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Baja BLAST
South of
the Border Saltwater Action
by Ed Jaworowski
 Dawn's
rosy fingers would slowly start creeping over the
water in about a half hour. Sneaking around the
house while collecting bits of my gear, fly box,
stripping basket, sunglasses, I tried not to wake
the bodies strewn throughout the bedrooms, on the
sofa and on the porch outside. I planned on
getting to the beach for the "change of
light bite." Not that it was a long trip,
about 200 feet. And not that I had to worry about
waking anyone. Before I got off a second cast, I
noticed several shadowy figures to my right and
left, performing the same drill. I understood now
why Gary Graham chose this particular location
for his second home, and I especially appreciated
his invitation to join Nick Curcione, Bob
Popovics, Mike Wolverton and a few other friends
for a week of fishing and feasting on the beach
of Baja, Mexico's East Cape. [Gary also arranges
trips through Baja on the Fly, 1-800-919-BAJA, or
e-mail: bajafly@aol.com]
Each morning during our vacation, it
became our habit to cast into the clear, flat
emerald waters of the Sea of Cortez, before
breakfast. Daily, in the half light at the end of
night, barely discernible swirls revealed
ladyfish savaging large schools of tiny baitfish
all along the wash. We cast Clouser Minnows on
intermediate or floating lines and thrilled to
see the fish silhouettes somersaulting in the
still gray light. An hour or so of this sport was
followed by coffee and cereal, then plans for the
serious sport of the day. This might include
launching an Avon raft or panga (a small fishing
boat) in the surf, taking a 4-wheel ATV five
miles south to fish the beach front structure or
taking 23 to 31-foot boats out of Rancho Buena
Vista offshore to fish for small tunas, dorado
and marlin. For that's what this area is all
about, variety. Fishing the lower Baja peninsula
is a smorgasbord affair. On this particular trip
I caught 15 species, 10 I had not caught
previously.
....they're all tough, strong
fish
On one of the days that we went off in
the boats, we traveled as far as two
hours---about 30 miles to the north---yet always
fairly close to the shore. When no fish showed,
we trolled in a likely area until we located
them, then cast ahead of the schools. Sometimes,
vast schools of porpoises indicated bait
presence, which, in turn, attracted the
barinette, Pacific bonito, skipjack or rarer
black skipjack. They're all tough, strong fish,
and even a fish of four or five pounds can make a
10-weight rod work. Toughest of all were the
yellowfins. While these too were juvenile fish,
they ran typically a few pounds heavier than the
others and were inherently stronger. With the
numbers of fish, and two and three anglers
casting at one time, double headers in this mixed
bag were frequent.
As I said, however, the name of the
game in Baja is variety. Any morning or afternoon
that the speedy footballs eluded us, we simply
looked for bait schools, which were not all that
hard to spot, and cast around these or around
marker buoys or flotsam for dorado (called
dolphin back in my east coast home waters or
dolphinfish or mahi-mahi elsewhere). Bill
Chetwood, equally at home on Idaho trout streams
or Bahamian bonefish flats, scored two days
consecutively on fish in the mid-30's, one of
which grabbed a Bob's Banger off the surface:
"Just like dry fly fishing for cutthroats on
Kelly Creek---but a little bigger." Here
you've got a chance not only for a lot of
different game fish, you can get into big fish.
The biggest are the marlin and
sailfish and this peninsula is popular with
billfishers. We all planned to spend our last day
in quest of billfish and horrid sea conditions
made the adventure wet and wild. Although we
boated none, several marlin hook-ups provided us
with "fish that got away" story
material. Nick and Bob each had hooks pull out
and Mike Wolverton, after sticking a frenzied 100
lb. fish, had his line wrap around a boat cleat.
I don't speak Spanish, but I think his torrent of
epithets amounted to more than just "hasta
la vista, baby". We rotated rod chores and
although I never got a chance to make a
presentation, the whole big fish scene, the
casting and maneuvering, watching them crash the
teasers and flies, was a revelation. I know I'm
looking forward to having another go at it.
