EARLY IN THE WEEK

As it turned out, the fishing came back to life! Maybe not full blast, but compared to the previous week, we were rocking with bent rods and good variety. Both of our fleets...the Tailhunter fleet in Las Arenas and our Tailhunter La Paz fleets found dorado between 8 and 15 pounds on the average, but also some of the trophy bulls running 20-40 pounds. Limits were not uncommon and it was good to see that some times there were so many fish that anglers were releasing them as fast as they could go or at least kicking back the small ones! It's been a few weeks since we had that kind of bite. Moreso, we often had double...triple...and quadruple hookups!


Even better, for our Las Arenas fleet where it's really been a struggle sometimes, we not only had dorado, but a surprising number of sailfish and marlin were hooked between 70 and 200 pounds. Most were released, but really did a number for some of the guys using light tackle.


As well, rooster fish showed up again between 10 and 50 pounds and we even had a few wahoo hooked up although none made it back to the boats! Add in some big bonito...jack crevalle...some pargo and snapper and it made for a pretty decent week of fishing.


During this whole time, we were all watching the weather...and watching...and watching. Norbert started as a little blip...it got bigger and bigger...and went to tropical storm level. But like so many other storms that have appeared on the horizon down south, the tracking for the storm showed it was going out to the Pacific and wouldn't do more than drop a little rain on us. We were sure that like all the other storms, it would continue to veer out and away from Baja.


It didn't...


LATTER HALF OF THE WEEK

Tropical Storm Norbert became Hurricane Norbert and would eventually reach a category 3 ripper. Although La Paz did not suffer extensive damage, in areas of Cabo and along the Pacific Coast, there was extensive flooding and damage. Several thousand people had to be evacuated and over 1000 homes were damaged. At the time of writing this, there was at least 1 fatality related to the storm.


For us in La Paz, the heavy wind and rain hit us just as we were launching in the early dark of Thursday morning. Rain began to pelt and the winds began to howl. And it got stronger. We all went for cover and hunkered down. And hunkered down.


For three days pretty much everyone had to sit it out. The roads to Las Arenas got flooded. Mud everywhere. While La Paz pretty much did not flood. there were intermittent bits of heavy wind...rain...drizzle...and more rain as the storm passed. AND THE PORT WAS CLOSED! So, we couldn't even get out if we wanted to. For safety measures, the port captain kept the port bottled up and prevented anyone from leaving until mid-morning Saturday.


It was really bad especially for some of our many anglers who never got to fish before having to go home. Or only getting to fish 1 day or 2 days. And, when they did get to fish, conditions weren't the best. If it wasn't windy or wet, then the waters, even after the storm passed, were turned over green and muddy. Hat's off to so many guys who grinned and were patient and still kept smiling while we did our best to control things of which we had no control. You guys and gals are the best!


It wasn't until Sunday that we finally started to see some changes in the water and some better fishing action with dorado, billfish and pargo waking up.


This coming week, as you're reading this looks like it might have some of the best weather we've seen in awhile. Hopefully, it lets the fishing come ripping back!