Day 3 - Monsoon Currier Strikes Again

February 11, 2013

There’s only one thing worse than being sick on an exotic fishing trip – being sick on an exotic fishing trip without proper medicine in pouring rain.  I’m sick as a dog.  My throat is toast.  My voice is gone.  My sinus is clogged and I ache all over.  I’m absolutely miserable.  I may as well be in the jaws of a caiman.

Due to weight restrictions I eliminated a lot of things.  One thing was Nightquil.  Even though Coz gave me some Nightquil pills, I couldn’t sleep a wink.  That’s why I heard the rain start at 2 AM.  From 2 till our 5:30 AM breakfast the rain picked up to a level of downpour found only in a tropical rainforest. 

At 5:30 I felt so bad I wanted to stay in bed.  But I couldn’t.  Today I was fishing with Brent Dawson – better known as Warpath as in Warpath Fly’s.  Warpath has more energy than any person I’ve met in my life.  His enthusiasm for fishing, fly tying and everything fun on Earth is amazing.  My suffering body was going fishing in torrential rain hell. 

Warpath rarely stops talking.  As we left camp he was unfazed by the rain and I’m not sure he noticed I wasn’t responding to his jabber.  We fished with a top guide today named Hymundo.  Hymundo knows how to find big peacock bass and he was in fact the guide who put me on to my huge redtail catfish in December of 2011. 

Hymundo took us to a remote lagoon and rather than having us cast to trees and snags he had us cast over a deep ledge.  I was simply doing the motions.  I’d cast as far as I could (not far today) with my head down.  It was raining so hard that if you looked up or had your casting arm up even with my collar and Velcro sleeves synched as tight as possible the rain would get in.  The water rolling down inside the rain jacket felt terrible.  And in my weakened state I was getting cold in the Amazon. 

Nonetheless Warpath and I caught numerous fish.  I’m sad to say I never even looked at the ones I caught.  I just swung my fish back to Hymundo and let him unhook and release everyone for me.  I was on my death bed.  Warpath on the other hand, not only went nuts from the front of the boat catching, unhooking and looking up into the rain, he caught some big fish. 

At the first stop he landed a beautiful 6lb butterfly peacock and later landed this 10lb peacock.  Even with my sickness I enjoyed Warpath appreciating his big fish.  It was a sight to behold!  If I remember correctly we caught a few piranhas, picua, jacunda and some trahiras.  I’m sad to say there are no other pictures because it down poured ALL day.  Even my waterproof Pentax fogged up and was worthless.

There were a few other fantastic fish caught today.  Here’s a uniquely speckled spotted peacock caught by Steve Eaton.  Despite the rain everyone is having a blast.  As the host that’s first and most important.  I’ll get better as the week goes.  It would be impossible to feel any worse than I did today.  Bed time.

Jeff Currier Global Fly Fishing