PHOTO 1: Over these, many seasons, some of the best photos, some of the best catches, some of the best times have come from these two guys. Mitch Chavira and and Charlie "Stix" McGee both from Encinitas CA. Usually, they are with Mitch's son, Cole, who lately has a habit of outfishing both of them, but this past week, the two amigos came solo and slammed big dorado and tuna. Both guys have caught just about every fish in the area except the elusive wahoo. Well, this past week, Charlie got his north of Cerralvo Island. Mitch will have to wait! Check out Bob Marley looking at the catch!

EARLY WEEK HIGH WINDS KICK IT UP BUT THE HOT BITE FOR TUNA AND DORADO CONTINUES TO RIP FOR MUERTOS BAY ANGLERS!

The La Paz / Las Arenas Fishing Report for Oct. 27, 2008

PHOTO 2: Landon Frazier is ust 10-years-old from northern CA, just about outfished dad and the rest of the group this week with some of the biggest fish almost daily. He had never done this before, but over 3 days he now has "the bug!" Here he's standing on the beach at Muertos Bay holding his biggest bull dorado. Along with the tuna bite we've had for over a month, dorado have now moved in with some fairly significant numbers with most fish running 10-30 pounds.

PHOTO 3: I know, I have Mitch's photo above with the wahoo, this is such a well-taken photo, I just had to put it in the report. Mitch is a regular poster boy. For our La Paz boats, it was literally impossible to fish early in the week with the strong winds, but as the winds abated, the dorado bite came back nicely with fish back at the SE end of Espiritu Santo Island.

PHOTO 4: This is how a day SHOULD be...all smiles and bent rods! That's Sergio up at the bow and Bob amidships both with tuna at the ends of their lines. They are fishing just yards offshore at San Juan near Muertos Bay. They had limits of tuna in a short time! It's not rocket science. The tuna have grown larger up to about 20-25 pounds and are just around the corner from where we launch the boats. Basically, if you pin a sardine on the hook, toss it overboard and wait to get bit! Easy!

PHOTO 5: Ray and Otha show off a few of their nice yellowfin tuna on the beach. This is a nicer grade of football tuna. Undoubtedly, this is the best tuna bite we've had in years with a tuna bite ongoing now since about August but seeming getting better and better!

PHOTO 6: Derick Tagawa, Mark Kojima and Randy Nakayama pose here with favorite captain Adolfo "Yofo" next to a nice day of fishing. Lots of talk of sashime on the beach! They had two days like this and came back early to the beach each day plugged.

PHOTO 7: One of our long-time best amigos, Roland "Wink" Winkler made it back to see us after many years. Wink is in the middle flanked by Sergio and Bob. Wink's never lets his wheelchair get in the way of a good day fishing and is one of the most fanatic of fishermen. He fished until his "arms were tired."

PHOTO 8: Like I said, the tuna are getting bigger. Some qualify as something a bit more than "football" status. Duffy Shropshire holds up one of the larger sluggers from this week. These fish are literally minutes or yards in front of the beach. Live or dead bait does the trick. Baits are really small so if you're coming down, small hooks are preferred. This week, I was using #1 and even #2 size live bait hooks. The only problem was when dorado came plowing through, the small hooks sometimes didn't set well in the dorado's mouth and we lost a few fish!

PHOTO 9: Scott Torney came down with mom, Virginia and dad, Jack long enough to squeeze in a day of fishing and shows off this nice bull dorado. We never really got the huge bulls we got last season, but there's not shortage of mahi either! I'd say the average bull right now is about 20 pounds.

PHOTO: 10: Captain Jorge stands here with our Alaska amigo, Rod Brown, who makes the pilgrimage each year from Wrangell, AK! According to Rod, he and his brother Jeff had one of their best trips ever with more tuna and dorado than they knew what to do with so they were really popular with captains, and everyone else giving away much of their fish.

PHOTOS 11 and 12: Marty Johnson of Atascadero CA has been on these pages many times as well as the other publications that I write for. He's one of the most enthusiastic fishermen you will ever see. Marty can fish with the best of 'em even though he hasn't been fishing many years. He took one day off this past week to use his flyrod and fish inshore in La Paz Bay. This is just a sample of what he did with his flyrod and spinning rod. It was literally a fish a cast...sometimes more as one fish would spit the fly and another would quickly grab it up. Marty described it as one of his best fishing days ever. Originally he thought the fish he is holding was a snook. However, when we checked, it's a rare weakfish, a species that is rarely caught. In the rack of fish in the photo below, you will see weakfish, barracuda, triggers, jacks and sierra.

THE FISHING REPORT

I guess I could just let the photos above do the talking. We sent alot of amigos home this week with stuffed ice chests! The week didn't start like that. Those winds that hammered S.California also had an effect on us as well.

Heck...talk about winds...for those of you who have visited us in the past imagine waves big enough to surf on in La Paz Bay! Coming from the north, the waves were large enough to get the malecon (waterfront road in town) pretty wet! Obviously, we weren't going to send anyone out in that junk.

So, we moved all our La Paz folks to fish with our guys who were already reserved t fish out've Muertos Bay. As you can see from the photos, it was a pretty good move. No one lost any days of fishing and not only did the fish cooperate, but on most days they exploded! Some days boats were back on the beach with anglers too tired or too plugged with fish to continue on.

The tuna bite is the mainstay, but the fish are getting a few pound larger every week. I put a few on the scale this week that went 25-32 pounds which is a nice grade of yellowfin...hardly a monter, but hardly a football either and strong enough and stubborn enough to make for a great drag screaming fight! I had alot of guys on light tackle this week who reported worrying about getting spooled on the smaller equipment! The tuna are inching their way south to an area near and in front of the friut loop house on the hill outside of Muertos to just outside the mouth of the bay.

Sometimes, it's one-stop shopping. As you fish the tuna, here come the dorado! Good numbers of dorado are now mixing it up with the tuna also! In fact, if you only wanted to pull on dorado and nix the tuna that is entirely possible right now. The dorado aren't huge either, but a 20-30 pound bull can put the hurt on just about anyone!

If you're coming down, bring small live bait hooks as smal, as a #1 or #2. The sardines are eenie-meenie! They still work great, but if your hook is too big, you'll impale your bait and kill it before it has a chance to get eaten!

Also, bring flurocarbon leader...25 and 30 pound fluro is about right!

As for other species, they're here too. Just no one is fishing for them. I'm writing this from the Giggling Marlin Restaurant at Muertos Bay waiting for our boats to come back and as I look down on the waters only about 20 yards from my table, 30 pound roosterfish are crushing and tormenting a school of sardines. As well, we've had marlin, sailfish and wahoo hookups this week.

That's my story!

Jonathan

Jonathan Roldan's

Tailhunter International La Paz

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