Costa Rica Day 4

Day 4 was cool because I checked something off my "To do before I die" list. OK, I don't have one of those lists written down anywhere but I have a somewhat sketchy draft in my cobweb filled brain...anyways...I got to go deep sea fishing.

It started out as an interesting day. I was up by 5:30 am for a 6:15 leave time. This is highly unusual for me because I am never up that early ( I never was until I came back from Costa Rica, then Mike decided that we must get up by 6...6 people.! Aaaahhhhhh (that rip sound you hear is me ripping my hair out). It wasn't a problem for me to be up that early since there was daylight. Actual daylight. Being in Alaska almost made me forget what a sunny day could do in terms of helping you wake up. Next we drove out to Los Suenos (with a ~ over the "n", but for some reason blogger won't let me do that). When we got there we were supposed to buy our fishing licenses. No problem. We find the guy sitting there waiting to sell us our fishing licenses. He looks at my father-in-law an asks in his best English,"How many?". My father-in-law replies, "four" while holding his hand up with four fingers up. Just in case. The man shakes his head and replies in Spanish that we only need three because they don't require one for children. He says all this while pointing at me. I know my breast size has diminished since starting to wean Michael, but hey! I tell him in Spanish that I am not a child but an adult women. He just looks at me and shakes his head. He looks at my father-in-law and repeats, "3?". I ask the license selling dude in Spanish if he is not selling me one because I am a women. He looked at me and said, "Women don't fish. I will sell you one but......" I was going to get angry but I remembered where we were. It was not America. Things are not done the same way there. So instead, I figured it was probably best to let it go. Besides, one license is worth like 3 meals. I think that's better than a piece of paper that I would forget to take out of my pocket before I washed the shorts that it was in.

Los Suenos

Jared and his sailfish

Scott wrestling his 200 lb. Marlin

My brother-in-law Jared got a sailfish. Scott had a 200 lb. Marlin on the line that got away before we could get it in the boat. My father-in-law snagged a 150 lb. tuna that Jared fought with for almost 3 lines before we decided to give up and cut the line. One good part of the story is that I was the only female and I caught the biggest fish (that made it on the boat), an 80 lb. Sailfish! Take that Costa Rican fisherman licensing dude!

My big catch!

The best part of the story is that while we were at sea there was one of those feeding frenzies with the diving birds and schools of dolphins! I mean SCHOOLS of dolphins. They were everywhere. Beside the boat and jumping all over the sea! I wish I had my video camera. I didn't get to take many pictures of that because my battery was almost dead. Boo!
I should mention that most fishing in Costa Rica is "Catch and Release". It keeps their sea environments balanced and healthy. There are a few exceptions that you get to keep the meat...tuna, mahi-mahi, and red snapper.