The first half of August has been a busy time here at the hotel. The staff barely had time to catch their breath after the record-breaking 12th edition of the Bisbee's East Cape Offshore Tournament before well known TV host Dan Hernandez with an entourage of 45 anglers arrived from all over the country to film a segment of his popular Dan Hernandez Sportfishing show.

According to Hernandez, fishing was awesome! He landed six marlin and two sailfish the first two days, and 20+ dorado, 15 roosterfish and one nice tuna plus plenty of smaller fish the other days of their filming.

He declared that his recent trip was one of his best ever; the dorado were so thick that they stuck the underwater camera down in the corner and hand-fed the dodo's ... the roosterfish were the same way. One of the anglers in his group landed a blue marlin over 300 pounds and others landed several wahoo. The marlin were very close to shore. All of his were taken less than two miles off the beach and right in front of the resorts!

"It was a great trip," Dan concluded, "plus there is plenty of live bait."

It's about as good as it gets right now.....most of the fish he caught were on live bait, mackerel and jacks for the billfish and sardines for tuna; when the dorado school was up, he also landed several on his special 'B-52 bucktails'. By the way, the roosters loved the larger live jacks.

He also commented in his blog about the lack of anglers visiting the area ... reflecting on whether it's just that people are afraid to spend money or whether it's all the bad press that Mexico has received recently. He went on to say that he knew that anytime anything bad happens in Mexico it makes the news, but over that weekend a hundred thousand plus people made it home safely from Mexico (including his group of 45) and that wasn't newsworthy! He further commented that he and his group felt very safe while he was at Hotel Buena Vista and the entire time he was in Baja!

Last weekend was 'La Ribera Days' at East Cape ... each city in Mexico has its own 'day'. And, depending on size of the city, the fiesta held usually on the weekend, is comparable in size. 'La Ribera Day' started Friday night and ended on Monday night. The biggest attractions were the Ferris wheels, bumper cars and games for the kids, plus the horse races, chicken fights, a carnival, nightly dancing and a fishing tournament for everyone.

It’s a festive affair with many drink and food booths and of course a stage for speeches by local dignitaries, a queen of the city crowned and the prizes for the tournament awarded…and the music of the many local bands which filled the area with their performances.

A total of 38 teams paid the 2,000 pesos to compete in the fishing tournament. First prize was awarded to Victor Sandez for his 353-pound blue marlin earning him $96,000 pesos.

In the tuna division our own Esaul Valdez on the Dottie B11 landed a 56-pound tuna, enough to capture the 13,000 peso top prize in that division.

On another of our boats, Liliana's angler Antonio Talamantes scored another 16,000 pesos for his 48-pound dorado.

Needless to say "Happy Hour" in our El Pescador Bar was even happier Sunday afternoon!

Here are the numbers for last week. (R indicates Released)
4 Blue Marlin 2 R
4 Striped Marlin 2 R
10 Sailfish 10 R
173 Dorado 17 R
23 Tuna
38 Snapper
5 Amberjack
1 Pompano
1 Cabrilla
22 Roosterfish 22R