Baracuda and Permit

Kent Goodman was fishing in the flats of Ascension Bay in Mexico when he saw a couple of fish approaching his boat. "The water wasn't crystal clear but you could see the fish and the waves were big enough that it stirred up the bottom. We were in about 5 feet of water. I threw a cast in front of the first fish and it sped up to the fly. I'm fishing a crab fly with a floating line. Right when it speeds up to the fly, I see it's a barracuda and it is a four footer. I'm like, no, I don't want him to eat my crab because it will just break it off and I won't get the permit. The second fish behind it was exactly a 31 pound permit. It was cruising with the barracuda so that tells you how big the fish is. It felt comfortable being with a 4 foot barracuda. So the barracuda sped up to the fly and I let it sink and it lost interest in it. But the permit saw the barracuda move and followed it and sped up and then it saw the crab go to the bottom and it just turned tail on. We ended up chasing the permit and it took over 200 yards backing out. We had to chase it twice. It took an hour and 45 minutes to land using an eight weight rod. It was a big accomplishment and I was very excited that it happened. I've had a shot at a lot of big ones and this one did not disappoint.