fishing Gonzaga bay with the family

[steelfish]

after long time without going fishing on a boat, I arranged everything to take my family fishing to their favorite place, yep, you've guessed right, Gonzaga Bay in Baja, which is 90 miles south from my town.

I have some gear new-to-me that was never used by me, so my plan was to try them and check how they perform, so
I will know if they are for sale or keepers for my arsenal, that gear was: a Quatum Cabo 60PT that I bought to our fellow NELZ here, then an Accurate boss BX400N single speed from Randy, a Talica 16 single speed I got from a local friend which I bought with some of missing parts which it was not working but seems to work ok on the lab and a Calstar rod GF700M which it was pretty beat-up, with broken guides and some ugly scratches on the blank, I rebuild it but I didnt knew what to expect from it on a good fish, the rebuild job is here https://alantani.com/index.php?topic=35628.0

on this trip I was more focused on be the deckhand on the panga to help my daughters and my wife to fish comfortable than trying to fish by myself and caught a nice one.
I talked with my amigo the panga Captain to see this trip more as a relaxed trip to check the seals and other marine animals out, to visit the cave on one of the islands and try to fish for a bit.

this was my first time going fishing at 3pm, the weather was perfect-o


we traveled around on one of the Islands trying our luck trolling some 20 divers lures but no avail, then the captain saw some birds and we went there to check was going on there or was UNDER there and try out luck there casting some jigs, we tried different kind of lures to check which one was the ticket, my wife had some slow pitch jigs and a SPJ rod that our captain loaned it to her, I used some 2oz irons and my kiddos had some spoons.


the 1st jig that was bit was on my wife's gear, she caught a nice red snapper / huachinango


then a nice fish got my lure and I quickly passed the rod to my youngest kid, it was a nice big Spanish mackerel


few minutes later she caught a big King Mackerel all herself using an Abu toro Beast 60 on an Okuma stalker inshore rod, since she still dont know how to cast with that reel she was just using the gear as vertical jigging, just leaving the jig to hit bottom and reeling back as fast as she could and after some times then BOOOM !! she started to scream I have a fish !!

she has STYLE to fight the fish, isnt she?


here is the BIG King Mack, it gave her a great fight !!



minutes later with the same gear her bigger sister caught another nice King Mack




here's my daughter fighting an angry King Mackerel with the Cabo reel


later on, she caught a small Barracuda but this time using the combo of the accurate BX400N on a Phenix PSW700H, there was no fight at all, that combo its way overpowered for that CUDA, she said it was like reeling a cut bait up haha, but she was happy with her fish which it was quickly returned to the water to grow bigger and fight another day 





I had my share of fish too but I was pretty busy helping the others most of the time.
that King Mack was caught with the combo of the Cabo 60PT (hey Nelz, there you have the promised picture) and Calstar GF700M (you can see the gear at the right side of the picture), that fish gave me a great fight, I can valid the gear as good as it gets and ready for bigger contenders, I used pretty light drag and it was smooth as the fish was taking line, with just a tiny adjust on the drag was enough to stop it



did you remember I mentioned a Cave? well yes, there is one which its not too deep inside of the biggest island, the girls were pretty exited to check it out



thats the end of the cave, maybe just 50ft deep into the wall of the island


then it was time to return to base but we wanted to try luck again trolling at the side of the island before going back to land

thats my 2nd daughter trolling a 20 diver lure and admiring the landscapes, she was using my Mario Bros fishing rod with the Talica 16 reel.


yes, I said Mario Bros, I know its a hit on the Movies right now but I made it 3 years ago, check https://alantani.com/index.php?topic=31101.0

this is the 2nd time on the water for that rod with still no fish at all but it looks cool on the pictures




no luck on trolling again, there you can see my wife and daughter on each side, but nothing, so, we called it a day and happy for a short but successful fishing and adventure day.


time to go !! check the water!!! at that time the water was flat as a Lake.


I liked this combo, pretty capable together, not too heavy and gives you security for fishing for anything local




on our way to the landing port



Did I already say that I need a bigger Ice cooler?


everyone at home is happy when the smells of fresh fish is at home




and my trademark picture



hopefully it wont take me another 2 years to post another fishing Baja Adventure
-- Alex the Deckhand

[redsetta]

Great report Alex - thanks for taking us along!
Nothing like 'pescando con la familia' and those conditions were perfección!
Hope you all get out again soon.
Cheers mate, Justin

[MarkT]

Nice! Is that king mackerel a Monterrey Spanish Mackerel? I think they're often found with Sierra in the northern gulf.

[steelfish]

Nice! Is that king mackerel a Monterrey Spanish Mackerel? I think they're often found with Sierra in the northern gulf.

Yep, the panga Captain told me some People know that fish as Sierra Monterrey (Monterrey spanish mack).
Me and my local friends call them "Riflotes" ( Big rifles)   

[MarkT]

At Cedros the pangueros call Goldspotted Sand Bass (Cabrilla Extranjera) Pinto Bass because of the spots. I had to look it up since it looked like a kind of Cabrilla (grouper) with cool gold spots!

[Finest Kind]

Wow! Very nice photos. A very exotic location to a guy from NY! Looks like a fantastic trip!
John

[oldmanjoe]

  Glad to see you and the family got a chance to go fishing .  Looks like a perfect day to be on the water !!

[Swami805]

Nice trip Alex, some good fish!  Thanks for posting

[Cor]

Lovely day on the water with the family and a meal from it as well.

[Shellbelly]

What a great family outing!  Getting under birds is always fun!  I hope all of you get to go again soon and often.

Gotta say I've never seen a Mario rod before.  That's cool!

[Shark Hunter]

Awesome!

[steelfish]

At Cedros the pangueros call Goldspotted Sand Bass (Cabrilla Extranjera) Pinto Bass because of the spots. I had to look it up since it looked like a kind of Cabrilla (grouper) with cool gold spots!

cabrilla extranjera is really good for fresh ceviche with nice firm meat, my wife prefer them over the YT
we have some "Pintas" they are similar to Cabrilla extranjera but it didnt has any of the yellow spots but some brown (coffee) color and big spots, looks similar to a "bay spotted bass" on steroids

1st picture a Cabrilla extranjera then some pics of what here we call "Pintas" (any of the Pintas pictures are mine, they were taken from the album of pictures of my amigo Captain)



*****

update the original post with a video of my 2nd daughter fighting an angry Sierra

[Bill B]

Great report Alex.  Good to see the family getting out and spending time together.  Bill

[steelfish]

Wow! Very nice photos. A very exotic location to a guy from NY! Looks like a fantastic trip!
John

thanks, yes amigo, its a pretty cool and exotic place, its pretty weird to have the Desert and Ocean one next to the other that gave you some pretty cool landscapes of the islands, in this other thread you can check more pictures of the same place, for coincidence I was also fishing with my wife and kids around 4 years ago or so.

https://alantani.com/index.php?topic=25126.msg282783#msg282783

[MarkT]

Looks like a very good trip for only being out for a few hours. I've only caught a few Sierra while yo-yoing for YT. They're good at snipping off your lures! My cats are always happy to see me after I've been fishing too!

I guess Cabrilla extranjera isn't another name for a goldspotted sand bass... they're way more brown with different spots. Mexican-fish.com isn't that great at identifying fish! They also say that the goldspotted sand bass are along the west coast of Mexico but not at Cedros and points north!