Small Fishing Village, Record Fish, Castara Tobago

It was another beautiful afternoon in Castara bay, the sun was beginning to set when a little chaos broke loose. Upon receiving word that a big fish was caught, and the words “hundreds of pounds” were uttered, we left cameras in hand to go see for ourselves. The scene was hectic and it seemed that almost the entire village was on hand. The small cement cleaning station was packed in tight with everyone taking a glimpse. The prize of the day? a massive Warsaw Grouper!

Everyone was waiting on the digital scale to arrive to see just how goliath it actually was. Manswell(watch the video below) was the man of the hour, a retired police officer and full time fisherman, with the hands to prove it. All those years seemed to melt away in his face as he re-lived the tale with youthful exuberance. It was a day like any other day and Manswell went to check his buoys he’d set earlier in the day. He didn’t know a monster lurked on the other end of one such buoy. Manswell told us the fight wasn’t hard with a smile, but one broken hook and another completely bent it sure sounded a bit rough to us! To top it all off this feat was done on a handline! 

The fish ended up being sold and carted away right after we hung and weighed it, the scale said 270 pounds, but the fish was too long for the beam and its tail fin was laying on the ground when the weight was taken, which leads to a bit of speculation, but I wouldn’t put 300 out of the picture! Despite the weight it was a great day for Manswell as now he holds the town record for biggest grouper, a nice title to have in a fishing village!

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