That's My Story

PHOTOS OF THE WEEK:

PHOTO 1 – 14 year-old Mike Harkins from Los Angeles has a knack for getting big fish each year he comes to La Paz including this sweet 30 pound class bull that he caught on the La Paz side this past week.

PHOTO 2 – A wild week of parties here, especially for the Jim Booth Group from Riverside. Here Jorge shows off his enhanced uh…chest against the Corona Girls during our big Corona Beach Party at La Concha Beach.

PHOTO 3 – Chris Silva from Riverside says it all. No explanation needed!

THE FISH REPORT

FULL MOON DORADO TEAR IT UP –

So much for that full-moon superstition! The dorado bit like their fins were on fire this week! In fact, it got to be a little too good. Usually sometimes if fishing isn’t so good, guys get frustrated and will cancel some fishing trips and decide to sleep in or lay on the beach. This week on several occasions, the fishing was so turbo, guys came back beat up and tired and canceled trip because they had no more room in their ice chests (even after releasing fish!) or strength in their arms!

The best fishing was on the La Paz side, but the buoys at Las Arenas were also holding fish. It was a case of just being on the right spot! You could go all day and scratch fish then hit the right sargasso patch or the right buoy and watch dorado life explode in your face and go non-stop bendo for the next hour! Just had to be patient. Sometimes the dorado rodeo was early. Sometimes it was late. Sometimes it was just spending that last 10 minutes out there on the water.

Once the fish were going, however…forget it!!! They’d bite a piece of tortilla flipped in the water! Guys were coming back with “tales of tails” literally charging the boat in a race to the baits. There were a lot of punk firecracker fish (many getting released), but there were also larger bulls in the 30-50 pound class as well.

I was on Black Magic one way with the youngsters from the Greg Leon group and the boys put a couple of 35 plus pound fish in the box, but not quite enough to beat the dads fishing the super pangas who got 40 plus pounders. Same for the Jim Booth group earlier in the week who also stuck some nice bulls as well as marlin, cabrilla and pargo. That’s what Steve Vetrone and his partner, Von did. When they got tired of all the dorado, they lit out for the rocks and went after the pargo and cabrilla which still seemed to be holding inshore.

No tuna or roosters or wahoo to speak of and the marlin bite was off, but that could also be a function of all the folks chasing dorado. I did go diving one day this week and the water temps were an incredible 87-92 degrees on the surface. I gotta tell ya that I dove through one rock overhang about 35 feet down and came face-to-face with about 30 nice sized dog tooth snapper that just stared back at me with grins like little kids caught with cookies and milk in the closet! I thought of all the times these danged fish had kicked my butt! These were 5-30 pound snapper and darned lucky they were hanging out in a protected area or else I’d have marked the spot on my GPS and been back in the morning.

We did have some thundershower roll throw that did opened the heavens on us with thunder, lightning and heavy rain. But they were short lived despite being spectacular.

FIESTA TIME

Special shout out to Jim Booth’s group out’ve La Paz. What a fun batch of folks. We hired them a big party tour bus to bring them up from Cabo loaded with drinks, music and video. We threw a big Corona party on the beach complete with the Corona gals and even a big taco cookout at the Sunset Bar where folks were up on the bar dancing and I was asked to preside over a wedding…as the PREACHER!!! Dave Aguilar and Denise Miller actually had flower and exchanged rings amid massive tequila toasting and good wishes as I held a broom over their heads and stood on a bar chair! Oh…and they also caught fish too!

HOTEL LOS ARCOS TO RE-OPEN

After almost two months of closure because of a labor dispute with the union, the two sides finally came to an agreement and the popular hotel will be opening July 17th, although their corporate offices tell me it’s more likely to be July 19th. Glad they’re opening. Lots of people had it rough with no work.

LOS ANGELES TIMES

In case you missed my posting, we were mentioned in a front page story of the business section in the Los Angeles Times on July 11th. In a story by Marty Zimmerman, he gives a good piece about the new airlines that might be flying into Baja next year. Here’s the link: http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-airmex10jul10,1,4126442.story?coll=la-headlines-business&track=crosspromo

That’s my story!
Jonathan
Jonathan Roldan’s Tailhunter InternationalWebsite: www.tailhunter-international.comPhone: (626) 333-3355FAX: (626) 333-0115E-Mail: Riplipboy@aol.comU.S. Office: 3319 White Cloud Dr., Suite A, Hacienda Hts. CA 91745
“When your life finally flashes before your eyes, you will have only moments to regret all the things in life you never had the courage to try.”