that you are going to get your biggest fish of the week when Caboclo is in the back of the boat.

So, when I met Caboclo at the dock, I just told him.  I said, "Today, I would like an 18 pound peacock AND a 100 pound arapaima.  I was joking.  But Caboclo just looked me in the eye, and said, "OK!"  And off we went.  

The normal routine with Caboclo, is he takes you to several other B list spots, and then around 1:30 p.m., you get taken to the lagoon of the giants for the last few hours.  So it was today.  We pulled into a long, narrow lagoon, and began the blind casting routine that is the drill this week.  I landed a nicely marked 12 pound fish at the lagoon entrance, and then picked away at six to eight pound fish for a bit.  We turned the corner in the lagoon, and then Caboclo began poling us straight across to the water we had just covered.  I raised an eyebrow, and he said, "Arapaima".  We basically staked out a bank where had spotted one, and waited it out.  Ten minutes later, a very large fish rolled about 50 feet off the bow.  I dropped a fly on it, crept the fly back, and then dropped it again.  About halfway back, I got the tiniest pluck, and then the line got heavy.  I instantly tightened up, and used my whole body to strip set several times as hard as I could.  There was a huge boil and the fish slowly headed out for the middle of the lagoon, swam around a bit, and the line slowly started to rise.  Cabloclo said, "jumping", and moments later the fish exploded from the water with the most violent head shakes I've ever seen.  Unfortunately, this is where I saw my fly flip out of it's mouth.  As it crashed back to the service, Caboclo said, "Fifty kilos" or around 110 pounds.  I was laughing, and literally shaking, the whole encounter had just charged me with adrenaline.  One of the coolest moments I've ever had, I've hooked some other large arapaima, but this is the first one I've got up in the air.  Just wonderful.

12 lb  fish at lagoon entrance

Really hard pulling 16

We worked over the rest of the lagoon, and again, right at the entrance, I hooked an incredibly strong fish.  I had a hard time catching up to it after the set.  Caboclo says, "Big fish?"  I said, No.....maybe.....YEP!.  All the good peacock stuff with the fish pulling for the bank, me laying the rod sideways and holding the line with both hands and feeling like everything is going to explode.  When landed, a fat, strong, 16 pound fish.  

We then spent several hours working other spots, and it was quite slow.  I did land a jacunda, one of my favorite fish.  They are a species of pike cichlid, and gorgeous.  No real way to target them, but you always seem to run a cross a few over the course of the week. At 1:30, we headed over to what is literally one of my favorite fishing spots in the world.

Jacunda!

17.5!

Same fish, different shot

We actually poled for some time, and the first 90 minutes were slow.  But then, towards the middle of the lagoon, I got a grab, landed a nice 10 pound fish, and after that began to pick away at them.  As we made the turn, I got smashed, and had a fish that was both large, and had attitude.  I just couldn't get it's head up so we could actually see it.  Finally, it rolled on top and it was amazing fish.  Big, and the most striking black bars you can imagine.  When I finally boated it, we quickly weighed it, 17 .5 lbs, my best.  A few quick pics, and it was back on it's way.  We then hit a small island, and as we poled around it, I just started hitting one double digit size fish after another.  In ten minutes landed a couple of 12 pound fish, and then hooked up one that 15.  A big fish was following it, and told Caboclo, "It's the end of the day, jump off that poling platform, grab a fly rod, and hook up that big fish!"  So, he did, and he did.  Unfortunately, his fish came off, and we didn't what would have been a very unique photo opportunity.

Ended the day with what was surely one of my best days ever.  9 fish over 10 pounds, including fish of 15, 15.5 , 16 and 17.5 lbs, plus a giant arapaima that I got to battle for a bit.  Carlos, the lodge manager met us back at the dock, and I said, "I'd like to register a complaint.  I asked for an 18 lb peacock and a 100 pound arapaima, and I lost the arapaima and only got a 17.5 lb peacock.  :)  It was an unforgettable day on the water, hopefully, Greysons day off will have him ready to fish again tomorrow.

                                                                   Look at that dorsal!

                                                        15 caught in the flurry right at the end.