Mag Bay 2026 trip in the works... want in?

adamcu280

adamcu280

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I'm attempting to put together a trip to Mag Bay for 2026 with Tim Hatler of https://www.palapasventana.com/mag-bay/

Basics are $3995/person all included except flights and booze. Based on the outer island so shorter runs. Three ~10hr days and one half day of fishing. We are currently working on two sets of dates: Oct 22-29 or Nov 5-12. Ideally we have a group of eight booking out the week which would get us a "buy seven, get one free" discount but a four-pack would be a great start (pretty sure we have three for sure right now). Four pangas set up for fly fishing with two anglers/panga.

If anyone's interested say so here or send me a DM and I can add you to the thread I have going with some other folks that are in(terested) including myself, Cabezon, dbaken, Matt B, Phil K.
 
adamcu280 said:
I'm attempting to put together a trip to Mag Bay for 2026 with Tim Hatler of https://www.palapasventana.com/mag-bay/

Basics are $3995/person all included except flights and booze. Based on the outer island so shorter runs. Three ~10hr days and one half day of fishing. We are currently working on two sets of dates: Oct 22-29 or Nov 5-12. Ideally we have a group of eight booking out the week which would get us a "buy seven, get one free" discount but a four-pack would be a great start (pretty sure we have three for sure right now). Four pangas set up for fly fishing with two anglers/panga.

If anyone's interested say so here or send me a DM and I can add you to the thread I have going with some other folks that are in(terested) including myself, Cabezon, dbaken, Matt B, Phil K.
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the target fish are ??
i did a mag bay whale watch trip this past march, and we had lunch at a village on a big island - is that the outer island? i dont know the name offhand.
 
goinoregon said:
the target fish are ??
i did a mag bay whale watch trip this past march, and we had lunch at a village on a big island - is that the outer island? i dont know the name offhand.
Click to expand...
Target fish are striped marlin with other pelagics (dorado, tuna, etc) around, with roosters, jacks, and other inshore fish available as well.
 
I wish I could join! Next October I have a different trip tentatively scheduled on those dates.
 
If everything goes according to plan we have two spots left for the November window. If we get two more folks and book out the week we can either get a free trip for the organizer (me) but I suggested we split the savings between the group so we all get ~$500 off the trip.

@alpinetrout was specifically called out by one of our group as potentially having interest. :)
 
If you haven't been to Mag Bay for striped marlin - this is a fishery I don't think you will regret doing. I went a year ago. When I was there, dolphins, whales, sea lions and turtles everywhere. Electric blue striped marlin everywhere. No throwing bait. You are casting to aggressive fast moving marlin slashing through bait balls. The marlin are the perfect fly rod size, around 90 to 120 lbs.

The marlin are in the green water starting a mile or two off the barrier islands. But the bait balls in the green water were small and moved really fast. The best fishing was in the blue water, maybe 7-8 miles off shore. It's all about birds - spot a group on the horizon dipping into the water, and there will be a bait ball and marlin. Coming up on slashing marlin is the coolest thing this side of roosters on bait.

Practice casting your 12 wts. You don't have to do a fast two-handed strip, it's about getting your fly in front of a fish far enough that it sees it, but not to far that it won't go out of it's path to take the fly. Then you have to do a hard strip set when it takes your fly. And then another hard strip set - the beaks are hard to dig a hook into. I lost the first two I hooked because I did not do hard enough strip sets.

And marlin are way fun to fight on a fly rod. Long shallow runs. Tail walking. Good stuff. And they get exhausted in a reasonable time from dragging the fly line through the water, so the fight isn't to long.

Finish the day exhausted with a cold beer and a setting sun.

Anyways, if you are interested or on the fence, reach out to Adam. We're looking for a couple more people.
 
adamcu280 said:
Sounds like we've got one spot left to fill... @SilverFly was specifically called out by members of the crew going.
Click to expand...
Super appreciate the invite, and would love going with this group. Just not in a position right now where it feels "responsible" jumping on board, but also know I'll regret not going.... arrgh! I can make it work, but need a day to process. Gonna be hard to focus at work tomorrow!
 
dbaken said:
If you haven't been to Mag Bay for striped marlin - this is a fishery I don't think you will regret doing. I went a year ago. When I was there, dolphins, whales, sea lions and turtles everywhere. Electric blue striped marlin everywhere. No throwing bait. You are casting to aggressive fast moving marlin slashing through bait balls. The marlin are the perfect fly rod size, around 90 to 120 lbs.

