Day 2 started out at 5:30AM at the marina waiting for our guide, Francisco (I highly recommend Francisco & Pam of flyfishloreto.com). We got there a touch early and were treated to a great sunrise, which was really nothing compared to future mornings. Looks like someone had a good time the previous evening...
We went out searching for Dorado this particular morning which took us quite far to the North. hint....didn't find any this day but managed a few other species, such as this little Cabrilla...gotta fight them fast and hard (even ones of this size) or else they'll cut you off in the rocks.
At one point, we saw what was basically a raft of birds diving and just sitting on the surface....we ended up on a nice school of Skipjack (apparently guides down there just call all little tuna "Bonito"....I think these looked more like the pics I've seen of Skipjack) attacking the baitball from beneath. What was funny about this is that the baitfish would congregate underneath the boat for cover from both sets of predators. After catching a few little tuna, we'd motor backwards a hundred yard, catch a couple of fish until the bait congregated again under the boat...rinse and repeat until we got tired of doing what we felt was more "work" than anything else. I was really happy to put a solid bend in my new Steffen Bros. glass 7'9" 10/11wt. What a fun rod that feels as though it has even more reserve power.
We failed on our quest for Dorado or Roosters this day, but not the next.
Day 3 started off with another great sun rise.
We had a hitch hiker on our way out of the harbor...
We worked over a number of prime looking spots without anything to show for it....
Until, we found this one seam that had roosters, jacks and pargo working a school of baitfish.
paydirt....oh yeah! This is what checked the box for me!
nice feisty pargo...
another rooster (somehow I managed 3 or 4 of these....damn, what a blast!
We still needed to find Dorado...by dumb luck, we stumbled across a small school where Phil got to check his box with 4 or 5 Dorado. I managed a couple myself as well before the school disappeared.
Fun-size
Our Panga captain on day 3 actually kinda sucked. I don't recall his name, but he didn't really know what he was doing. The only reason we touched any fish at all was because we told him where we wanted to fish. Somehow, we still scratched out a few fish like another Skipjack & Phil got a nice trigger (I'll let him post up his pics).
This is actually from several days later....I have no idea what it is, but it pulled hard and fast...
We went out searching for Dorado this particular morning which took us quite far to the North. hint....didn't find any this day but managed a few other species, such as this little Cabrilla...gotta fight them fast and hard (even ones of this size) or else they'll cut you off in the rocks.
At one point, we saw what was basically a raft of birds diving and just sitting on the surface....we ended up on a nice school of Skipjack (apparently guides down there just call all little tuna "Bonito"....I think these looked more like the pics I've seen of Skipjack) attacking the baitball from beneath. What was funny about this is that the baitfish would congregate underneath the boat for cover from both sets of predators. After catching a few little tuna, we'd motor backwards a hundred yard, catch a couple of fish until the bait congregated again under the boat...rinse and repeat until we got tired of doing what we felt was more "work" than anything else. I was really happy to put a solid bend in my new Steffen Bros. glass 7'9" 10/11wt. What a fun rod that feels as though it has even more reserve power.
We failed on our quest for Dorado or Roosters this day, but not the next.
Day 3 started off with another great sun rise.
We had a hitch hiker on our way out of the harbor...
We worked over a number of prime looking spots without anything to show for it....
Until, we found this one seam that had roosters, jacks and pargo working a school of baitfish.
paydirt....oh yeah! This is what checked the box for me!
nice feisty pargo...
another rooster (somehow I managed 3 or 4 of these....damn, what a blast!
We still needed to find Dorado...by dumb luck, we stumbled across a small school where Phil got to check his box with 4 or 5 Dorado. I managed a couple myself as well before the school disappeared.
Fun-size
Our Panga captain on day 3 actually kinda sucked. I don't recall his name, but he didn't really know what he was doing. The only reason we touched any fish at all was because we told him where we wanted to fish. Somehow, we still scratched out a few fish like another Skipjack & Phil got a nice trigger (I'll let him post up his pics).
This is actually from several days later....I have no idea what it is, but it pulled hard and fast...
