I've had a love affair with travel and experiencing different parts of the world since I was a teenager. I spent my high school senior year living in rural Egletons, France as an exchange student and staying with several host families. Experiencing new customs, cultures, landscapes and foods can make you both appreciate the place you call home and at the same time, guide you to reimagine your priorities and perspective on the world at large. While I don't get the opportunity much these days to fully immerse myself in another country the way I did back in the early 90's, I do really enjoy going back to some of the same places every year and getting to know them better along with enhancing them with new experiences each time. Belize has become one such regular destination on my annual travel itinerary. I like the people, cuisine, leisurely pace of life (island time), warm climate and richly beautiful and diverse flora and fauna. Of course, I love the fishing as well.
Honestly, most of my travel and sight-seeing these days is viewed through the lens of fly fishing and the excitement of permit, tarpon and bonefish opportunity is always more than enough spark to ignite the next adventure. I've been spending a week in Belize for the past four years and look forward to it each winter. As much as I enjoy the benefit of local knowledge and guides when visiting new places, there has always been something truly appealing about trying to figure out the fishing largely on your own. Places that potentially offer a DIY aspect to the fishery are really exciting to me, especially if you can throw in a relaxing environment and elevated dining experience. I'm not above living on Top Ramen for a week, but would rather not if I don't have to.
Backstory
During Covid, Jeff Spiegel reached out to me with questions about the now defunct Solitude Reels that we once carried at the shop. The conversation shifted from fishing equipment to punk rock, steelhead and ultimately Belize. Jeff had been running a remote paddle board and bonefish camp in Cayo Frances on Ambergris Cay for several years. We talked about doing a trip with the Confluence once all the Covid travel restrictions subsided. Eventually, 5 other anglers and I made our way south to Belize City via a direct Alaska Air flight from Seattle and proceeded to repeat the trip for the next several years. Fly fishing off paddle boards was fun, bonefish were plentiful, hospitality and food at Cayo were unparalleled and a friendly cadre of adopted island dogs was always eager to greet you as you returned to the dock each day.
In 2024, Jeff decided to sell Cayo Frances Farm and Fly to pursue a new camp he'd been building full time. I got a chance to tour the new property on the reef side of Ambergris Cay last year for part of a day. The buildings were just being framed and a steady crew of builders labored to make Jeff's vision a reality. The miles of rugged reef side flats beckoned to be fished and the vast network of inner lagoons and mangrove labyrinth behind the burgeoning camp was an explorer's dream. We had a couple of hours to walk the beach northward and look for fish that day. We saw more permit tails in that short excursion than I'd seen in all the years combined at Cayo Frances. When the day was over, I made loose plans to come back in 2025 when all the building was finished and see what the newly anointed Rocky Point Permit Camp was all about.
RPPC 2025
In early February this year, six of us hopped on a direct flight from Seattle just ahead of what amounted to be the coldest, iciest, snowiest week Whatcom County would experience this winter. We landed in Belize City without incident, cleared customs and then made our way over to the Tropic Air terminal for our short connecting flights over to San Pedro on Ambergris Cay. In all the hustle and bustle of a busy weekend arrival, three of us made it over to the island ahead of schedule, two guys got delayed an extra few hours when they missed their plane due to enjoying a hot dog in some dark corner of the airport and the sixth guy just barely made it off the mainland on the last daily flight to San Pedro. I was among the lucky first to arrive and while we waited several hours on a hard bench outside the airport for our friends and our luggage to arrive, we at least did so in the warm tropical air with a steady supply of icy Belikin beers in hand courtesy of the bar next door. Once everybody showed up, we collected our bags and walked to the small hotel we'd booked for the night in the heart of San Pedro. We had dinner at the Old Tackle Box where we'd eaten last year and, after a satisfying plate of blackened snapper and coconut rice, gathered outside the restaurant along the lighted dock to watch big tarpon and barracuda glide in and out of the pilings.
The following morning we met for breakfast near the hotel and secured a rented golf cart for our journey to the northern end of the island. Jeff met us on the beach a few blocks up from the town square and we split our gear between 3 golf carts and piled in. Golf carts can shoulder a surprising load of equipment if you manage to stack everything just right and the 6 of us squeezed in amidst the wheeled luggage and rod cases for a bumpy ride out of town. San Pedro is a maelstrom of whizzing golf carts, taxi vans and pedestrians ambling down streets scarcely wide enough for one car. We dodged ruts and fathomless mud puddles along the way, passing condos and developments until the road just became a sandy thoroughfare on the beach. Here we slowed our pace, focusing on the green waves breaking on the reef and the long, smooth inside flats where we hoped to see permit tails or perhaps murderous Jack Crevalle as they ripped up and down the shallow water eating everything in sight. We didn't see much happening on the beachfront and eventually meandered into the jungle on the final push to the camp. An hour and a half after departing the lively and noisy chaos of San Pedro, we turned right into the Rocky Point Permit Camp.
