We went trolling this morning outside the reef. It was looking pretty bleak until Andrew hooked a big barracuda. It took off like a bandit and Andrew struggled to keep his balance and the the tip of the rod up as the fish took line off the reel. The barracuda kept jumping, sometimes up to 10 feet in the air.

After a good fight, Andrew started to get the fish close. We had some concern that the fish might jump in to our dinghy which would not be good - barracudas have pretty big teeth and everything about the dinghy is soft, including our toes. Skillfully, Andrew made sure not to pull too hard when the fish jumped to avoid pulling it into our boat.

As soon as we saw how big its teeth were, we decided to try to tire the fish out before landing it. This strategy seemed to work well and soon we had despatched the fish with gaff and knife. Andrew indicated that it is pretty exhilarating to catch a fish of this size on a small inflatable dinghy.

Tonight we will eat "Cuda" tacos. Fortunately, barracuda does not carry ciguaqtera in the San Blas.

On a side note, this is the first time I had a chance to use my new Mel Pardue knife (stuck in the barracuda's head in the picture). My buddy Paul gave this to me at his wedding last month as a groom's men gift. If you need a folding blade which you can deploy with one hand, lock open and jam in to a fish this is for you!