Game Fish Diaries - Chic McSherry

As soon as you arrive, your skin colour marks you out as a new kid in town and the street hawkers swarm around you like flies. As your tan develops however, they tend to leave you alone, probably reasoning that you’ve seen it all by then. Within one hour of my arrival, I was offered everything; marijuana, cocaine and even women. All vices catered for – 24x7. Of course it’s the usual emerging nation transaction – poverty and need on one side chasing prosperity and greed on the other. You can’t help but feel for the wee kiddies, some as young as three years old, unsmiling and with dull, lifeless eyes, on the street selling gum and trinkets well into the night. What lessons are we teaching them I wonder?

And then there are the bars. They start at wild, go through wilder still and finish up at just plain crazy. I met some American guys on my second evening and we had a fair number drinks together. They were daft enough to wear the big sombrero in The Giggling Marlin which meant that they had to down two shots of tequila in quick succession. Of course, once everyone was suitably hammered, the cry “Let’s go to Mermaids!” was raised. Mermaids, it should be understood, is one of those kinds of bars.

When we got there, the guys all took off a whoopin’ and a hollerin’ straight into the arms of the beautiful Mexican hostesses. Like a good Scot however, and never having been in such an establishment before, I concentrated on making myself invisible. I like to people-watch and the clientele in Mermaids was most intriguing. There was the expected and ubiquitous gaggle of fat, balding, elderly gentlemen who were making just as much noise as my erstwhile companions. But what surprised me most was the number of women who were there. Some were with guys – presumably couples – but there were some single women there too who were enthusiastically throwing money at the dancers. I have to use the word “dancer” loosely as the girls enacted more of a shuffling sashay around the central pole. Not entirely unsexy you understand, but somewhat lacking in creativity, style and energy.

Every so often, one of the girls would lead a grinning guy off to a curtained cubicle for a private dance. After the song had finished, the guy would return looking slightly dishevelled and saying “Goddam” a lot whilst his friends clapped him heartily on the back and ordered another round of beers. It was almost ritualistic.

Finally my cloak of invisibility slipped and a pretty wee lassie came over and sat beside me. She had the most beautiful smile I have ever seen but could speak not a single word of English. My Spanish, thankfully, allowed us to have a reasonable conversation provided she spoke to me as though I were a four year old, which added to the charm of it all.
She told me her stage name and I told her my stock phrase, that I wasn’t an gringo but was a Scottish woman, and we chit-chatted about this and that until, inevitably, she asked me if I wanted a “Baille privado”. What the hell – why should the other guys get to say “Goddam!” and not me?

The cost was $20 and she led me to one of the curtained booths. I sat down on the rickety chair and she commenced her “routine”. I looked at her, she looked at me, we both burst out giggling. I guess it’s not my thing. I prefer my women interested in me, not my wallet, so we went back to the bar and we chatted some more. Turns out she had just split with her boyfriend and had started working in Mermaids two days before I arrived. She came from Guadalajara and had moved down to Cabo to stay with a girlfriend who also worked in the bar. Her plan was simple; work in Mermaids for a month and get enough cash together to go back to college and do a course in Business Administration. It seemed like a good plan to me.

My friend Kath from Houston says that this sort of thing is a victimless crime. I’m not entirely sure that I agree with that as most of the girls that get into this are victims, if only of poverty. But as she says, in a life of limited options it has to be a choice. It may not be a great choice, but it is often a practical choice. That logic fizzles out slightly though when you consider that in wealthy countries they have places like this too and choices there are not so limited. I don’t know what I think about it all to be honest; it’s a bit of fun but it’s also a bit sleazy; the girls are friendly and happy but only if you pay them to be; the guys all look normal but are predominately old enough to be the girls’ fathers and you have to wonder how they’d feel if their daughter worked there. No-one seems to get hurt – maybe that’s the best you can say about it.

My little friend sends me emails and she saved enough cash to get back to college after one month just like she planned. I for one can only be happy for her. It’s a happy ending in an often unhappy world.

One of the great things about Cabo is that it’s safe. There is a visible and active police force but the crime levels seemed to be on the petty side of things and it is not at all intimidating to walk around in the town at any hour. The locals seem to have grasped the fact that the Americanos have loads of money and that they actually want to spend it. The only price for the release of all that cash is the assurance that it is safe to walk around whenever and wherever they want, the ability to speak only in American English and be understood without any hassle and, finally, the right to pay for everything in good ‘ole, easy to understand, US dollars. Every transaction in dollars injects about 20% extra in pesos into the local economy as the wily Mexicans simply take the peso price and divide it by 10: $100 pesos becomes $10 American. When you realise that you can get $11.60 at the bank you have to tip your sombrero to these roadside entrepreneurs. It’s all good.

