Issue link: https://www.e-digitaleditions.com/i/554642
S P O R T I N G C L A S S I C S 1 3 6 casts than I care to enumerate, I was still thrashing the water. I put the big 2/0 fly into the trees again and again. I slammed it on top of the fish and spooked them. I wrapped the line around the tip of the rod. I hit myself in the back of the head. I demonstrated nearly every example of bad casting that afternoon, trying to complete the grand slam. William's patience ran thin. I could hear exasperation in his voice. But he still continued to encourage me. "Just cast it straight in there between those two trees and under that log. See them in there? You can do it." Yes, I saw the fish parked behind a log under a wall of towering mangroves. But actually I could not do it. I could cast it across the log and get snagged. I could launch it into the mangrove branches above. That I could do. And I did. William smiled as he poled us in close enough to extract the fly from the foliage. "It's ok. We'll keep looking." I cast into more trees. I cast into thick mats of surface weeds. I cast into everything but the groups of tarpon loitering under the overhanging trees like commuters waiting for a bus. Then, at five o'clock, the day running out, William's patience running out, my right arm running out, I finally caught a tarpon. It weighed maybe six pounds and jumped higher than my head before coming to the boat. O ne of the other perks of fishing Cayo Largo is the fabulous possibility of a grand slam—which is not too hard, once you've caught a permit. Of course, that's like saying, it's easy being wealthy: all you have to do is have lots of money. But, seriously, look at the statistics: Last year (2014) Cayo Largo had 64 grand slams and 22 super grand slams (permit, bonefish, tarpon, and snook). The Avalon fly, the boundless flats, and the finely honed guiding services there give anglers more promising shots at permit than anywhere else on earth. Bonefish are prolific. And though giant tarpon are mostly available only in late spring and early summer, the resident, year-round five- to twenty-pound toddlers ensure the probability of a grand slam—again, once you've caught a permit. W ith two hours of fishing time left on the clock, William roared inland from the ocean flats and plowed to a stop in a mangrove-jungle lagoon. Slowly poling along the edges of the trees, he soon spotted tarpon lurking under overhanging branches. Nothing to it, right? This was going to be easy. Not. Two hours later and more botched "Spirits we• high back at the lodge that night. Rum drinks flowed. We cele†ated my firˆ •rmit, firˆ tarpon, firˆ snook, my grand slam. "