It had been a long tough week on the flats. Back-to-back cold fronts replete with a savage easterly wind had churned the crystal waters of Cayo Cruz into a milky soup. Overhead, the towering thunderheads had crowded out the sun, further conspiring to make sight-fishing all but impossible. All week my guide Raffa and I stuck stubbornly to our task, and despite those wretched conditions, we’d had a couple of shots—gut-wrenching heartbreakers when a permit suddenly appeared, right in front of us, materializing from nowhere, and was already fleeing before I finally made it out. Somehow I managed to hook a fish, but tragically, it came unbuttoned, right at the boat.
On the last day, as I throw open the big shutters on the windows of old Casona, I am met not with rain and wind, but a clear, sparkling sky, shot through with the rosy hues of the dawn. My old friend Tim and I squeeze into the old Russian truck, and bump down a rutted tarmac, past sugarcane threshers and field workers who are waving and laughing as they stroll down the main drag to another long day in the fields. We turn off the highway and head north. I’m upfront with Lucio, our driver, and I grin as he lights up a Popular and absentmindedly hums along to the incongruous old Adele CD that serenades us to the dock and back each day. I cadge a smoke and as I wind down the window, I catch the warm, salty air wafting off the flats. As we cross an old causeway, we can see that the wind has died and vast flocks of flamingos are tip-toeing in the shallows. Better yet, the spring tides have washed the sand suspension out of the water, rendering it clean and clear at last. As we pull up to the dock, I see that our dear old friends, Raffa and Nelson, are already preparing the skiffs. Today, at last, we have a chance.
Tim and Nelson head west to Cayo Megano. Raffa and I head to a spot that I love—the vast flats east of Punta del Este. The first hour is slow. The tide is only starting to rise, and the Punta del Este flats are just a little shallow to accommodate the big permit that like to feed on its endless white canvas. We push across to Roca y Piedra and fish the outermost edge, close to the ocean, most likely the best place to ambush a big permit as it arrives to forage in the shallower water. We find a nice long broken line of rock and turtle grass, and pole gently along its edge. Only a few rays glide across the flat and they are alone.
Then, suddenly, Raffa is animated. “There, Mac! Look! Eleben! Tailing!” I start to point my rod to 11 o’ clock but already I have it—a big black sickle tail is wagging lazily in the early morning sun, rooting out a crab from the rocky seam that divides the vast white swathes of sand.
The wind has died to nothing, and I wait breathlessly as Raffa gently pushes us in range. As he stops the skiff, there is a faint crunch from the pole as it buries in the coral beneath the powdery sand, and the tail slides under the surface. “Puta!” Raffa hisses. But just as I am about to echo his curse, the tail is suddenly up again, the fish unaware of our presence as it resumes its early morning feed.
Responding to the flat calm, I take a chance, quickly biting off the Sideswiper crab and replacing it with a little tan-colored Alphlexo—a pattern that makes less splash on the glassy, mirror-bright surface. The fish is still happily grubbing in the sand and broken coral, and I start to line up the shot, lengthening the line and then sending the fly arcing out over the water. I feather its fall, and the little crab imitation lands just to the left of the fish. I let it drop and then give it a gentle strip to grab the permit’s attention. At first, the fish seems unaware of my offering, but then, in a magical moment, it slides purposefully over to the fly and we watch as its tail arcs up high into the air. I draw the line smartly back and, feeling resistance, set the hook with a sharp, jabbing strip-strike. The next few moments are fraught with anxiety, as I watch the running line shoot up off the deck. Soon, my precious permit is on the reel and we are in business.
Battling a permit is never fun. I’ve watched big fish—that I thought were beaten—tip up in a heartbeat and rub my fly out of their mouth, leaving me inconsolable. Fishing is supposed to be fun, but this is somehow too important to enjoy. I’m often reminded of the old Liverpool soccer coach Bill Shankly’s famous quote: “Some people think football is a matter of life and death. I assure you, it’s much more serious than that.”
Permit fishing is the same: After a long battle and a tense, nearly unbearable end-game, comes that special moment that permit addicts know. That moment when a guide’s hand closes around the wrist of a fish’s tail and an angler senses relief and elation, a feeling that assures all those long hours were undoubtably worth it.