The cabanas were complete and the main lodge building was shiny new and inviting. I was pleased to see that Jeff had maintained most of the palms on the property, producing a comfortable, shaded series of structures perfectly ensconced in the jungle. The rooms of the cabanas were clean and cozy, the main lodge where we'd eat and socialize was filled with fishing and nature books, artwork and Jeff's so-called "punk rock bathroom". The bathroom was sticker bombed with various fly fishing and outdoor equipment decals as well as a unique RPPC sticker that folks could only earn by catching a permit and immortalizing the achievement with their name and date on the wall. I was pleasantly surprised to find a Confluence Fly Shop sticker smiling back at me sandwiched between all the others. We were home for the week.
After a quick lunch and orientation, we organized our gear, paired up and made plans to fish through the afternoon. My favorite part of a new place, a new experience is the unknown. What would we find around the point? What was lurking back in that remote blackwater lagoon? What would show up on the tide change and come spilling out of the channel off the reef? We wanted very much to find out. Rocky Point Permit Camp essentially boasts two different fisheries. There is the front and there is the back. The frontside faces the open Caribbean and just offshore, the world's second largest barrier reef. The permit love the reef in addition to numerous jacks, triggerfish, bonefish and some absolutely monstrous barracuda. They dip into to the sweeping coral flats for a quick crab or shrimp snack then sneak back to the outside where they spend much of their time. It is a dramatic landscape of breaking waves, colorful coral structures and shallow rocky flats. The backside, in contrast, is a vast network of sandy flats, lagoons and mazes of mangrove channels that open up into redwater and blackwater ponds where we'd stumble upon baby tarpon and lady fish and sometimes barracuda. The light bottomed sand flats were dimpled with signs of feeding bonefish and over the deeper green and brown rocky flats you'd occasionally glimpse the black sickle tail of a large permit casually slicing through the surface. There was so much geography accessible to us that it would be impossible to get bored in one week let alone several.
Most of us who like to fish the flats cross our fingers for cloudless skies, a mere light breeze and general conditions that make sighting ghostly bonefish and subtle permit a higher probability. Like all fishing trips, however, you are subject to whatever Mother Nature decides to throw your way and you just have to commit to making the most of it. Our week brought lots of clouds, sudden and violent rain squalls and its fair share of wind. The prior week a sweeping cold front had pushed south and cooled the waters by a degree or so, enough to put some fish on edge and convince others to move elsewhere. We caught some fish every day, but on most days had to work pretty hard at it. We'll skip the play by play and instead opt for a highlight reel of the week.
Permit
As implied by the species featured in the camp's name, RPPC offers arguably one of the best opportunities to catch a permit on your own. While half of us had caught several permit while fishing with guides over the years, none of us had ever sealed the deal on our own. Although we were all happy to connect with any number of species available to us, the permit topped the list and we fervently pursued them all week. The good news is that all of us saw multiple permit every day. Sometimes it was large schools of panfish sized fish glinting in the sunlight as they nervously swam past, sometimes two to three decent sized permit slowly meandering along the flat perusing for small crabs amongst the rocks. Now and then we'd see the large and tall tail of a gargantuan specimen pushing twenty pounds off in the distance and carefully and quietly stalk them to get into casting range. None of us are exceptionally experienced permit fishermen and all attempts at tricking one into eating a fly were met with the contemptuous response from these fish that even really good perm chasers have grown accustomed to. In other words, they pretty much all gave us the middle fin. All but one.
One lovely morning midway into the trip, with decent light and minimal wind, Eldad, Evan and I walked a mucky, heavily rooted road/trail through the jungle towards Rocky Point. We would make our way north of the point and then fish our way south back to camp. Our casual pace quickened once the mosquitos found us and we eventually emerged from the jungle onto a rugged coastline with endless turtle grass flats. The three of us spread out and began scanning the distance for signs of permit. I quickly found two in the milky water behind and eagle ray and dropped a fly perhaps a little too close or a too loudly and they were gone. Moments later, Evan and I hear Eldad down the beach yelling. Eldad catches plenty of fish and seldom makes much ado about it unless it's really big or really unique. It turned out to be the latter and after a rather short tussle he triumphantly cradled his first permit and what would prove to be the only one hooked amongst our group. It was not a large one, but as every angler and guide alike that is passionate about catching permit will tell you, "A permit is a permit". That evening back at camp, Jeff ceremoniously awarded Eldad the special permit sticker. We joked with Eldad that he should write "actual size" on the small sticker in addition to his name and date. I know I've seen him land numerous bluegill that would put that permit to shame. Nonetheless, a permit is a permit and our cajoling was rooted in pure jealousy. 100 percent.