I was only clipped twice: once in Rip’s Bar beside Cabo Wabo when I gave the bartender $10 and he gave me change of $5 plus some attitude and the other time in the Hotel Finesterra where they gave me a totally incomprehensible bill and a $30 surcharge which no-one could explain to me yet gave me no choice but to pay. That’s not too bad for a week as a turista, but needless to say I won’t be recommending either joint. It’s not the money, it’s the principle. Be honest hombres – you’ll make more.

The Cabo fishing season runs pretty much all year round but the hot times are December to March for striped marlin with September to November for blues and blacks. March also gets a hot bite for swordfish. Sailfish are around most of the time in variable numbers as are yellowfin tuna, dorado and wahoo. I’d booked a prime week and I expected prime fishing. The weekly fishing reports on the various web sites about Cabo only served to encourage. The fishing was hot.
The marina is central to everything and is a sight to behold with the most beautiful fishing boats you could want to see stacked up line astern. October through December is when the big tournaments take place and the harbour is simply jam packed with incoming boats at this time.  There is huge money at stake; total cash prizes in the 2003 Bisbee’s ran to $2,500,000. That’s a big number in any sporting competition.

As well as the tournament boats, there are several very healthy charter operations working out of the marina with companies like Picante, ABY, Redrum, Gaviota, Mucho Loco and Pisces to name but a few of the larger operations. I thought that the Picante boats were particularly impressive looking and were clean, smart and tidy. That is usually the sign of a good operation. As well as the multiple boat operators, there is a swathe of single boat operators, private boats and pangas. You can pay your money and take your choice and your chances.

I fished with Pisces who are a very professional and well established Cabo operation. Their office was close to my hotel which was a bonus, but their boats left from a dock diametrically opposite necessitating a brisk 30 minute walk of a morning to get there by 6.30 am and a good 45 minute stroll back in the sultry and oppressive heat of the afternoon. The Pisces administration team – Tracy, Nancy, Adriana, Oscar and Mario – all looked after me extremely well and could not be faulted. It’s exactly the kind of operation you need to go with when visiting a strange place for the first time.

I had originally wanted to book a 31ft Bertram for the week but Pisces were so busy that they could only give it to me for one day and on my other days I would be on 28ft Uniflites. It wasn’t the size that mattered, it was the power. A 31ft boat has twin engines and therefore can get out there faster and stay longer before running for home. This maximises fishing time. Also, if it transpired that the wrong location was chosen and the bite was hot elsewhere, it was at least possible to up sticks and run to the other place on the bigger boat. However, I had what I had and that was that. To make things more complicated, if a little more interesting, I would be on different boats with different crews most days.

They mostly pull lures in Cabo and it is lures that take most of the blues and blacks. The stripers and sailfish tend to hit them but drop them without hooking up so the lures double as a bait-and-switch teaser system and when a fish strikes, a live-bait is quickly hooked and pitched to the interested predator.

That probably covers the bases as far as background goes. Let’s go fishing…

Jorge and Roberto

Like I said, Pisces were busy that week; so busy that on my first day out they couldn’t even get me out on one of their boats and had sub-contracted me onto another fleet. I was on the Gaviota IX and it seemed to be a relatively regular occurrence that Gaviota boats were used by Pisces anglers. Roberto was the older crewmember and, unusually in such an arrangement, he was also the mate. Jorge was the (younger) skipper and was the cousin of Roberto. A family affair then. I stepped aboard and proudly introduced myself as a Scottish woman who spoke a little Spanish to a bemused Roberto.

Leaving Cabo of a morning is quite an experience. At around 6.30am, all the anglers show up at the various fishing fleet bases, have some coffee and sweet rolls and get ushered onto their boats by the administration guys onshore. Then all the boats start leaving dock within about a fifteen minute window. First they head for one of the many small outboard driven live-bait boats, where $20 buys you ten sardine-like baitfish, and then they head for the harbour master, who is normally afloat also, to hand in the paperwork detailing who is aboard the boat for the day. Mexican law states that everyone should have a fishing license when leaving dock and I think that is a really good thing. Not only does it put some money back into the economy, but it also underscores the value of deep-sea fishing to the politicians and, hopefully for Cabo’s sake, that should give the sport enough of a voice in Mexico to prevent it going the way of Mauritius where an untaxed, politically voiceless, sport-fishery is plagued by long-liners.

