This past week provided a couple of quality blue marlin for the Los Cabos Billfish Tournament, a 1st and 2nd place winner that was taken on the first day of the 3-day event. Biggest fish was taken aboard "Extraction" and checked in at 625 lbs. and the 2nd place fish, taken aboard "Expedition", checking in at 515 lbs. Over $440,000.00 in cash and prizes were awarded and included daily jackpots for dorado, wahoo & yellowfin tuna, albeit, no qualifying dorado were taken and the surplus rolled over to the other two species. Biggest wahoo was taken aboard the "Minerva II" and checked in at 34.5 lbs. The largest tuna was taken aboard the "Reel Gold" and checked in at 65.4 lbs. However, the big story was on the tuna jackpot happened on day 3 at the weigh-in station on a fish caught aboard the Ole Ole. "Team Ole Ole handed their fish over to a dockhand that turned around with the tuna in both hands at waist level, only to be greeted by a large sea lion nicknamed Poncho that jumped out of the water and snatched it out of the dockhand's hands. Hundreds of spectators witnessed the incident. The fish was gone". Team Ole Ole was awarded the new Pancho Award, which came with a trophy and prizes for the most unusual event of the competition.
On the non-tournament front, the dorado counts remained high and limit style fishing was the general "rule of thumb" for most of the fleet. The billfish bite was still a bit off kilter, probably due to the full moon condition and overall numbers of boats fishing the area. We had 64 days fished that produced some incredible catches on dorado and a good variety of other fun fish species that included 1 blue marlin, (a smaller fish at about 200 lbs.) 18 stripers (released) 4 sailfish (released) 1 wahoo, 59 yellowfin tuna, (mostly school sized fish in the 15-25 lb. ranges but an occasional 70-95 lb. fish in the mix) and 444 dorado. Cabo Climate: Warm days, very pleasant evenings and "mucho" sunshine continue to bless the Cabo San Lucas area. Just a few scattered clouds wandered over this past week as the area passed through the full moon phase of bright and starry nights. Sea Conditions: About as good as it gets for both sides of the peninsula with sea temps that ranged from 82-84 degrees from the shoreline and out to the thousand fathom curve and beyond. Mostly light and variable surface breezes from different directions at different times and some southerly swell moving up the line from the southeasterly directions, compliments of Hurricane Raymond. Nothing serious, just enough to notice. All-in-all, excellent sea conditions. Best Fishing Area: The better fishing was again in the Migrino area and on the Golden Gate and Jaime Banks, all on the Pacific side of the peninsula. It was mostly dorado in the inshore area outside of Migrino and yellowfin tuna on the Golden Gate and I heard of one tuna that was near the hundred pound mark taken on a Minerva Fleet sportfisher. Best Lure/Bait: Live bait working best on the billfish and the dorado but the artificials are working very well for the dorado, too. Yellowfin taken on both, live bait and lures, including tuna feathers and cedar plugs. Live Bait Supply: Excellent live bait supply that was unaffected by the full moon.