5 of the best fishing destinations abroad

Barra del Colorado is not a place most tourists know but if you’re an angler—especially a tarpon angler—it’s the stuff of dreams. Around here, tarpon stack up by the hundreds in the warm Caribbean waters beyond the mouth of the Rio Colorado. Not huge tarpon, but thousands of fish in the 40- to 80-pound class. There’s no need to take the heart-stopping run out the mouth of the river though, since there are also tarpon upriver, where you can swing big plugs or gaudy 3/0 streamer flies in the current, amid the chorus of howler monkeys. Snook in the five- to 25-pound class are also abundant in the Colorado. Inaccessible by road, Barra del Colorado is reached by charter from San Juan, an hour’s flight over the jungle and banana groves. Several lodges, including Casa Mar, Silver King and Rio Colorado Lodge are clustered around the village.