The melee of boats scooting around the harbour area during that fifteen or so minute window is something to see and it’s a wonder there aren’t more collisions and bad tempers.

Paperwork done, Jorge cranked the engines up on the Gaviota IX, scooted round the world famous Cabo arch and out into the Pacific. Some of the boats were actually going through the channel formed between the arch and the nearby rocky outcrop and what with the very large rollers that were present that morning it had to have been an…interesting…experience for the anglers aboard.

This large stone outcrop is used by a colony of frigate birds as a roost and possibly also as a breeding area, although I can’t confirm that. Watching them take off sluggishly but effortlessly in the pre-dawn made me think of them more like pre-historic pterosaurs than modern day birds.
It took us about an hour to run out to the fishing grounds off the lighthouse on the Pacific side of Los Cabos. On the way out, I watched huge manta rays breaching and crashing through the waves. From a distance, it looked like someone had skimmed a large, lozenge-shaped Frisbee across the surface of the water.

The sea-birds in the area tend to be dusky in colour and fit into three main categories: small petrel like birds, medium sized fulmar like birds and larger booby or gannet like birds. All go by the generic Spanish name of pajaro (bird) and the guys didn't have a handle on taxonomy. But the birds were not nearly as common as I expected and the way they moved around and hunted reminded me more of the birds that I saw in Gran Canaria; just ones and twos mostly and very occasionally a small flock. There are a few distinct species around Cabo: the frigate birds previously mentioned (tijereta in Spanish - scissor tails) and occasionally we would see a snow-white tropic bird (called gallo by the crews which just means rooster).

The lures went into the water at about 8.20am and Jorge put the boat along the edge of a debris line and began trolling. The debris in the water was as obvious as it was welcome. It consisted largely of plant material; branches, vegetable matter, even whole tree trunks and it collected in long lines along current rips thereby showing where shifts were taking place underwater and also giving shade to the fish below. No piece of ocean drift, natural or manmade, is without its resident population of trigger fish and other small fishes. Small fishes bring larger fish so these so called “weed lines” are used the world over by hopeful anglers.

Pretty soon, we found a big floating log and Jorge circled it with the lures a few times before stopping the boat whilst Roberto hooked up a live-bait and cast it out. The little bait fish immediately made for the cover of the log and we waited. Jorge explained that he could see silhouettes under the log that he reckoned were either wahoo or dolphin. I looked. I looked again. I looked until my eyes hurt but I still couldn’t see a bloody thing. I didn’t disbelieve him you understand, it just never ceases to amaze me how these guys can see the fish in the water. Experience counts.

However nothing bit the live-bait so we started trolling again. As well as the debris, there were a lot of turtles out there from a variety of species but all referred to, pragmatically, by Roberto simply as “Sopa”; soup.

At 8.55 am the lure on the left outrigger was hit and the line came out of the clip like a whipcrack. I jumped for the rod and the reel screeched. Both Jorge and Roberto turned around and just looked. Not the reaction I was expecting to be honest. The rod was bent over and I was just lifting it from the holder when, with a splash and froth at the lure, the fish was gone. The guys shrugged their shoulders and we trolled on. That unsettled me a little: if you get a strike you need to rev the boat to set the hook and if you don’t get a hook-up you should at least go round again or, since we had them aboard, throw a live-bait out to see if the fish was still in the area. But when you’ve missed your chance, you’ve missed your chance.

We trolled on for the rest of the day without further incident despite occasionally finding large schools of dolphin or flocks of birds which would normally indicate tuna or other predators in the area. The birds, however, were mostly just sitting on the water and not feeding actively.
Roberto came down from the flybridge to chat to me regularly. I think I was an oddity to him; a turista who wasn’t a gringo yet could get by in basic Spanish. We covered a lot of ground in our conversations one way and another but old Roberto had a predilection for discussing putas (ahem – ladies of the night). He averred that there were lots of them in Cabo and that they would do anything for the right price and he also wanted to know what the putas were like in Scotland. I wouldn’t call him a dirty old man exactly, but it was nevertheless a surreal conversation to be having in a foreign language.

In general, there seemed to be fewer fish caught that day by the fleet overall. The boats all fly flags when they return to port to indicate to others the fish they have caught, and obviously to advertise their prowess to passing anglers. Helpfully, a different flag is flown for each species and a red flag with a white T indicates a release. The fishing had been very hot up until I got there but on this day it seemed, generally, that all catches were down.
Siempre mañana  - always tomorrow.

Enrique and Martin

I liked these guys a lot and fished with them twice; once on my second day and the other on my last day. Martin finally corrected my standard introductory error and explained that I was a Scottish man – escoses. Thanks amigo.

