A bit late with this, just been a bit busy the last few days. Probably going to be all over the place in this thread and it might be long, so a fair warning lol.
Got back from Puerto Rico late Sunday night after one week on vacation, and it was easily one of the best times I’ve had in recent memory. Haven’t done a vacation away from home in 6 or 7 years and it’s been even longer since I’ve been to Puerto Rico specifically. I think I was 8 years old, I’m 22 now. So a long time.
The good thing with going to P.R. is we don’t need to worry about paying for a place to stay since we have family all over the place. My grandfather’s house specifically is in the mountains of the center of the island. For some reason I took more videos than pictures so I’m gonna work on maybe editing them together and uploading at another time. I’m also guilty of not really taking enough pictures. For whatever reason the thought of “I need to take a picture of this” doesn’t really pop into my head a lot of the time Here’s one of the very few I have. I’ll have to get more pictures from my dad.
The roads in this area are pretty crazy. Basically what would normally be one lane back in the states is a two lane road in P.R. Combine that with some of these roads having cliff edges on either side. Fortunately they’re all decently paved for the most part. It would be really sketchy if these were dirt roads.
Getting around takes a really long time. One of the things I probably should have expected but didn’t. It could easily take an hour and a half to travel 20-30 miles, and not because of traffic. It’s the winding mountain roads that make getting from one place to the next take so much time. Sometimes you have to drive 20 minutes in one direction just to get to a road that takes you in the other lol. The beautiful scenery makes up for it though.
If you’ve looked at my panfishing thread, you know that I really wanted to do some fishing in P.R. There’s a ton of feral cichlids, three of which I really had my eye on: Convicts, Midas/RD, and Peacock Bass. Unfortunately I never got my hands on Peacock Bass. But I got the other two!
This was the lake, where I was hoping to catch some peacocks and Midas. It took about an hour and a half to get there. I saw ZERO peacock bass. Was a little disappointed but fortunately this rocky bank had tons of Midas (probably all some hybrid Midevils in actuality). They were VERY picky, but I caught this impressive male with an underspin, intended for crappie fishing. Not long after though it started to dump rain on us, but I was happy nonetheless. I caught a Midas!
Next up, the convicts. This was really the highlight of the trip for me in all honesty. I have a pair of convicts at home, and I knew this was a possibility in P.R. My grandfather brought us to a park, not far at all from his house, which had full access to a river. And if you willing to get your feet wet, and do some minor rock hopping there were tons of deeper pools that’s you can access.
I didn’t know what to expect here. My dad and I got to the very first pool that looked fishy and I caught a glimpse for a split second. First thing I said to my dad was “I think I just saw a convict.” Understandably he asked if I was sure lol. Sure enough I put my lure in the water (a micro drop shot rig with a tiny fake worm on the hook), and there were TONS of small convicts. All probably in that 1-2 inch range, too small to catch on my rig. Now it was time to find the right fish.
I hopped from one pool to the next and I gotta say I got lucky on one of them. Did a short pitch about 10 feet in front of me into a pool and saw a nice male come out from the rocks. At first he was grabbing the weight but finally he caught a glimpse of the small fake worm and didn’t think twice.
Like I said I think this was the highlight of the trip from me. Yup, catching one little 5 inch convict of all things
. But what can I say, it put a massive smile on my face. I actually have some pictures of the river that my dad took of course, I was too busy looking at all the convicts in the water.
My grandpa in the photo above. The best tour guide you could ask for. Knows the island like the back of his hand. I could see where I get this affinity for being outdoors. At over 70 he was leaving my father and I in the dust, while walking through all this hard to get through terrain.
We took 2 days out of the week and made them beach days. I had a great time but in all honesty I’m not much of a beach person. The combination of sand and really strong wind tends to annoy me a bit. I will say that the beaches on the south west coast are so much better than the north. Calm and warm waters and the winds are much more tolerable. My father took some rods and both caught some type of snapper, my guess is mutton snapper? Really pretty fish and they fight like hell. Just using a simple Keitech on a swim bait head.
Last thing I want to mention, I promise. Not something everyone will be interested in, but I’m a car guy and the cars in P.R are awesome. You see things that you just don’t see in the states, especially when it comes to Japanese cars. Old Mitsubishi Monteros, Suzuki Samurais, Toyota trucks of all varieties and years. I’m a sucker for Japanese SUVs and pickups, and that is all you see. There’s also a ton of old Jeep wranglers on the road, especially old CJ-5s from the 60s and 70s. Probably boring the hell out of you guys but if you like cars, you’ll probably like Puerto Rico.
There’s probably a lot I left out. That whole week felt really weird, and some of the days kind of blurred together. During the week I would often ask “Did that happen today or yesterday?” LOL. But yea hopefully I didn’t bite anyone to death.
