EAST CAPE BOATS FISH AS BUENA VISTA BEACH RESORT REOPENS AFTER STORM

Sept. 9, 2006, Axel Valdez, Buena Vista Beach Resort, East Cape, Mexico:

We had a very strong hurricane. There were no personal injuries, but the community suffered infrastructure damage to homes, roads and services. We are getting back to normal. We are back in full service. Fishing resumed at East Cape with four boats on Thursday, nine on Friday, and 13 on Saturday.

Perez Family from Moraga, Calif., fished with Capt. Alejandro aboard the Dusty B III, nailing 16 tuna, a dorado and a striped marlin released on Thursday, Sept. 7, 2006.

Everything is clean now. The federal government did an excellent job as they sent a crew of 600 men from the electrical federal company. Electricity should be back on starting today.

John slammed into East Cape resorts at about 9 p.m. on Friday, downing trees, breaking windows, damaging homes and power lines, but Hotel Buena Vista Beach Resort escaped major damage.

The large plate glass window in the hotel's Pescador Bar was broken, as were about a half dozen other windows. Six of the resort's landmark palm trees were snapped in half.

But all our boats were saved and except for the windows, trees and some isolated tiles we remain intact and fully operational.

We were essentially in the eye of the storm for 50 minutes with hurricane-force winds. That's when the trees snapped and the windows smashed. Ten guests rode out the storm at the hotel.

Airline service to Los Cabos was curtailed for about 12 hours late Friday and Saturday, and it has now been restored, as have the roads. There were washouts and flooded arroyos, of course, but everything is now passable.

(See "Mexico Fishing News" online for current fishing reports, photos, weather, and water temperatures from East Cape and other major Mexican sportfishing areas. Vacation travel articles, fishing maps and seasonal calendars, and fishing related information for East Cape may be found at Mexfish.com's main East Cape page.