Their boat, The Karina, is immaculate and is one of Pisces own vessels. Martin was very fastidious on board and kept the deck scrupulously clear and clean with regular washing down. On my first trip out with them, Martin’s twelve year old son, also called Martin, tagged long for the ride. I couldn’t help thinking about my own Jamie and Scott back home and wishing they were there with me too. He was a really nice kid and was helpful but not obtrusive all during the day.

We headed out into The Sea of Cortez on that trip and about half an hour out we saw a big fish explode onto the surface. Martin put a live-bait over the side and we circled the area a few times without a strike. He then set out the three lure spread and we set off to find another fish.
There were huge waves that morning. Massive. They rolled majestically through the mirror-like sea without a breath of wind to ruffle their silky surfaces and when we were between them, it looked for all the world as though we were in a mini valley between two blue hills.

The Pacific is very blue indeed. It has a quality and clarity that I had never seen before. Like a massive gemstone with an unstable surface. And when the sun comes up of a morning and mixes in some blood red light, it has to be one of the most beautiful natural wonders on the earth.
By 10.20am I confess that I was starting to feel the pangs of potential defeat creeping in. Then the left outrigger lure took a strike. Enrique immediately gunned the engine and I watched in fascinated awe as the fish tore after the lure, snapping and slashing at it. Martin was beside me in an instant and had a live bait over the side before I could react. He thumbed the reel feeling for a strike and then I saw the rod beginning to bend whilst he increased the drag and shouted “Adelante!” to Enrique who immediately accelerated the boat. The fish was on.

I got in the chair and the fish shot out of the water behind us. It was a sailfish and a bloody big one at that. It took off on a searing run and Enrique backed up on it a little whilst I recovered line. Up it came again, and again, and again, shaking its head in fury and aggression.  The heat was intense and I was sweating profusely when, 20 minutes later, I got the fish to the boat. Young Martin had my travel camera ready and snapped away as the sailfish obligingly jumped right beside us. In another few minutes I had it back close enough for Martin Snr to leader it. “Dejelo ir” I said (Spanish for “Let it go”– I think) and Martin either grinned his approval or smirked at my bad Spanish – I can’t decide, but he clearly understood the intent. Enrique came down from the bridge and they both worked to free the hook from the fishes jaw and then lifted it onto the transom for an obligatory photo. To Jorge and Roberto - a message; that’s how it’s done.
What a fish. At an estimated 120lbs it was my biggest sailfish to date and it was a spectacular beast. I checked the camera after retrieving it from young Martin and my heart sank. It looked to me as though the film had not moved on very much from last time I had used it and I suddenly had the impression that he had pressed the button but hadn’t turned the film winder. We didn’t get our pictures after all.

We rigged up again and trolled on. A couple of dolphin came towards us and cruised effortlessly in our bow wave for ages. Martin invited me up to the pointy bit of the boat and we were able to lean right over and almost touch the mammals as they surfaced to breathe. A truly magical moment.

Later in the afternoon, whilst I was sitting on deck reading a book, I heard Martin shout “Whale !” and I just caught the end of the breach as the mammal sank below the depths. The hollow left in the ocean beside the boat where it dived would have swallowed a bus and I was really mad I had missed it. Teach me to read business books on a fishing trip…

The sailfish was our only strike that day but man it felt good to be going back to port flying a billfish and T flag.

Roberto and Victor

The third day and only one fish thus far into the trip. Something drastic was required, clearly, so out came the “Fishing is life…” t-shirt. As I pulled it over my head, though, disaster struck and I heard a loud ripping noise. Terrible. How could this happen – I mean I’ve only had that shirt for ten years and it cost, oh, about $6. Whatever happened to quality and durability? I wore it anyway, rips and all. I felt that I needed the juju.

The Rebecca is a 31foot Bertram and is a very tidy boat. I like Bertrams, if only for the funky idea that lots of old-hands think that the sound of the engines are underwater fish attractors. I can’t attest to that, but I do know that when I fish on them I usually get lucky. Roberto, the skipper, was a black haired, swarthy, frowning, taciturn Mexican. He looked as though he had stepped straight out of a spaghetti western and, of all the Mexicans I met on my trip, he was the easiest to understand being as how he only used single words where others would waste whole sentences on conversation. He was complimented perfectly by Victor who was equally quiet and reserved. Both guys spent most of the day up on the flying bridge, which is their prerogative of course. You couldn’t hear a sound from them all day and I began to think that they were perhaps telepathic beings.

