DATELINE: JULY 25, 2022 – IKPENG VILLAGE, RIO XINGU, BRAZIL
My first trip to the Amazon was more than 20 years ago. I was going to Brazil frequently for business, and it was easy enough to tack on some fishing when I was already down there. It all started with a 2001 adventure with Ian-Arthur Sulocki where I got eight new species … and amoebic dysentery.
My first Payara, July 23, 2001. Note the teeth.
Then there was a 2003 Hi’s Tackle expedition where I caught 14 new species, including my first big peacock bass on a surface lure.
December 7, 2003. I never could quite break the 20 pound mark, which haunts me to this day.
That trip had no amoebic dysentery, but it did have a travel glitch that nearly stranded me in Brazil for Christmas. Former co-worker Chris, armed with only my credit card and frequent flyer numbers, somehow got me home.
That’s Chris, logistical genius and all-around good guy. He’s holding a smallmouth he caught in New Hampshire on a day off during a Boston business trip – which somehow got ME in trouble with his wife.
By 2001, I had managed to obtain quite an assortment of travel gear – taking one-piece rods onto a small plane is impractical and risky. Some of these travel rods – like the classic Loomis HSR-90 3S – still come on most trips with me. It’s a solid eight-pound class spinning stick that can catch a wide variety of fish. But I also owned some more specialized stuff, and one that stands out is a meat stick of a casting rod, the LR-844 3C.
Matched with a heavy bass reel and 65# braid, this rod can wrestle even the most reluctant predator out of heavy cover – an important quality in the Amazon. I remember putting it away after that 2003 trip and thinking how often I was going to use it, because I felt like I would go to the Amazon every year or two.
Fast forward 19 years. I did a lot of fishing and went a lot of places, but I somehow never did make it back to the Amazon. I had kept myself busy – my species count was at 175 the first time I showed up in the Brazilian jungle, and as I prepared for this trip, it sat at 2079. This adventure was originally supposed to happen in 2020, with my nephew Charlie, but Covid and my sister’s mixing up yellow fever and the Macarena put the kibosh on that. I knew I was still going, and 2022 seemed like the right time. Late July was good timing, as I worked for a European company and they all go on vacation then, although I knew at least one sociopathic salesperson would invent an emergency the minute they figured out I was away from cell service.
While packing for the trip, I threw in a couple of spinning rods, a medium casting setup, and a heavy saltwater-type rod for big catfish and freshwater stingrays. (A freshwater stingray is one of my dream fish.)
I brought two boxes of lures with me. These had been packed for the better part of two decades.
That red and white Y0-Zuri, top center, has over 100 fish, 15 species, and 14 countries to its credit.
I was sorting through reels when I came across a Curado 300 loaded with heavy braid. Hmmmmm, I thought to myself. It might be nice to have a heavy casting setup in case we find some big wolffish or some other surprise. So I went through the Loomis tubes in the back room of the garage, and there was that LR-844 3C. Inside the tube, faded but still readable, was the business card of the concierge of the Copacabana Palace Hotel in Rio de Janeiro, where I spent a few days after the 2003 trip. It had not been opened since then. It occurred to me that I might have more poles than I really needed, but I quickly dismissed this as nonsense. Even if I used it every 20 years, it was still the perfect tool, and I was glad I had it.
An old friend I hadn’t seen in years.
As far as the Amazon goes, this trip would be relatively civilized – I have known the outfitter, Alan Zaremba of Worldwide Sportfishing, for many years, and he runs a top notch operation. (The Arosteguis trust him with all their Central and South America trips.)
That’s Alan on the right.
We would be staying in an Indian village, sleeping in permanent tents that were sheltered inside a large, sturdy hut. I packed a large supply of REI camping food and Red Bull, and enough gear to stock a reasonable tackle store. This location was known for a lot of different species, and I felt ready for anything.
Most anglers fly to the staging city in one long overnighter. I am too old for that kind of 5-stop chaos, so I headed to Sao Paulo a few days in advance to relax before I headed inland. Of course, I still squeezed in a day of fishing, pursuing the dreaded Corimba. Despite the heroic efforts of Emerson and his staff, I failed yet again.
Hanging with some of the guys at Santa Clara Lake.
I did catch the biggest tilapia I have ever seen.
