baja star

[alantani]

has anyone ever fished on this boat?

Baja Star Opportunity
Yahoo
/
Inbox



Ian Orr
 
From:
ianjorr629@gmail.com
To:
alantani@yahoo.com
Cc:
Ian

Fri, Jul 31 at 3:12 PM

Hello Alan,
   Pleasure speaking with you this afternoon! Below is the trip overview. Appreciate you for sending this to your fishing peeps. Please keep me in mind if you have any openings on your Marla's trips in the future. Thanks!

Who wants to jump on this special opportunity on the new Baja Star? We have 5 open spots on our limited load (10 anglers) 5.5-day fishing adventure departing from & returning to San Jose del Cabo, November 30th , 2026, at 3-4pm and returning December 6th at 5-6am. The price for this limited load is $3,800. This is a 65-foot boat with plenty of deck space.

The owners are customizing a trip for us fishing the iconic Gordo banks and then head north to Cabo San Lucas, the famous Lower Banks and Mag Bay. We'll be targeting giant tuna, yellowtail, dorado, wahoo, groupers and snappers abundant in these zones. The crew will be fileting fish daily and freezing it on board so we can take our fish home on our return flights. I generally take 25 pounds of frozen white fish and pack 25 pounds of fresh yellowfin together to have fresh yellowfin when I return. Of course I may bring up to 100 pounds home this way. Fish processing is included in the price.

This will be a true long-range adventure with Royal Star veterans, Captains Diego and Adriel, with unmatched service and cuisine. If you want to join us, contact me asap at ianjorr629@gmail.com or text/call at 312-351-0469.

Orchid is also helping with booking or questions; her info is below. Check out their website as well.

Orquidea (Orchid) Martinez-Guevara
Lead Sales and Marketing Agent USA
(619)520-0097
WWW.BAJASTARSPORTFISHING.COM
 

[jurelometer]

According to their instagram, they just finished refinishing the boat and are just starting trips in July.

The trips are pretty much all out of Puerto Escondido, which was a sleepy village about an hours drive south of Loreto, but is being turned into a luxury marina complex, with money pouring in from... somewhere.  No one loves Loreto more than I do (I am usually down there for a month or more per year),  but long range partyboat trips out of Loreto into the sea of Cortez seems kind of weird.   The better fish stocks are on the Pacific side.  There are some minimally productive jumbo yellowfin spots in the sea of Cortez that they can reach, and they can beat up on the couple  of islands between Loreto and La Paz that are a bit too remote for convenient day trip traffic, but mostly, I am a meh...

And there will be some weather issues for Loreto based trips.  Winter to mid spring, lots of very windy days. On a panga day trip, you can pick and choose your days, and be back  on land before it picks up around noon.  And in the summer, there are these unforecastable sudden/short northeastern storms that blow through in a couple of hours (toritos).  The panga game is to keep your eyes open and outrun the bad weather back to the beach, but on a long ranger, you will have  to bounce it out.  If you remembered the Tony Reyes boat that flipped and sank farther north a few years back, this is what happened.  A properly set up 65 footer should be able to ride out winter/spring blows and summer toritos safely, if not completely comfortably.   

According to their website, they plan to focus on the Sea of Cortez side, but using long ranger techniques (but you will probably have to catch your own bait).  Maybe they know something about the opportunity that I don't, or maybe funding was available for an operation out of the Cortez side, and they decided to give it a go.  Dunno.

Flying into Loreto (or possibly Los Cabos for the trip mentioned), you are going to have to deal with the rigidly enforced 4 rods/reels plus a reasonable amount of fishing tackle limits for Mexican customs.  While this is sufficient for most sane fisherman, most long rangers will probably feel naked.  And I am not aware of any commercial airlines out of Baja that will take fish that is not sealed and hard frozen, so I am not sure what the email sender to Alan is talking about.

It looks like they are planning to string a couple trips  together to fish out to Cabo and then up to Bahia Magdalena (AKA Mag Bay).  From Mag Bay, you can do a transport to Loreto to fly out, but you will probably need an overnight for you and your coolers of frozen fish.

It looks like they are using Orchid Martinez to manage the booking part. Orchid has been involved setting up all sorts of fishing tours into Baja for decades, including some of the more logistically challenging spots.  It is a tricky and messy business for all involved.  I have had some personal interactions - and it did not go cleanly, but nothing goes cleanly when you get a bit off the beaten path in Baja.  Trips in and out of Loreto will on the beaten path and will be easier to run smoothly.

The web site, Facebook, and Instagram pages that I saw only listed the owners/captains names (Adriel Quezada, Diego Nuño) and didn't describe much of the boat, other than it was solid fiberglass construction from the 70s.  Maybe the names ring a bell with members here that long range?

There is a thread on this  operation on Bloody Decks that is worth reading. If you search for Baja Star, you will find it.  It seems that the captains are known, and BD guys think that they also know the boat.

I would say to proceed with caution if you are interested.  This is a new operation in a business that comes with big logistical challenges.  Make sure that you are comfortable with the level of risk that you are taking safety-wise, not just your dollars. If you want to fish the same areas from land based operations, there are other options as well. I am always up for a land based trip between Loreto and La Paz, and due west on the Pacific Coast Side as well.  It is really nice there.


-J