That they could fish and fish well was made plain to me the instant lines went in. They put out a four lure spread (as opposed to the three lure teams the other guys had used) including one from the flying bridge as a shotgun. They also generally used smaller lures than the other guys, apart from one large lure in the prop-wash directly behind the boat. The twin engine Bertram meant that we could get out there quicker and the run out into the Pacific took only 40 minutes that morning. The sea was a bit choppier than the previous days, partly due perhaps to the approaching tropical storms which were the sole topic of conversation in the bars the previous night, and which would ultimately come to nothing despite the panic created and fortunes spent in phone calls home. There were more birds too that morning, although not in huge flocks it has to be said.

I keep a notepad with me when I’m aboard to jot things down and I’d just written a note “I feel lucky today” when the right outrigger went off and a bull dorado took to the air in a cobalt and silver arc. I absolutely love dorados – both as a sport fish and as a table fish and this one, at a healthy 20lb, was enough of a handful to keep me smiling. I brought it in slowly as Victor flipped a live-bait out just in case it was swimming in a school, which they often do, as it is possible to get more than one in those circumstances. This one was solo however so we brought it to the boat and despatched it. It was only 9.10 am – the juju was working.

My full attention was on the spread now and I sat in the fighting chair to watch. Roberto had found a large, roughly circular, mat of debris and there were some birds and dolphin working it. He made a circuit and was just starting a second time around when I saw a black and gold torpedo tear into the prop-wash and grab the big lure. The rod went over double and I knew immediately we had a big yellowfin on. I made to lift the rod but Victor, like crews everywhere, gets nervous when guests of unknown ability touch the gear and he rushed up shouting “Arriba! Arriba!” and grabbed the rod, indicating that I should get into the chair.

Line poured from the Penn 50 and I sensed immediately that this was going to take a while. Once the other lines were safely in, Roberto backed up on the fish. At this point I am as sure as I can be that the tuna had no idea it was hooked. There was virtually no solid resistance, just dead weight. That didn’t last, of course, and it wasn’t long before I started to feel the pressure of the fish as it dropped into typical yellowfin mode: dogged, stubborn, immovable force.

Interestingly this was the point where Victor decided to make small talk. He asked me where I was from, how long it took to get there, did I have kids, how long I was staying…all very pleasant stuff. My exertions on the tuna allowed me enough time to think of my responses in Spanish and it made for pleasant chit-chat. Until, that is, I needed all my energy for breathing.
This was one unbelievably strong fish. After 30 minutes my arms were aching from holding onto the rod. I thought it odd that they hadn’t harnessed me up but didn’t bother to mention it as I still seemed to be on top of things at that point. It was the usual tuna slog – ten yards to me, nine yards to the fish. Sweat was pouring from me in the heat.

After an hour, much to my relief, the fish started to come up and it wasn’t long before I had the swivel to the rod-tip and Victor had a hold of the leader. I’m not saying that Victor is bad looking or anything, but something sure spooked that fish as it took off as soon as it got one look at him and he had to dump the leader quickly to prevent himself from being pulled overboard.

Now I felt its power and now I started to know pain. The tuna was unstoppable in its run and I looked at the reel in dismay as I realised that every single inch I had recovered in the previous hour had just gone back out into the depths. Only this time, the fish was pulling at full strength, fear fuelling it even more than before. My arms were almost breaking and when the fish sounded I could barely hold the rod, so slippery were my hands with sweat. I had visions of it flying overboard and Victor and Roberto standing me against the transom, blindfolded, and shooting me for being so careless. Finally, I caved and asked Victor for a harness. “No” he said “No tenemos uno” …we don’t have one.

That was that then. I was on my own and the only solution I could think of to the rod security problem, not to mention to give my arms a little break, was to grip the reel between my thighs. This had its own problems and the bolts which held the reel onto the rod gouged some interesting tattoos into my legs. But it was still a whole lot less painful than what I was feeling in my arms.
The tuna had by now adopted a circular swimming pattern, typical of big yellowfins. When the fish was swimming away from the boat, the pressure on my arms, legs and back was unbelievable and the rod was bent almost double. When it was headed back towards me I could recover line easily and times without number I had the false hope that the fish was finally beaten and would come up. I was flagging very badly by about an hour and a half into the fight and could barely pump the rod. My mental state was one of demoralisation – I was persuading myself that I couldn’t beat the fish. I was simply not pressurising it enough and, even though I knew it, there was little I could do because of my leaden arms.

