La Paz Baja 2013. . .Part One

[Tony Buzolich]

This year the guys and I decided to try something a little different for our annual trip to La Paz. We wanted to explore some new areas as well as hit the usual Las Arenas / La Vantana area that we’d been fishing for so many years. We stayed this time at the Marina Hotel right on the malecon in town and fished with the Baja Pirates.



Several of the guys made daily trips to Las Arenas while the rest of us stayed close and fished out of the marina at Pichilingue only a few minutes away from the hotel. This also gave us access to Isla Espiritu Santo as well as the northern part of Isla Cerralvo.

We’d been hearing about some of the bad weather and possible hurricane but fortunately we lucked out with really nice flat as glass water most days. On the downside, the sargasso was scattered from the previous storms and finding large matts was not to be had.



That didn’t stop us though from finding plenty of dorado.







Our days would always start with getting bait either at the harbor or at the island.



Matching the hatch with a good sardina pattern always worked best.



Some parts of the island got a bit shallow near the fish camp before heading offshore and required us to trim up the motors.



At Las Arenas launching was moved to the ramp at Muertos and boats were trailered in and out of the water.



Fishing here next to the beach was still fantastic with Toro’s and big Roosterfish.









After gathering bait it was just a matter of trolling while looking for sargaso and more dorado. It never took long before we found fish and my wife always seemed to hook up first.









. . .Part Two to follow!

[EricO]

Hey Tony,

What weight of fly rods did you use most of the time? Curious to know.

EO

[Tony Buzolich]

I think we all used 10 weights as our light rods. They were the easiest to cast quickly and worked great for the dorado. If the guys were planning on getting into skipjack or larger stuff out at El Bajo then they used 11w and 12w.

Bait (sardinas) were readily available and natural colored fly patterns seemed to work best. My first picture of a dorado shows a brown/white airhead type fly stuck in his mouth which worked good. I also used my sardina fly a lot which everything chased, even the marlin went for it but the hook was too small (4/0). Jim and Steve did great using Jim's brown/white Feather-Duster fly.

When we were trolling looking for sea-weed and dorado, blue/white was the color to have. It mimicked flying fish which were everywhere. It was incredible to see a bull dorado with its head half out of water chasing flying fish as they glided away from the boat.

Blue/white also worked further offshore for the marlin and the yellowfin. Take a look at my "Marlin Bit & Spit" fly. Even a single 6/0 was'nt big enough to get a good hookup for the marlin.
Tony