Quinte Fishing

As many of you may know, I have been writing about my fishing adventures over the last six months while working in Brazil. But ever since I first learned I would be staying here, I have had my eyes on one prize. A peacock bass.
As I am not in an area well known for them it turned out to be more difficult than I had planned. I spent the last 6 months trying to figure a way to get one. I have driven through mountains and swamps and edges of lakes in places I probably shouldn't have been as stories of fishermen being robbed and shot were many.



The closest I got was seeing one caught by a guide I hired. He enjoyed sitting up at the front of the boat and casting every hole first and showing me how to catch one. No there was nothing I could do. Welcome to Brazil.
As I came to find out, it is winter here now and much like our bass, they go almost dormant and become very difficult to catch. Still I pressed on. I finally arranged a trip to go further north to the warmer waters to a well known lake with one of the people I went on the ocean trip with earlier this year.
I talked one of my co-workers into going along and after driving through the night, we arrived at a small fishing resort. We had breakfast made for us shortly after we arrived and a few coffee to wake us up after the long trip.



Standing on the dock while putting the boat in I could see small peacock bass swimming in close. Now I felt my perseverance was going to pay off and we were ready to go.



We started out with top water but were not getting anything to rise so we switched to small Brazilian made jerk baits. Chartuese and red&white was the colour recommended to use. And fish them hard and fast.
After a while, I switched over to a perch Rapala clackin rap. My Brazillian friend quickly pointed out my lure was no good and "gringo's" don't know how to fish. Bad move on his part. I let it sink and ripped it back to the boat. It wasn't long before I finally had my first peacock bass!





The Brazillian was quick to come back and pointed out how his was 1 cm bigger than mine.



So what else could a true red blooded Canadian Gringo do but get the biggest one of the trip. And be quick to point out "Cannibals" don't know how to fish.





My co-worker got in the action, but he became known as the piranha King.



We had many laughs, saw many cool things and caught a few more smaller ones.







We found a tilapia still alive with half its tail chewed off from piranhas. And the piranha King's hooks ended up buried appropriately in my middle finger from one particularly tenacious one. It was the end of he day anyway so we headed back with the hook still buried deep. Once back, everyone was quick to offer their expert ideas on how to slice and dice MY finger to get it out. Finally I took a nice shot of rum and a quick yank with a pair of pliars was all that was needed.

Next day we caught a few more small ones and yeah, my friend and I did go swimming in the lake. The Cannibal thought we were crazy but only because the water was "ice" cold. It was 24 degrees...

After all was said and done, we had to head back. I must admit, I contemplated becoming lost in some unknown remote area of Brazil never to be seen again. But reality kicked in and away we went.
We stopped at the local town on the way out to see some of the sites.

This will be my last fishing trip in Brazil and I will be heading home soon. I can not wait to get back, but all my fishing trips I have had here will certainly never be forgotten.

I hope you enjoyed reading about my Adventures in Brazil.

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HUNT, FISH and RIDE

Another outstanding report. Man they do worship the peacock bass down there. Luv the pics and am very envious of your travels. Thanks for sharing

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Dan Elliot - A bad day on Quinte is better than a good day at work !!!
http://www.quintefishing.com