On the plus side, there was a lot of steak, visiting with old friends, and shopping for Marta gifts – one of her favorite clothing stores in the universe is next to my hotel in Sao Paulo.
One of my favorite sights anywhere – a large plate of beef and a caipirinha.
Then the big day came. I had to take two domestic flights, ending up in the small provincial town of Sinop. Things went flawlessly. I flew through Brasilia, and by coincidence, the other anglers on the trip also connected through there, so we all got to meet and take the connecting flight into Sinop together.
There is no more beautiful sight than all your luggage arriving at your final destination.
There were four other anglers on this trip. This is a luck-of-the-draw kind of thing – you always hope for good guys, but there could always be a “Louis” in the mix. (No, I still don’t feel bad about what I did with the salad dressing.) I lucked out on this one. Three of the four guys were buddies from New Mexico, brothers Sammy and Johnny, and their childhood friend Owen. We were also joined by a young, enthusiastic Brazilian angler named Fabio. The New Mexico group, although completely exhausted from 24 hours of flying and having the airline lose some of their equipment, was still thrilled to be there. And Fabio, a lure specialist, was irrepressibly happy about everything.
Sinop is a tiny place, but Alan had arranged a nice hotel, and we were on our own for the evening. Of course, I immediately looked for some water, but the only ponds were miles away, so we found ourselves a nice grill where we could eat and get to know each other. The New Mexico contingent had been friends since grade school. They were all retired, and from the stories that started coming out, they have done a ton of travel fishing – a ton. They’ve hit a bunch of the South American destinations together – the Amazon system, all over the northern part of the continent, all over North America, and some other stops in Asia. They are gamefish guys, so they don’t devote the insane hours I do to every little fish that might be there, so they have an incredible photo album of trophy fish, including plenty I don’t have. This was Fabio’s first big travel trip, and he was focused on lure fishing, mostly for peacocks and wolffish.
The gang in Sinop. From Left to right, Fabio, Owen, Johnny, me, and Sammy.
The Fish Gods are fickle, and they chose to mess with the New Mexico guys first. Their fishing rods ended up stuck somewhere in Florida. I would have gone absolutely apoplectic and taken luggage agents hostage, but these guys took everything in stride. (A skill I should think about developing.) Alan borrowed some rods from the outgoing group and rounded up a few of his own, and everybody had equipment for the week.
We got up early on Monday the 25th, took a van back over to the airport, and boarded two twin-engine private aircraft.
The Air Zaremba fleet.
It was a short flight, about 200 miles. We picked up the river and headed north, and while there was some amazing beauty, there were also a lot of slashed and burned open areas. This isn’t going to work long-term.
Lining up the runway.
We landed on an excellent dirt strip, got our bags together, and with plenty of help from the staff, made our way to the boats. Camp was just 15 minutes downriver, and they somehow kept me from trolling on the way.
The staff was extremely helpful, and in what seemed like just a few minutes, we were in our main tent and putting gear together. We met Mega, who would be the main guide for the week – we would rotate boats with him, some of the other professional guides, and the Indian villagers, who also knew the river very well.
Mega – Amazon guide extraordinaire.
Monday was supposed to be a day off for folks to get gear organized, plan strategy, and relax. Johnny, Sam, and Owen were content to relax, eat lunch, and get their tents set up.
There is no way I was going to relax 200 feet from a major tributary of the Amazon.
Mega had obtained some assorted small fish baits for me – worms, bread, dough, etc. I got one worm from him – these were the size of garter snakes – and got down to the river around 11am.
This was one of the smaller worms.
The first half an hour was maddening – there were at least three species of fish visible in the shallows around some downed wood, and none of them had any interest whatsoever in my micro-offerings. Leaving a bigger bait soaking in the river also wouldn’t work, as the bottom was solid, snaggy rock. I had a week ahead of me, so no need for panic. Or was there? The small stuff was visibly spooking every time I dropped anything in the water. I took a deep breath and decided to change strategies. The boats were all parked in the shade, and I reasoned that if I walked out on one of those, I would get over a little deeper, shaded water, and that might give me a better chance.
I set up comfortably on a boat seat, prepared some small and medium rigs, and set to it again. Bam – a quick bite and a wonderful species – the disk tetra. All the travel was suddenly worth it.
I had pictured catching some small, beautiful stuff, and this was a fantastic way to start.
