The previous post in this blog is Album - Tanzania.
The next post in this blog is Album - Los Roques.

Fishing : Leaving Los Roques

The Los Roques archipelago lies 80 miles off the mainland of Venezuela and is the only coral reef atoll in the entire continent. The great thing about Los Roques is that the area is protected by the government as a National Park with all commercial fishing and spear fishing is forbidden.

The archipelago is made up of 200 square miles with some 350 cays and islands and huge numbers of flats that hold large numbers of bonefish, some of which are huge specimen fish. Along with bonefish we were also going to be trying to catch tarpon, horse eye jack, permit, blue runners and various other game fish.

The bonefishing grounds comprise of white sandy beaches and pancake flats found between the numerous islands. The angler will find that the best way to target these fish - averaging 4-5 pounds - is on foot rather than on a skiff. I beleive that wading the flats gives one a far better experience than being poled on the front of a skiff. We also targeted bonefish found in deeper water and these provided explosive action as they hit the fly - usually clouser minnows - with great force.

We flew in to Caracus and then headed straight out to Los Roques and by 6o'clock we were sipping cold beers outside our tents on the islands main camp site.

View the photos here.