Got back from Puerto Rico late Sunday night after one week on vacation, and it was easily one of the best times I’ve had in recent memory. Haven’t done a vacation away from home in 6 or 7 years and it’s been even longer since I’ve been to Puerto Rico specifically. I think I was 8 years old, I’m 22 now. So a long time.
The good thing with going to P.R. is we don’t need to worry about paying for a place to stay since we have family all over the place. My grandfather’s house specifically is in the mountains of the center of the island. For some reason I took more videos than pictures so I’m gonna work on maybe editing them together and uploading at another time. I’m also guilty of not really taking enough pictures. For whatever reason the thought of “I need to take a picture of this” doesn’t really pop into my head a lot of the time Here’s one of the very few I have. I’ll have to get more pictures from my dad.
The roads in this area are pretty crazy. Basically what would normally be one lane back in the states is a two lane road in P.R. Combine that with some of these roads having cliff edges on either side. Fortunately they’re all decently paved for the most part. It would be really sketchy if these were dirt roads.
Getting around takes a really long time. One of the things I probably should have expected but didn’t. It could easily take an hour and a half to travel 20-30 miles, and not because of traffic. It’s the winding mountain roads that make getting from one place to the next take so much time. Sometimes you have to drive 20 minutes in one direction just to get to a road that takes you in the other lol. The beautiful scenery makes up for it though.
If you’ve looked at my panfishing thread, you know that I really wanted to do some fishing in P.R. There’s a ton of feral cichlids, three of which I really had my eye on: Convicts, Midas/RD, and Peacock Bass. Unfortunately I never got my hands on Peacock Bass. But I got the other two!
This was the lake, where I was hoping to catch some peacocks and Midas. It took about an hour and a half to get there. I saw ZERO peacock bass. Was a little disappointed but fortunately this rocky bank had tons of Midas (probably all some hybrid Midevils in actuality). They were VERY picky, but I caught this impressive male with an underspin, intended for crappie fishing. Not long after though it started to dump rain on us, but I was happy nonetheless. I caught a Midas!Next up, the convicts. This was really the highlight of the trip for me in all honesty. I have a pair of convicts at home, and I knew this was a possibility in P.R. My grandfather brought us to a park, not far at all from his house, which had full access to a river. And if you willing to get your feet wet, and do some minor rock hopping there were tons of deeper pools that’s you can access.
I didn’t know what to expect here. My dad and I got to the very first pool that looked fishy and I caught a glimpse for a split second. First thing I said to my dad was “I think I just saw a convict.” Understandably he asked if I was sure lol. Sure enough I put my lure in the water (a micro drop shot rig with a tiny fake worm on the hook), and there were TONS of small convicts. All probably in that 1-2 inch range, too small to catch on my rig. Now it was time to find the right fish.
I hopped from one pool to the next and I gotta say I got lucky on one of them. Did a short pitch about 10 feet in front of me into a pool and saw a nice male come out from the rocks. At first he was grabbing the weight but finally he caught a glimpse of the small fake worm and didn’t think twice.
Like I said I think this was the highlight of the trip from me. Yup, catching one little 5 inch convict of all things
. But what can I say, it put a massive smile on my face. I actually have some pictures of the river that my dad took of course, I was too busy looking at all the convicts in the water.My grandpa in the photo above. The best tour guide you could ask for. Knows the island like the back of his hand. I could see where I get this affinity for being outdoors. At over 70 he was leaving my father and I in the dust, while walking through all this hard to get through terrain.
We took 2 days out of the week and made them beach days. I had a great time but in all honesty I’m not much of a beach person. The combination of sand and really strong wind tends to annoy me a bit
. I will say that the beaches on the south west coast are so much better than the north. Calm and warm waters and the winds are much more tolerable. My father took some rods and both caught some type of snapper, my guess is mutton snapper? Really pretty fish and they fight like hell. Just using a simple Keitech on a swim bait head.Last thing I want to mention, I promise
. Not something everyone will be interested in, but I’m a car guy and the cars in P.R are awesome. You see things that you just don’t see in the states, especially when it comes to Japanese cars. Old Mitsubishi Monteros, Suzuki Samurais, Toyota trucks of all varieties and years. I’m a sucker for Japanese SUVs and pickups, and that is all you see. There’s also a ton of old Jeep wranglers on the road, especially old CJ-5s from the 60s and 70s. Probably boring the hell out of you guys but if you like cars, you’ll probably like Puerto Rico.There’s probably a lot I left out. That whole week felt really weird, and some of the days kind of blurred together. During the week I would often ask “Did that happen today or yesterday?” LOL. But yea hopefully I didn’t bite anyone to death.
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