Flats wading boots are designed to protect your feet from sharp objects and all kinds of tropical nastiness. Obviously then it makes sense to wear them religiously. Fair enough if you have time to prepare for a day on the flats, but not so if you suddenly decide to jump the skiff and intercept feeding fish. With little notice I didn’t have time to throw on any shoes before racing towards a tailing fish and after landing one, up popped another fish. Wading barefoot might have helped me latch into a couple of hefty bonefish, but this school boy error got me more than I bargained for. Three bits of coral had become embedded in my left foot. Now, as coral is a living organism things can turn nasty quite quickly. nothing for it but a liberal dousing of alcohol (on the foot…) before digging them out with a filleting knife (above).
~The offending coral might only be tiny, but it’s more than enough to create a major infection~
~Turned loose, one of the huge bonefish which saw me leap overboard barefoot~