Tarpon
One of the aspects that excited me about RPPC was the potential for more tarpon hanging around the back. Four of us ventured into the Cantena Lagoon one morning in the hopes of jumping a few. While I'd carefully studied maps of the area the night before and made a plan for getting into the myriad of tiny ponds and openings deep in the mangroves where we might have found baby tarpon, I failed to bring up a live map on my phone to track our position. As a result, Eldad and I ultimately blew past our intended destinations as we feverishly paddled the canoe straight into the wind and ended up halfway to Mexico. Eldad fell twice while standing in the canoe with a resounding boom and much of the day resulted in a monumental and tiring struggle. Meanwhile, Nathan and Clint went straight to the appointed tarpon grounds and Nathan proceeded to jump four small baby tarpon. Eldad and I made it back to camp wind-beaten and weary and proceeded to catch some bonefish in front of camp as a consolation prize.
Second effort on the following day, Matt and I studiously followed the directions of Dillon, a young redfish guide from Texas who was helping at the camp, and proceeded to find tarpon at just about every point he said we would. Around mid-morning we paddled our canoe into a leeward corner of the lagoon. I stood at the stern and gently poled the canoe around the mangrove edges while Matt stood ready at the bow. "Tarpon at 10 O'Clock!" I pointed. Matt put a cast in front of the fish and it chased a couple of times but didn't eat. Around the next point we found another one. The fish saw us and began moving away but Matt was able to drop a cast ahead of it before it re-entered the mangroves. The fish turned on the fly and was instantly on. After several jumps and my struggle to manage the canoe while the tarpon went haywire, Matt brought the tarpon to hand. "Lip it like a bass," I advised. Matt, an avid bass fly rodder at home, knew exactly what to do.
We switched roles after that tarpon and later found ourselves pushing far up the mangrove channels that were barely wide enough for our canoe. Sometimes we'd encounter a tight bend that required a ten point turn to successfully maneuver the canoe forward. Eventually we came to a little dark water pond somewhere way back in there. A blind cast with my tan and white EP Minnow met with a solid thud and a decent sized mutton snapper came to hand. Then around the other side of the pond we saw them. A large group of baby tarpon was rolling happily and feeding against the edge of the mangroves. I ended up hooking four of them that jumped multiple times before throwing the hook. There is a reason tarpon anglers focus on how many fish you jump versus land. Tarpon can come off pretty easily with their typical multitude of leaps and aggressive head shakes, especially when you're fishing from a canoe that they can more or less tow around.
On the paddle back that afternoon, we noticed a thin column of smoke rising high into the sky above camp and jokingly wondered if a new pope had been chosen. It turns out that our buddy Clint had gotten severely dehydrated, became violently ill and we had witnessed the burning of a desecrated bath mat that was simply not worth the required effort to salvage. Clint was unfortunately down for the count for a few days but a steady regimen of fluids and electrolytes put him on the eventual road to recovery. The moral of the story is drink lots of water and don't fret when the tarpon shake your fly free.
Bonefish
When we talked to Steve and Dillon who had been fishing around camp for several weeks out of the year, we got a sense that there were bonefish everywhere around these parts. Indeed, we caught bones both north and south of the camp in front, occasionally came across large groups of smaller ones and certainly saw some nice ones that didn't want to play. The bones in the back, however, were mysteriously absent most of the week and the shallow, idyllic flats where'd they'd clearly been rooting for shrimp and other crustaceans on a regular basis were literal ghost towns. I don't think I've had many days any place where I've actually seen more permit than bonefish but this was certainly the case for the first few days. We wondered where they had gone. As the weather gradually improved over the last couple of days of our trip, we began to see a few more bones moving predictably in the places we expected to find them.
The second to the last day, Eldad and I paddled and then walked the canoe along the edge of a white sand flat where we'd seen a few bonefish over the week hoping for a shot at a few of the bigger ones that routinely hung out in the area. Sure enough, as we approached the point I spotted a couple of really nice bones moving slowly along the shoreline. With little wind and very shallow water I dropped a lightly weighted Gotcha about 10 feet ahead of their path in a futile effort not to spook them. They half startled when the line landed softly some distance away and changed course for deeper water. The larger of the two, which could have been mistaken for a baby tarpon, came back however, and resumed its leisurely route near shore. I dropped the fly a little farther away and as the bonefish approached, gave it a little twitch. The rooster tail wake of panic appeared so suddenly that I worried the fish had spooked again, not realizing that bone had pounced on the fly and was quickly off to the races. All of my fly line and a good length of backing emptied from the reel in mere seconds. Unfortunately, when the fish turned and ran towards me with equal speed, I could not reel or strip line quickly enough and the barbless fly merely dropped out of its mouth. Game over.