I figured it was possibly dehydration so I asked Victor for water. After a huge gulp I felt my strength renewing. Victor read my condition I think and asked if I needed him to help me out, presumably by taking over on the rod. Aye, that WILL be right! I hadn’t half killed myself just to hand the glory to someone else. This fish was mine.

With frequent drinks and some expert boatmanship from Roberto, who read the tuna’s swimming pattern perfectly and shadowed it with the boat, we finally managed to get it to leadering distance one more time, but this time it was beaten. I confess that I don’t particularly like the kill as I feel that both parties have earned a break. But tuna is great meat and food is food.

Once aboard, the guys looked at it and said “Dosciento”. So – a 200lb yellowfin tuna and my biggest ever, on 80lb test and without a harness to boot. I felt great but exhausted – my hand was set in a vice grip, so much so that I couldn’t even open the water bottle by myself and my arms trembled like Ozzy Osbourne’s. After a couple of photos, Victor said “Vamanos?” a little hopefully. I looked at my watch – it was midday and I wasn’t beaten yet. Fish on, hombre.
Out went the lures again and I had a little lie down to recover, all the while doing some stretches on my arms and hands to keep them from seizing up totally. The workouts prior to the trip were now paying huge dividends and I don’t want to think about how sore I could have been at that point if I hadn’t been relatively fit.

At 12.45pm, the left outrigger exploded and Roberto accelerated the boat but the fish didn’t hook up. Victor got a live-bait over the side and I could see the azure flash as our quarry lit up and charged it. The little sardine made for the surface with the marlin in close pursuit. With a final ultraviolet burst the live-bait was eaten. Line poured from the free-spooling reel and Victor tightened the drag to drive the hook home. I had my first striper on. As Victor cleared the other lines, however, the spool stopped screaming and all went slack. Stripey was off. Bummer. But what excitement and what a thrill to see the strike like that, only 20ft from the transom. Bring me another.

That was that though – no more strikes for the day although I can’t really fault the juju; one dorado, one huge yellowfin and a lost striped marlin. That was more like the Cabo I expected.
Something has to be said though about the lack of a harness on Rebecca. I’m not entirely clear if this is Pisces policy or not as I asked at the office later and was given mixed responses; Nancy felt that they don’t use any harnesses apart from belly belts but Mario said they did and should have had one aboard. They definitely had harnesses on other boats as I saw them with my own eyes. Fighting a big fish is more psychology than brute force. Every salmon angler knows that once you get their heads up they are beaten. So it is with big game; they have to know that whatever they do they will be resisted totally and therefore they should just submit to the pull of the line. You can’t possibly be expected to do this with your arms alone – there aren’t many people who could do bicep curls in a gym with 50lb weights for hours on end so why expect the average angler to do it. It is also much more humane to get the fish boatside quickly; if the fight is short and the fish is to be either released or killed, it has to be better both for its chances for survival or for the quality of its meat depending on what fate has in store. And the selfish gene kicks in too - a shorter fight means a quicker release or kill and consequently more fishing time. A harness, please, for next time.

Back at the Pisces offices, Adriana suggested that I might want to have the tuna stuffed and sent home as a trophy. Hmmm…I could just see that thing hanging on my bedroom wall. I’d never get laid again.

Jose and Juan

There comes a day in every blue water trip where I get the blues myself. This is mainly due to the fact that I don’t have my kids with me. I’d gotten up at 3.00am to call them that morning and hadn’t really got back to sleep so being dozy definitely affected my mood. I was also pretty tired from the battle with the tuna the day before and all in all I wasn’t in the best of frames of mind to go out on the Andrea that day.

I have to say though that Jose and Juan were an excellent crew and both worked incessantly all day to try to get me a fish, except paradoxically at the one point where some extra effort may have paid off. We ran out for almost two hours into the Sea of Cortez to a place called the Banca Gorda on Jose’s GPS, but referred to as The Gordo Banks or Bancos Gordos by everyone else. The intention was to look for bigger bait and troll around the many smaller pangas that were fishing out there. A few other boats had the same idea, Rebecca being one, but we never connected with any tuna for bait and so moved on.

Jose fished small lures to start with and also ran a bowling-pin teaser from the transom – the first skipper I fished with in Cabo who used teasers. Juan fussed around the deck often and invariably had a huge smile on his face as he went about his business. They were both really friendly, affable guys who clearly loved their jobs; you just get that settled feeling from people who have found their niche in life and Jose in particular oozed tranquillity and balance. The Japanese call it wa and Jose walked the talk. This wasn’t Juan’s usual gig – Jose’s normal mate hadn’t shown up at the dock that morning so Juan had been seconded in from another outfit to help out, but he was a fine addition to a fine boat.