Casting to fish from beach -
great thrill
But of all the fishing we did, perhaps
because of my years of mid-Atlantic and New
England surf experience, the greatest thrills
came from walking the beach, whether casting
blindly into dark holes and among rocks or
stalking cruising fish. Perhaps, no, I think for
sure, the high point of the trip for me was my
first roosterfish (pez gallo). While Bill and I
scanned the surf for combs, from atop the Honda
ATV, we spotted a small spray of bait and Bill
said, "Go get him, he's yours." I
really had no idea what had spooked the bait, but
keeping low at the water's edge, I made out a
fish fifty or sixty fish away, nervously eyeing
the prey. I flipped a brown and white, bead head
Keel Eel in his direction. The plunk did the
trick. The rush, grab and strike happened so fast
that a turn of line whipped around the reel and
rod butt. Somehow, miraculously, I managed to
untangle it before the fish got going full bore.
He wasn't big, under 10-pounds, but damn, what a
thrill, which was enhanced by Nick's assessment.
He's taken a ton of them in his day and feels
that, "A rooster while wading ranks right up
there with a permit." Roosterfish are
unique, colorful and exotic. On another day, we
chased schools of them, which were in turn
chasing anchovies, generally just out of range.
The fish, lit up, combs erect above the surface,
really put on a show.
The meals and late night bull
sessions
complemented an exotic fishing trip.
We took some colorful mutton snapper,
which we spotted cruising in the skinny water
along the edge of the beach. I even appreciated
the somewhat comical trumpetfish, nailing Clouser
Minnows with their tiny mouths, well over a foot
forward of their eyes. Gaudy barred pargo and
cabrilla, grunts and triggerfish, taken on shrimp
flies over rocky reefs added additional thrills,
along with some small jack crevalle. On any given
evening, we were apt to see fish breaking close
offshore or schools of rays repeatedly leaping
clear of the water for reasons known only to
themselves. We spent our days like that, until
the dinner bell summoned us to a succulent pig
roast at Gary's house, or signaled it was time
for our visit to a local home, where we devoured
an incredible, authentic Mexican feast. Several
local restaurants, Tio Pablo's and a fish fry at
the Buena Vista Hotel won't soon be forgotten
either. The meals and late night bull sessions
complemented an exotic fishing trip.
Tackle and Flies
Tackle requirements for the fishing
here are quite simple. Although mega reels on
14-weight rods were de rigeur for the marlin, 8
to 10-weights, casting intermediate lines or
Teeny salt water heads answered all our needs.
And again, other than special billfish leaders,
we required no complicated leader concoctions,
not even wire bite tippets. We did however, learn
to appreciate the cranking advantage of large
arbor, large diameter reels, especially for the
tunas.
Fly selection was pretty basic too.
Various colored Clouser Minnows and white Lefty's
Deceivers were safe bets. For the rest, we stuck
with several Pop-Fleyes creations, Bob Popovics'
epoxy Surf Candies, Keel Eels, 3-D's, and
Bangers. For the billfish, Nick recommended we
use nothing but huge versions of Bob's Cotton
Candies, with lots of tinsel flash: "Easily
the best marlin bait I've ever used," he
says.
San Jose Cabo is only about a two hour
flight from Los Angeles. Although living 3000
miles from L.A. makes the trip to los Cabo
somewhat less convenient for easterners like me,
I'm glad somebody let me in the secret that west
coast anglers have enjoyed for so many years.
Even now, I occasionally wake up early and
imagine, "This is the kind of daybreak they
like," and I still recall the boils and
swirls of bait and ladyfish along the surf, and
the runs and jumps after a fish was hooked. From
afar, even the rattlesnake skins I saw strewn on
the desert hillsides and the occasional scorpion
add romance to my recollections of my first visit
south of the border.
  THE IMAGES
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