We encountered more small groups of larger bonefish in the afternoon and caught several. They were a little standoffish at times, following the fly but refusing to eat. Usually a quick hack job to make the fly smaller, sparser or less flashy brought positive results. I hooked the last bone of the day moving through a little cut that opens up into a deeper reddish brown lagoon. As the bonefish made its second long run, I noticed an enormous black tail rising and falling where the water deepened. I hollered to Eldad, "Big permit! Make a cast!" Almost as I uttered these words the bonefish made a run straight at the permit, which promptly disappeared. I looked for it in the vicinity for a good 30 minutes after the bonefish had gently glided from my grasp but we never saw it again.
Trigger Alley
One of my goals for this trip was to catch an ocean triggerfish. With their sooty grey complexion they're not nearly as colorful as the Picassos, Peach-face and other trigger species folks target on Christmas Island and the Seychelles, but I really wanted to get one. It's certainly confidence inspiring to start looking for them in a place that Jeff and his crew have appropriately dubbed Trigger Alley. Triggers like to feed around the ragged coral areas and it wasn't long before I began noticing thick dark tails wagging in the air in between incoming waves. Triggerfish have a very peculiar way of swimming, often on their sides, sometimes gliding lazily with the tidal current, sometimes moving in an odd corkscrew fashion.
Triggers seem to "hear" or sense very well and will let you know in no uncertain terms when your fly has landed too close to them and they're not wild about it. The challenge became landing the fly close enough that they managed to see it but not in a way that freaks them out. After trying a variety of retrieves, I found that a very short staccato strip that kept the fly moving but not terribly fast seemed to pique their interest. They'd follow the fly, sometimes nipping at it here and there. Sometimes you'd actually hook them and have them on for a moment and when the hook came free, they'd follow and ultimately eat it again. I found after multiple fly changes that a small shrimpy fly with a prominent bit of orange at the back like an EP Spawning Shrimp seemed to work best.
It wasn't nearly as hard to entice the triggerfish into chasing your fly as it was to actually stick and land one. They have these prominent almost human-like teeth that are well suited to munching everything from coral to crabs, including your fly. Hook one too deep and it could literally bite through your leader or even your hook. Strike too early and you'd find yourself tethered to an angry trigger by a mere flap of skin. I think it was the third day I finally hooked one just right and landed it. I wasn't the biggest I'd seen nor did it fight particularly hard but I'd accomplished my goal and was pretty excited about it. Days later, Evan got a really nice one to hand out near the point. It all but annihilated his fly the moment it landed and tore off for the reef but he adeptly brought it in after a blitzing run into his backing. I hooked a similar-sized one not minutes later about 30 feet away in the same fashion but didn't fare as well and the hook pulled on the trigger's reef-bound torrent. You win some and you lose some but I found it to be a really fun game to play and whittled away many hours chasing ocean triggerfish throughout the trip.
El fin
All good things must come to an end, including this trip. With the weather improving dramatically over the last couple days of the adventure and looking ahead to the coming day's weather forecast, we all would have happily remained up north on the island for another week. We solemnly loaded up our luggage on the golf carts and made it about two thirds of the way back to San Pedro before the rough road took its toll and a leaf spring on our golf cart snapped. Fortunately for us, we were very close to Jeff's house and he was able to limp the broken cart home to retrieve another. We got to San Pedro, checked into our hotel and spent the rest of the afternoon strolling around the vivacious city center and wandering the beach before heading back to get ready for dinner. As the sun was setting on the lee side of the island, Evan emerged from his room bearing a 9 weight musky rod and handful of flies. We could see occasional big tarpon rolling in the bay and sometimes moving under the dock lights behind the hotel. There were some portly bonefish amongst them as well. In his quest to simply hook one more before the flight home, Evan tied a small bonefish fly to the end of 50 lb. fluorocarbon and gently lowered it into the rancid smelling bottom muck ahead of a big bone. I wondered what it would be like to hook a bonefish in this place, how one might navigate the tangle of rickety docks and skiffs lining the waterfront with a fish known to routinely stretch your fly line backing. If you're imagining that it might be a lot like a rodeo, like an anxious cowboy struggling to stay atop a wild, powerful, rampaging bronco...then you're pretty close. I've never seen a bonefish played like that, with a drag setting that could only be described as medieval, but he landed it and it was a nice one.
We washed up and gathered for dinner at a restaurant we like, savoring favorite dishes like whole fried hogfish with plantains, conch ceviche and a few more Belikins. We recounted stories, relived adventures and talked about the next one. If there's one thing I may enjoy more than experiencing a new area for the first time, it's definitely going back...with some insights. I'm already looking forward to Rocky Point Permit Camp in 2026 with an emphasis on the permit!
