Big Cubera Snapper caught by the author out of Puerto Jimenez
Osa Peninsula, Costa Rica
January 2016
I just got back from two weeks in the beautiful Osa Peninsula in Costa Rica. I stayed for a week in Puerto Jimenez and a week in a vacation house outside of Sierpe. In Puerto Jimenez I stayed at Las Islas Lodge (www.lasislaslodge.com) which is very comfortable and whose owner Oscar is a very dedicated fisherman. That's who I fished with over there. El Nino is in full effect down there and the water is very hot which is not great for the fishing. I fished the first day offshore and saw tons of tuna under dolphin. Some of the ones crashing had to be over 200lbs. However, we couldn't get them to bite. My captain got one around 80lbs and I got blanked.
The next day I decided to fish inshore and had a wide open pargo bite on live bait plus one roosterfish. The snappers ranged from 5-50lbs and were a blast to catch. The were boiling all around the boat sometimes.
The next day I went the other direction and tried to focus on topwaters. Some big snapper came up but unfortunately they kept getting beaten to the poppers by smaller snappers and jacks. I did get a pretty decent Roosterfish along with snapper up to 20lbs.
On the Sierpe side, I fished with a guy named Deidy who runs the fishing over at Aguila de Osa. Great guy and great fisherman. I fished two days with him and both days I had to work for fish but we put together quality scores both days. There were a lot of African Pompano around and they were fun to catch. Most fish were on bait although I got a few vertical jigging. The mate got a wahoo vertical jigging which was cool. I got a decent Rooster down here as well. In total over 4 days fishing inshore between Puerto Jimenez and Sierpe I landed around 60 snappers, roosters, trevallies and jacks, and other inshore bruisers. Great time and pretty good fishing considering how much people kept remarking that fishing was slow due to water temp.
The weather was really hot and muggy down there and water temperature was around 90 in some places. I would happily fish down there again; the people are great and there is a ton of wildlife. The wife and kids loved it which let me get out fishing more.
January 2016
I just got back from two weeks in the beautiful Osa Peninsula in Costa Rica. I stayed for a week in Puerto Jimenez and a week in a vacation house outside of Sierpe. In Puerto Jimenez I stayed at Las Islas Lodge (www.lasislaslodge.com) which is very comfortable and whose owner Oscar is a very dedicated fisherman. That's who I fished with over there. El Nino is in full effect down there and the water is very hot which is not great for the fishing. I fished the first day offshore and saw tons of tuna under dolphin. Some of the ones crashing had to be over 200lbs. However, we couldn't get them to bite. My captain got one around 80lbs and I got blanked.
The next day I decided to fish inshore and had a wide open pargo bite on live bait plus one roosterfish. The snappers ranged from 5-50lbs and were a blast to catch. The were boiling all around the boat sometimes.
The next day I went the other direction and tried to focus on topwaters. Some big snapper came up but unfortunately they kept getting beaten to the poppers by smaller snappers and jacks. I did get a pretty decent Roosterfish along with snapper up to 20lbs.
On the Sierpe side, I fished with a guy named Deidy who runs the fishing over at Aguila de Osa. Great guy and great fisherman. I fished two days with him and both days I had to work for fish but we put together quality scores both days. There were a lot of African Pompano around and they were fun to catch. Most fish were on bait although I got a few vertical jigging. The mate got a wahoo vertical jigging which was cool. I got a decent Rooster down here as well. In total over 4 days fishing inshore between Puerto Jimenez and Sierpe I landed around 60 snappers, roosters, trevallies and jacks, and other inshore bruisers. Great time and pretty good fishing considering how much people kept remarking that fishing was slow due to water temp.
The weather was really hot and muggy down there and water temperature was around 90 in some places. I would happily fish down there again; the people are great and there is a ton of wildlife. The wife and kids loved it which let me get out fishing more.
Another big Cubera caught out of Puerto Jimenez
Beautiful Roosterfish caught out of Puerto Jimenez on a live bait
Some African Pompano caught on jigs and live bait
