SPECTACULAR FISHING FOR MARLIN FOUND
BETWEEN LA RIBERA AND PUNTA COLORADA

April 9, 2005, Bill Burkett, Fat Cat, East Cape, Baja California Sur, Mexico:

After a winter of watching the East Cape windsurfers enjoy the Sea of Cortez we're finally getting our turn again. We launched our 22 foot Glacier Bay catamaran, "FAT CAT" on Monday, April 4th and got in on the spectacular striped marlin bite taking place between La Ribera and Punta Colorada. The marlin are balling mackerel about three miles offshore and the sight is nothing short of awesome! Everywhere you look you see marlin chasing bait and anglers fighting marlin.

I was fishing with my buen amigo Jose, who is captain of "RUDE GIRL" from East Cape's Hotel Palmas de Cortez. With the time it took to launch the boat and locate a mooring spot, we were unable to buy bait. So, when we arrived in the area where the bite was, we searched for a bait ball on the depth-finder. Once we located bait we dropped bait rigs down and immediately loaded up. We hooked two baits up with sinkers and dropped them down below the bait ball. Before we could send the bait rig down for a second batch of macs, we were hooked to our first marlin! We ended up releasing two marlin and a very large, about 120-pound, early season sailfish. What a great way to start the season!

I again had a late start on Tuesday and left without bait. Unfortunately,I was never able to locate a bait ball and had to settle for watching everyone else catch marlin while I trolled the area with lures. Everywhere I looked there were marlin after bait, as well as large schools of jacks herding the same bait schools. Unfortunately, with all that bait there was little interest in my lures and I only had one strike--without a hookup. However, just watching this spectacle was special.

My last trip offshore was on Friday. I again fished the East Cape area off Punta Colorada. The bite had slowed considerably, but marlin were still present in the area. I was fishing with another local, Mono, who's the deckhand on the "JACK DANIELS". We drifted with mackerel deep all morning without a bite, so decided to try trolling the area. We ended up catching a nice striper on a drop back bait when it came up behind a lure. All and all it was a good start to our East Cape fishing season.