On my very next cast, I got another new species – the spotted Leporinus. I was two for two.
These are the same genus as the Bogas found throughout South America. Pound for pound, they are one of the hardest-fighting fish in freshwater.
Fabio came down to cast a few lures around the boat landing. He caught a spotted jacunda – the first and only one of these I have ever seen.
Nice work. This motivated me to stop bait fishing for half an hour and cast lures. Alas, there were no bites, so I was back to the small stuff.
The local kids play in the river behind my fishing spot.
I got a few more spotted Leporinus, and then I caught a gorgeous fish with black and yellow vertical bars.
This one turned out to be a Flamengo Leporinus, species three of the afternoon.
A couple of quick notes – first off, a huge 1000Fish thank you to Dr. Alfredo Carvalho of the University of Sao Paulo for his tireless work on the IDs from this trip. Some of these species were obscure and/or recently identified, so I have the confirmed Latin name and did my best on common names.
While I worked a sabiki, I started drifting a little larger bait just off the bottom, and I was rewarded with a catfish, specifically Bloch’s catfish, which was the fourth new one of the afternoon.
I was starting to feel pretty good about things.
Of course, there were a few pirahna mixed into the catch. I expected plenty of these, and with much of the family already on my species list, I didn’t anticipate anything new.
This is a redeye pirahna, one of the more widespread species. Not only are the teeth razor-sharp, but the fish has a powerful jaw, so even a quick nip can take out a sizeable chunk of flesh.
As it got late in the afternoon, I got yet another leporinus – the threespotted.
It’s called that because it has three spots.
I closed out the day with two tetras – the radapura and the yellowtail.
The radapura tetra. I caught a lot of these over the week.
The Amazon yellowtail tetra – species seven of the day and 2086 lifetime. 2100 now seemed very doable.
I couldn’t have been more thrilled – and I had seven more full days of fishing ahead of me. I even caught a couple of bigger fish, like a redtail cat. I considered a night session, but the insects quickly put that idea to rest. I had left all the chemicals up in my tent.
A small redtail – quite a surprise on a trout rod.
The area is delightfully bug-free during the day, but at a certain time of evening, they appear in numbers, and they are incredibly organized.
Later that night, I discovered that not only did the camp have reliable electric power, it also had wifi. I would not have to go a week without baseball scores! But that also meant I could see email – if I wanted to. Part of my job was approving contract language on large deals, but everyone had been warned I would be out of the office for a week and that they would either have to get their requests in before I left or they would have to wait a few days. It is not without some delight I mention that I got to watch one young, rather entitled sales rep ignore this process and go through a range of escalating emotions on each succeeding evening. I must confess I got a giggle out of not reading them every night. I took care of it on my first official day back to work, we got the deal, and no one died.
It had been a good opening day. Seven species, some cool-looking stuff, and plenty of opportunity for the week ahead. I had two particular goals for this trip – to reach 2100 species, which would take only 14 more now, and to catch at least 462 total fish on the trip, so that I would be at 1000 fish (of any kind) during the year. The first time I caught 1000 fish in a year was 2002, and the milestone fish was a piranha in Uruguay. I have caught at least 1000 total fish every year since then, and the milestone catches have been in places as varied as England, Belize, and Australia, but never in Brazil before. (We have already discussed my OCD.)
I slept surprisingly well that night, considering that I’m not big on camping. The tents were equipped with sturdy cots, and I brought modern amenities like LED light strings, portable batteries, and Ambien. It felt almost like home, except that I could wander outside my tent, look at the stars, and see the Southern Cross. (One of the greatest songs of all time, about a man sailing the South Seas to run from a doomed relationship.)
I saw it the first time in 1999. Despite the claims in the song, I didn’t immediately understand why I came that way, but I too was in a doomed relationship at the time. I should have just skipped the call from Avalon and sailed to the Marquesas – I’d probably have gotten a spearfish. (Random web photo, by the way.)
In the morning, I would chase my first big fish in the Amazon in 19 years, and to paraphrase Stephen Stills, there is nothing as big as the promise of a coming day.
Steve
SPECIAL ANNOUNCEMENT – THE BOOK WE ALL NEED
Dr. Alfredo Carvalho has come out with a wonderful new book on Brazilian Coastal fishes. This is a must-read for anyone who might ever fish down there, and if you read it, you’re going to want to fish down there.
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