On Nov. 8, thirty Fish Sniffer readers and staff headed to Baja California along with myself and Fish Sniffer staffer Alexandra Frith and her husband Fred with a simple goal in mind: to have fun, soak up some warm rays and catch lots and lots of fish. Well, this writer can tell you that this group accomplished all three in excess!

This was our 3rd annual Fish Sniffer/Neptune Adventures San Jose del Cabo Fun Fishing Tournament, and it was a doozy. There were so many fish caught and every other aspect of the trip; the weather, facilities etc. were excellent. Our home base was once again the Best Western Posada Real, a beautiful beachfront hotel under the attentive management of my old friend Urbano Olea. Urbano's hotel is a world-class facility, whose impeccable staff run it like a fine swiss watch. 

We got together the first evening before dinner with everyone at the poolside palapa bar, a home away from home if there ever was one, to go over all the details. Readers enjoyed a goody bag with Fish Sniffer hats, P-Line flourocarbon and a couple tuna trolling style lures, and various other tackle box goodies. Subscriber Mario Castillo of Galt, who with his partner Walt Warneke, won the event last year, had a big surprise when his name came out of the hat in an impromptu raffle for a big bag of tackle worth over $200.

The rules would be simple. Two anglers per team, 2 fish weighed per day with only dorado, wahoo or tuna counting to your total. A sidepot was setup with a generous cash addition from The Fish Sniffer for each individual with the largest tuna, and the largest dorado. Also, we had several fishing rods from Fenwick and Setyr Rods in Grants Pass, Oregon to add for additional big fish catches.

Fish Sniffer subscriber Larry Edwards of Turlock, a very familiar face on many Fish Sniffer sponsored events, greeted me with his big bear hug and smile, and with eyes wide exclaimed about how many fish he and his partner Gary Kearns had caught already in a couple days waiting for us! Fillet poundage was rumored to be in the triple digits!

The first day's fishing started out steady, but not hot yet. I headed out on a cruiser with Jerry Labouf of Neptune Adventures and 15 year old Ricky White who was making his very saltwater fishing trip. We picked up sardinas from the bait panga and headed out to the fleet at Gordo Banks. We caught several bonito and skipjacks, when around ten, the real tuna started biting. Nothing of any size, but we enjoyed fresh sashimi from nice football yellowfin on the water. 

Eating sashimi from a fish mere minutes out of the water is an incredible treat. The flesh, still warm from the tropical waters, is so sweet and tender. It almost makes having a sharp knife, soy sauce and wasabi essential equipment for the tuna tackle box. Our deckhand Chuy served up the fish Mexican style in a bowl with soy and lime. Delicious!

After the first day the standings were pretty tight. A 34 pounder was leading the way at this time, but there was a full days fishing to go. We shared cocktails, stories and fresh fish superbly prepared by the Posada Real kitchen staff. The trip is packaged as an all inclusive, so the poolside restaurant was happily cooking up the day's catch.

 I joined Chuck Moseman and Vera Loskutoff for dinner, and they graciously shared their catch of the day (some nice snappers they picked up after the tuna) at the hotel's restaurant. This was easily the best pan sauteed breaded fish I have ever had. Maybe it was warm ocean evening, maybe it was Chuck and Vera's excellent company, but that fish was bar none delicious!

While the breeze was a tad stiffer the next morning, the waters we're still great and we decided to head SW towards Cabo and see if anything was in that direction. Insight of a monster Carnival Cruise ship, we found a good sized school of porpoise and set troling in, out and around them for the next hour. 3 scattered yellowfin later we set in search of a better bite. 

It had to be there. A couple more hours of sunbathing (i.e. not reeling in fish) finally changed into fish fury. Within 20 minutes we had boated another dozen yellowfins, just around the corner from the Palmilla.

We also threw the kitchen sink at a marlin that just didn't seem to want to bite anything. Bait, lures nothing. So we headed back to the beach to see how the others had done.

The fish cleaning table was in high gear. Word had obviously gotten out that this day’s catch was a good one. Locals surrounded the table, as there were fish for everyone! Numbers were huge. Walt and Mario had a major day picking up 38 tuna in a panga, and the Wendy Wynant group from had a huge day in a cruiser catching over 50 tuna!

The next evening's award presentation was a hoot! The crowd was lively, the tequila had folks smiling and the prizes were flying into readers hands. The biggest tuna, a beautiful 66 pounder taken by Tod Marty won him a a cool $245 and put him and his partner on top of the tourney which netted them a 3 day/2 night all inclusive stay at the Posada Real worth well over $1200. 

Second place was taken by Carl Burton and Bob Coolidge and it won them a 2 days of guided panga fishing courtesy of Palmilla Bay Sportfishing, and Third Place was taken by Mario Castillo and Walt Warneke which rewarded them with an airfare voucher for $300!