At 9.55am I was lying back half dozing when the left outrigger lure took a strike. The reel buzzed authoritatively but the clip didn’t release. Jose swung the boat around but the marlin didn’t come back. We should have put a bait over the side for that one as we’d had such success with that tactic up until then and, after all, we were carrying ten baits aboard in the live well each day and only using the odd one from time to time. It’s not that we were likely to run out. However, perfect hindsight is a gift we all possess and we didn’t do it at the time. Like I said – the one time a bit of extra effort may have paid off…

That was the only strike of the day so yet another blank for me. The guys changed lures and teasers every hour or so but to no avail and as I indicated, it was the day of the blues for me so I spent most of my time wondering why the hell I go all those thousands of miles, leaving the kids behind, just to bob about in a featureless, fishless ocean. Big game fishing, you must understand, is great fun; pulling lumps of plastic behind a boat when nothing’s happening isn’t necessarily the same thing.

On the run back to the marina, we saw three absolutely massive cruise ships anchored just offshore. I had never seen anything like them; multi-storied floating cities and they must have catered for hundreds, if not thousands, of people. The town would be jumping tonight, I thought.
At the dock, Oscar passed on his commiserations for my second fishless day and I looked over to the next berth where Rebecca was flying marlin, tuna and dorado flags. They had had a good day again then, and at the same place we had been fishing too. Roberto saw me looking over and pointed to the flags, giving me a grin that made the sun pale. He should smile more often – suits him.

Enrique and Martin

Last day and back with the guys on the Karina. Martin’s son was in school so it was just the three of us. As we left the dock, I sat on the flybridge and watched Enrique set up the GPS system. It was similar to the one I have in my Range Rover oddly enough and he had preset routes where, presumably, he had found fish before. We were going on Tour 1 it seemed.

We headed directly out from Cabo, which was appropriate to my sense of order as we’d been alternating between the Pacific (to the right) and the Sea of Cortez (to the left) and, since this was my last day, I liked the idea that we were off straight into the mix rather than favouring either one.

It was a slow morning though. Very little debris to follow, fewer birds and not a sign of a dolphin anywhere. At times like this, the mind starts to wander and I mused on the aspects of language. I had tried a few times to teach the guys unfamiliar English words like “Gannet” and it was really interesting to discover they had the inverse trouble that I have with Spanish pronunciation.
Despite saying the “NN” very clearly, and even saying it on its own, they formed the opinion that I was saying “LL” for “Gallet”. Maybe the true organ of language is the ear as the pronunciation of the words is definitely equally important to the string of letters which make them up.

And then the right outrigger went off and a dorado took to the air. I brought it in slowly as Martin tried an obligatory live-bait but, again, no takers. It was 12.20pm and I confess that I had all but resigned myself to another blank day up until then. The relief that we were not going back empty handed on my last day was palpable; too much bad luck can really get to you after a while.
Martin put the two outrigger lures back out and was adjusting the leader on the flat line while Enrique got the boat back up to speed when I saw it; a spirited splash and the unmistakable dorsal of a billfish under the left outrigger lure. I shouted “Pescado, pescado, pescado!” at Martin with some pride at going into Spanish on autopilot. He looked up but the fish had gone down. He turned to look at me and I almost physically spun him back as the bill and sickle tail of the fish cut through the water behind the lure once more. Enrique shouted “Reel, reel, reel” from the bridge and I wound the reel to accelerate the lure, attempting to induce a strike. Martin, meanwhile, flipped a livey over the side. In a repeat performance of our previous success, the reel started to run and then Martin tightened the drag whilst Enrique accelerated the boat to set the hook. The fish was on and running hard. Martin set about clearing the deck for action whilst I got into the chair with the rod but fate turned and the spool just stopped spinning. The fish was gone.

Martin is a man who clearly does not like to lose one. He apologised to me profusely and cursed the fish in Mexican Spanish (oh yes – I know some of those words too). I was touched; the guy clearly wanted to get me into that fish. But that’s fishing – some you win, some you lose. We lost this one.

The dorado was a great consolation for lunch. They are pretty much a perfect fish; great to catch, great to eat and a breeze to clean. Martin made an expert cut all around the outside of the fish. He then ripped the skin off in one piece and slid the knife under the slab of flesh, cutting smoothly as he lifted upwards and within seconds the meat was free. He repeated the operation on the other side and cut me a healthy steak for my lunch before disposing of the remains of the carcass overboard and keeping the balance of the meat for him and Enrique no doubt. No guts, no blood, no waste, no mess.

