The Tale of the Permit and the Barracuda... and the Crocodile

The permit and the cuda, and two generations of Chinuntdets.
Here are are Don's and Glenn's great palometa...

Angler John Chinuntdet's wife had to cancel her trip with him to The Palometa Club in 2009 at the last moment and it happened again this year. The fish gods must have been feeling sorry for John because the gave him...

... a Grand Slam on Sunday after he LOST FOUR PERMIT on Saturday! We don't know how his wife Tonya was feeling about all this but John had big ole grin on his face.

But it get's even better. John and his father "Doc" had about as good a father/son week as you could hope for (yeah, Doc took Tonya's place at the last minute). Seventy-five-year-young Doc hucked his spinning outfit while John chased the magical palometa. On the last day of the trip John hooked up on a nice 15-pound permit and was deep into the fight when junior guide Pedro screamed "barraca" and went chasing out after a barracuda that had arrived on the scene to potentially do bodily harm to John's new best friend. As any good father would do, Doc grabbed his spinning rig armed with a big tube lure and zinged it over Pedro's head in the direction of the lurking predator. With just a couple of fast cranks the offer was accepted and the battle was on, John with his permit and Doc with the cuda. Both were landed and at dinner that night Doc was awarded the honorable "Permit Defender" award.

We also had the pleasure of Don McLaughlin and fishing buddy Glenn Colton at The Palometa Club this week to put in some serious permit pursuit with the Chinundtdet boys. The wind blew, the clouds came and went but these two seasoned saltwater warriors hung right in there. The effort by anglers and guides resulted in two permit each for Glen and Don to add to the two that John had landed for the week. One of Glenn's beauties weighed in at 22 pounds!

And this report would not be complete without mention of our good friend and repeat guest Chase Horsburgh who blasted in for a quick three-day fix with his pal Julian Gratry. It was actually sort of a bachelors party for Chase who ties the knot on June 19th. The two guys "saw more freakin' permit than you could believe" and according to Chase had at least 30 legitimate shots, "but couldn't seal the deal." Julian did land a few bonefish in his saltwater debut and Chase hooked up to an eight-foot saltwater crocodile that ate his crab fly and then took him into his backing before breaking off. Good on ya, Chase!