Road Trip - Mag bay and Loreto

[fully involved]

Just got home last night after a 20 hr. drive so waited til today to post. Left Nov 14 and ran straight for San Carlos, Mag Bay to partake in the carnage recently reported. Tides wouldn’t permit launching until about 6:00 AM so we got a room at Hotel Brennan. Talked with a guy there with a 25’ Davis whose friend flew back to LA from La Paz the night before to replace a bad servo on his shift linkage. He was waiting for him to get back. He said all of the recent talk was that the fish were south from the Entrada due to cold water up north. Followed them out through solid fog in the morning because they had the route to the Entrada plotted. Finally found the right bait at Punta Belcher so we loaded up. Fog burned off just before the Entrada with dead flat seas at 69.7 so we took off towards the south as advised. Found 73.5 and dropped in the trollers. 110 miles later with no luck at all headed to Bahia Santa Maria to spend the night on anchor. Radio reports from other boats up to 8 marlin per boat along with YFT and Dodos at the Thetis. Oh well, I guess we had a 50/50 shot and blew it this time. Couldn’t fish the next morning because we had to catch the tide to get in. Just got the boat pulled on the out going tide (3 ft. deep near the ramp) and made the run to Loreto. Needed to get on some fish so hired a local guide through Arturo’s. Reports were not sounding promising and the wind was blowing about 17. Met FinInstinct at the ramp in the morning. He was doing seatrials on a brand new beautiful panga. I hope all went well. The bait guy and his cast net plugged my bait tank in about 10 minutes with sardines. Ran to Coronado in the morning for a steady pick on decent Cabrilla but were getting so beat up we called it a day around 2. Heard reports of some Roosters being caught at Puerto Escondido so the following morning we headed south from the marina. Found what we were looking for in no time. It was wide open on Roosters. They were really small, about 5-15 #’s but on bait casters it was pure joy. Ran to the south end of Carmen to try to find the bigger models and stuck in a Lisafish on a 40# while we continued slamming and releasing the little guys on baitcasters. The bigger baits got slammed 3 times but we couldn’t get anything to stick. Launched from Puerto Escondido the next morning and followed the same scenario.

All in all it was a great trip, certainly not what Baja is capable of producing but the time just spent with my son was priceless.

[Steve@316]

Very nice. Great post!

[Foss]

Wonderful post. Did I understand right that you only spent one day (and two nights) at Mag Bay? That's a heck of a long drive, you must have been on a tight schedule.

[fully involved]

Wonderful post. Did I understand right that you only spent one day (and two nights) at Mag Bay? That's a heck of a long drive, you must have been on a tight schedule.

Unfortunately, yes. Having never been there we really weren't prepared. The trip was a last minute thing with a goal to just get south and find something biting. Now at least I know what to expect and what I need to plan for. I knew Loreto so we figured we'd do better over there where we were more prepared for. Yes we were on a tight schedule. Can't leave the wife alone over Thanksgiving.

[Ali]

Nice Pics!

[Mot's Sr.]

Thanks for the nice post and pictures. Looks like you guy's had a good time, even though it was a short and fast one. Thanks for the post

[aguachico]

Beautiful pics. I love Baja.

[terry c]

Great trip thanks for the report

[Finstinct]

Nice meeting you in Loreto. Thats an awesome rig you have!! The new panga ran great...needs a few modifications. If you ever want to use it next time your in Loreto shot me a PM or eMail. Good job on the roosters. We found'em also, same size range. Found some yellows and jacks in the same size range a little farther south of the port. The wind was crazy, but atleast we all found something to pull on!! :smoking33

Vince