The marlin are in the green water starting a mile or two off the barrier islands. But the bait balls in the green water were small and moved really fast. The best fishing was in the blue water, maybe 7-8 miles off shore. It's all about birds - spot a group on the horizon dipping into the water, and there will be a bait ball and marlin. Coming up on slashing marlin is the coolest thing this side of roosters on bait.

Practice casting your 12 wts. You don't have to do a fast two-handed strip, it's about getting your fly in front of a fish far enough that it sees it, but not to far that it won't go out of it's path to take the fly. Then you have to do a hard strip set when it takes your fly. And then another hard strip set - the beaks are hard to dig a hook into. I lost the first two I hooked because I did not do hard enough strip sets.

And marlin are way fun to fight on a fly rod. Long shallow runs. Tail walking. Good stuff. And they get exhausted in a reasonable time from dragging the fly line through the water, so the fight isn't to long.

Finish the day exhausted with a cold beer and a setting sun.

Anyways, if you are interested or on the fence, reach out to Adam. We're looking for a couple more people.
Click to expand...

I will add practice casting your 12wt while standing on a bosu ball in the wind with targets scattered 360 degrees around you. I was pretty confident going into the trip. Casting on a boat being bounced around in the waves is quite different than standing in a field of grass. Took me a full day to get my sea legs. We fished with 500 gr Leviathons and being able to throw it 80' in 2 or 3 casts will increase your odds a bunch. Most of the bait balls are moving - even in the blue water on our trip. To get more than 1 or 2 shots at a moving bait ball you need to be able to throw it a ways. You will often have fish feeding on one side of the boat and 10 seconds later they are feeding on a different bait ball on the other side of the boat - it is the most chaotic fishery you can imagine :).

Casting these lines was quite different for me than my usual intermediate line on a 6 wt. My biggest problem (casting from the back of the boat) was keeping the line up high when I had to cast with my line over the center console. I don't know how many times I hit the canopy - better than putting a 10/0 in the captains ear. It helped to shorten my stroke and shoot just a little line into both the forward and back cast. If I made a long stroke and shot too much line the loop would drop and I would have issues with said canopy. Casting these big rods and heavy lines a long ways isn't that hard if you keep your stroke shorter and don't over power it. Easier said than done when you see a lit up marlin with its bill out of the water!

It is also important to figure out how much line you need outside your tip top to make a good cast with these lines. The coaching I got on my first Baja trip was to get the sinking portion out and let it fly. When I do that with my rod the head of the line turns over early and lands in a pile. If I had 15 or 20 feet of running line out, I could shoot a ton of line.

There is really not much opportunity to position the boat in a favorable position with respect to the wind. The fish are up and down pretty fast most of the time. The "static" bait ball is a wonderful thing but we probably had fewer than 10 times where we could make more than 5 casts to a bait ball. There will be fish eating for less than a minute on most bait balls. The captain tries to get in range period - not worth it to consider the wind direction. So, you need to be pretty comfortable backhand casting as well. I was not very good before the trip so most of my practice was backhanded. Glad I did cause I bet at least 40% of the casts I made where backhand.

One more skill you will need if you fish for roosters is casting to teased fish. The biggest tip I will give in that situation is get your line in the air earlier than you think you should. You don't have to cast super far - 60 feet is plenty - but you have to time it really well. If the guide says drop it and you make one more false cast you are done. Get your line in the air, shoot a little into your last back cast and let it fly. Better to land it short than too long. If you take one more cast, you will be too long cause the teaser is moving fast. You also need to be stripping as soon as the fly lands. I like to make a loop with my pinkie on my line hand and keep the line in that loop. That way the line is always in my hand and I am not fumbling for it when the fly hits the water.

Gonna be a long wait for you guys, but it is certainly worth it!
 
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