La Paz Mothership Report

You may have guessed from my avatar that I enjoy a little offshore palagic warm water fishing now and then.  Back in the day, I fished the deep water off Florida and the Bahamas on an annual offshore junkanoo.  This year, we tried a little something different and headed to La Paz, BC for a little saltwater fun.  Time to post the report for my NWKA boyz (and girlz.)

First, the background.  This annual trip is "do it yourself" all the way.  We bring our own rods, reels, tackle, lures, and even frozen ballyhoo from the sunshine state.  The boat rental is "bareboat"...meaning no captain, no crew, no nothing.  Just the boat.  If you qualify as a captain, this is a great way to go - and cheaper too.  It's a 38 foot Luhrs, the only powerboat bareboat charter in Mexico outfitted for fishing.  And I mean serious fishing with outriggers, fighting chair, rod holders, livewell and tuna tubes.  (And yes, kayaks too.)

The geography of the La Paz area and East Cape is awesome.  Hot and bright and azul.  The water is deep blue and clean.  The boat has air conditioning and fans, which is nice but not necessary, because if you're from Oregon, you don't mind being hot.  Am I right?

We sleep on the boat.  Plenty of beds and bunks.  And we fish.  No golf.  No facials.  This is a fishing trip.  Trolling all day for big palagics.  Anchored out at night in some undiscovered (by us) cove, and after feasting on sushi rolls and pan fried mahi, we mix up a few more cocktails, turn on the spreader lights, dump out the chum and night fish off the back deck until we can't stand catching fish.  It's really too easy when you dip a sibiki rig for a couple of seconds and pull up three snappers without even casting.  Did I mention this is a blast if you like to fish?

Now to the report.  It was a Dorado fiesta.  aka Dolphin fish or Mahi Mahi..it makes no matter what you call them because I don't think they know their name.  The dorado were in town for the summer and they were especially hungry.  Over and over they attacked the spread with gusto, tailwalked all over the water, lit up bright blue and green and yellow, and invited their friends for double and triple hook ups.  The downside?  Only one sailfish, although she was a big one, foul hooked in the eyeball, which is a whole nother story that I will tell you personally when we are bored from waiting for a dino bite this winter on the willy.  And only one yellowfin tuna, which I will describe as mouth candy - the tastiest fish in the sea.  Although dorado are freakin' great to eat too.  We did battle a couple of blue marlin but could not manage to boat them for pictures. 

Yes we caught dorado until our arms were sore.  And then some.  At the peak of the frenzy, four out of five of us were hooked up with still more hungry mahi asking for live bait from the bait well.  Someone had to gaff those tasty swimmers or we could have hooked up five, and maybe more if we had one rod in each hand.  Yes...that means one of us was fighting a fish and driving the boat at the same time.  Tough duty.

Here are a few of the pictures fresh from La Paz.  And BTW, I had a talk with the boat owner about kayak fishing.  He says he has 5 sit-on-tops and will gladly outfit them all with rod holders if I ever want to bring some friends down to go kayak fishing from this boat.  So if anyone wants to talk about kayak fishing, or even just fishing, off a liveaboard for a week in the Sea of Cortez, please send me a PM.  I'm always happiest when I'm planning a fishing trip.

DC

 

Un finin' believible! My dream come true. Good for you. sea of Cortez, I'll see you someday.
Good to see someone living the good life!
Envious. Rich

OH man, that was pretty much my dream report right there.  Dorado. YUM. I dream about Dorado fishing at least once a week. I'd love to go.

Did you get a chance to try any fishing with the kayaks?

Unfortunately no.  The other guys on this trip are not into it.  And between clearing lines, boat driving, live bait casting, leadering, picture taking and gaffing, I didn't really want to disrupt the flow we had going to untie the yaks.  It wouldn't be hard to do though.  Just take a little planning and cooperation.

That looks epic!  Great report, man!    . 

That looks nice.  What level captains ticket you need to drive that thing?

-Allen

No license needed.  Just a good boating resume.  The first time I bareboat chartered 10 years ago, they had me hire a captain for the first day even though I had boating experience.  Once you've had a succesful charter, it's pretty easy after that.  Sometimes the check out process can be stressful because they require a driving test, chart test, etc.  But this one was a piece of cake.  The navigation around La Paz is pretty much line of site because there is plenty of deep water, so I think they worry less about it there than the Florida charter cos. 

Oh, that looks like rough duty, there. For the time being, I can only dream of a trip like that.

Are the rates down there similar to what they are up here?

Cheaper.  Both the boat and fuel.  And better service too.  The local staff drove us around town for provisions and licenses and they clean the boat afterwards - usually something you have to do yourself with other charters.  Five people for a week runs around $1,000 to $1,200 per person for everything except airfare, which is almost half the cost of the Florida charters I've done. 

See more about them and the boat here:

http://www.seascapecharters.com/

That sounds like a good idea for January-March time frame.

And no drysuits involved!?!?!

Sweetness!!

My first avatar was a closeup of a sail I caught in ACA (still is on ifish). I had a hookup down there, but I could never connect the dots with his boat, a kayak, and me all at the same time. Your deal sounds waaay better. If y'all do put something together, let me know!

Until then, I think there may be an 8 hour drive in my near future.

http://www.pensacolafishingforum.com/fishingforum/Topic440189-44-1.aspx

what a gorgeous Mahi.....almost a shame to take them out of the water , isn't it?

You may have guessed from my avatar that I enjoy a little offshore palagic warm water fishing now and then. 

Before I was a kayak fisherman, I was a blue water fisherman (and before that I was a fly fisherman ... what an evolution this path has been).  I haven't done much to marry the 2, but there is always next year.

-Allen

One of our crew is an avid fly fisherman from Colorado.  During one of the dorado frenzies, he grabbed his 12 weight rod, put a live sardinas on the hook and nailed a nice mahi.  Now if I could have gotten him into one of the yaks, that would have been a good picture.  (I did give him a hard time about putting meat bait on a fly rod.  Not sure that is fly fishing, but what the heck.  It was a great fight.)