We went for a late start on purpose today. The long day yesterday was a full one with plenty of hiking, climbing, boat rides and car rides. Sammy, Grant and I are all trying to make a vacation out of this week in Baja so we need to pace ourselves.
We left Sammy’s around 9 AM and arrived on a beach that means a lot to me. It’s a beach that I camped on for five weeks straight back in 1996. I caught a lot of new fish that trip including a few of my first roosterfish. If only I knew then what I know now about fly fishing for roosterfish I’d have caught 100!
So I could enjoy and reminisce, I had the boys drop me off at my favorite end of the beach while they hit Grants. I packed a beer and walked for a few hours looking for fish. I took a few nice breaks. It was a fantastic morning.
Unfortunately I didn’t see much in the way of fish. Though not especially windy, the surf was big. Oversized waves bashed the beach creating a murky look for the first 20 feet from the beach. It was hard to see anything. This being said, I saw one small rooster and got him to chase my Clouser minnow. The only other fish was this nice 10lb Pacific jack crevalle that did cooperate. He put on a show for me yanking me and my 9-weight Jungle Winston up and down the beach for nearly ten minutes before I beached him and released him.
Grant and Sam retrieved me around 1. They didn’t see any fish at all but caught this croaker tossing the Clouser in the surf on a blind cast. The morning was tough.
In the afternoon we headed for some other beaches. They weren’t so good either. There are numerous other rooster fly fisherman around and the few roosters we saw were educated. One cast and they were running for the deep before your fly hit the water.
We have a plan for tomorrow to try an off the beaten path beach or two. They won’t be prime roosterfish locations but there shouldn’t be any other anglers and I think all beaches in Baja have at least the occasional passing rooster.