Last run in and at least we were flying a yellow dorado flag. No shame there but what I wouldn’t have given for it to have been a billfish flag.

Winding in

So. Is Cabo “the most dependable year-round marlin fishery” and does it have “world class fishing and world class boats”. Tough one. Let’s start with the boats. Pisces are world-class or thereabouts for sure, not least for the quality of their crews and professional organisation. Great bunch of guys and gals who worked very hard at all times to make sure I had the best opportunity and, given more strikes, we would have had our share. I reckon the Picante operation looked world class too but I never fished with them. Of the others, they looked less tidy and less well organised than Pisces and Picante although don’t let me stop you from looking into their operations for yourself if you want to go. Some of the smaller, one man, offerings were a bit suspect however and I would definitely have them down as tourist boats rather than fishing boats.
As for world-class fishing, well…that depends. You have to understand that Americans have The World Series in baseball. Trouble is, no one else plays so it’s really only the American “World” that counts. When you consider that all of the blue water sports fishing magazines are American in origin, you begin to get a sense that “world-class” means “world class in comparison to other US destinations”. Cabo is, after all, just a three hour flight from Texas and you could be forgiven for thinking you were still in the USA whilst you’re there. It is a fact that when you travel outside of Europe and the Caribbean, you rarely meet Americans unless they are on business trips. There are loads of very hot fishing destinations out there that few, if any, Americans get to so Cabo is probably compared more to Oregon Inlet in the Carolinas than, say,  Bermagui in Australia. That’s not to say that it isn’t “world-class” in its own way, but when you read “world-class” you automatically assume “world-leader” and that it is definitely not.

When it comes to the most dependable year round marlin fishery, I have to say that there is some truth in that. I just had a bad trip, of that I am sure. The fishing dropped off just as I got there which can happen in any game fishing trip and it would be crazy to judge the place solely on the singular experience of five days fishing. Many of the boats in the marina were having multiple catches of billfish in a day as well as dorados and tuna. I just always seemed to be on the wrong boat on any given day. Life can be like that sometimes. After all, if every billfish that we had raised or hooked had stuck, I’d be crowing about having caught five billfish, a trophy yellowfin and couple of dorados thrown in for lunch. Such is fate.

The Pisces web site gives weekly catch statistics which are very honest in that they give catch percentages for billfish and for the boats overall. There is rarely a week when the billfish catch goes over 65% for all boats or the overall catch reaches 100%. This means that every week, someone goes out and gets either totally skunked or gets some smaller game but no billfish. It’s fishing. You need to live with it.

And Cabo is different. It’s not really a fishing destination anymore; it’s a fun town in its own right with entertainment as wild as you want it, good restaurants, exceptionally friendly people and some good fishing on the side. I was treated extremely well by everyone I met; from Pisces staff to bar staff to street hawkers. On my last night, as I often do in new places, I walked to the end of the town and wound my way back stopping at a bar every so often for a beer and a blether with whoever was there. By then my tan and dark features helped disguise me as a potential local and many an American came up to me and said “DO…YOU…SPEAK…ENGLISH?”. It was kinda sweet. The locals too made the same assumption and I was regularly treated to a spray of rapid Spanish before I came out and told them I was not a gringo, I was a Scottish man. I had a real laugh trying to teach some of the Mexican guys how to say “Geezabrek” – a traditional Scottish remonstration, or “Howzitgaun” – the quintessential Glasgow greeting and I also freaked out some Mexican guitarists by borrowing a guitar and hammering out a Flamenco Compas to approving nods.

In one bar, a Mexican Indian strolled over and insisted he shine my shoes for $20 pesos. I tried to explain that they were suede and couldn’t be shined but he wouldn’t be put off so I let him go ahead. He laboured away, all the while telling me stories that he’d been in the army, had done time in jail for street-fighting, had tried to kill a man, that he always carried a gun (except when shining shoes), that he had been kicked out of his house by his wife and had to sleep on the beach. Hugely entertaining stuff. After about half an hour of intense effort he sat back proudly and invited my approval. I looked down. I could see my face in the gleaming black mirrors that used to be my best suedes and I had to bite my tongue for fear of laughing, they looked so ridiculous. I gave him $100 pesos for the sheer value of the experience, even though the replacement shoes would cost me a fortune. Narcisio – if you ever read this…no violence, ok?

So that’s Cabo: been there, done that, ripped my lucky t-shirt. But I did get me a new one. It says “To Fish Or Not To Fish…What A Stupid Question!” It’s a sentiment I can buy into, even though it cost me $8. Probably inflation. Let’s see if this one lasts ten years.