July 14, 2016, was certainly a memorable day for Bryan Vincent and his family. The Vincents were in Los Sueños, Costa Rica, for a family vacation and went fishing to celebrate Bryan’s birthday. “We decided to try the seamounts for a marlin,” Vincent says, fishing on the 42-foot Maverick Sea Fly with Capt. Carlos Espinosa. Joining Bryan were his triplets: 20-year-old daughters Katie and Allison and son Matthew. Due to fishing conditions, Vincent’s youngest daughter and wife elected to remain ashore and enjoy the resort’s amenities. The triplets had gained offshore fishing experience over the past several years, first in the Gulf of Mexico off Venice, Louisiana, and then on family fishing vacations to Panama’s Tropic Star Lodge. This was their first experience in Costa Rica though. “Will [Drost, owner of Sea Fly] always wanted us to come experience the fishing and the beautiful resort at Los Sueños,” Vincent says. “And he was right: It really is an amazing destination.”
In particular, the seamount fishing has recently taken center stage. These underwater mountain ranges off the central and southern Pacific coasts of Costa Rica attract massive shoals of baitfish and small tuna, which in turn make them feeding stations for pelagic species. The fishing is usually very consistent and makes for one of the best options in the world to target blue marlin in good numbers.
“We had only been fishing for five or 10 minutes and raised a nice blue marlin.”
After a 9 p.m. departure and chugging through the night to reach their destination, the crew aboard Sea Fly put the lines in the water at sunrise near a seamount some 85 miles off Los Sueños. The kids gave dad the first shot since it was his birthday, and a bite didn’t take long. “We had been fishing for only about five or 10 minutes, and we raised a nice blue, which I caught pretty quickly,” he says. “It was a good one, around 300 pounds. After that, I wanted the kids to catch everything else.”
Allison was next up, and it wasn’t long before another blue marlin appeared in Sea Fly‘s spread. “She did a beautiful job on that fish,” the proud father reports. “It was another nice blue, also around 300 pounds.” Then, a huge striped marlin crashed the spread during Matthew’s turn in the chair. “The captain called it around 250 pounds — it was an extraordinary fish,” Vincent says. The third of the triplets, Katie, was ready for the next bite. Her fish turned out to be a Pacific sailfish, which was also released in short order.
In less than 90 minutes, and in three consecutive bites, Bryan Vincent’s triplets — Allison, Matthew and Katie — had caught and released a Pacific grand slam (in addition to his personal blue marlin) on his birthday. They continued to fish until 1 p.m. before starting the long run back to port. “By then, we had seven bites and released four blue marlin, one striped marlin and one sailfish,” Vincent says. “It was just an incredible day and one that I will never forget.”
