San Sebastion Air Tour
We had the opportunity to try the San Sebastion tour this week. It is a GREAT cultural tour of the "real" Mexico. Aboard a 14 passenger plane, you fly the coastline of the city of Puerto Vallarta, over the Mismaloya waterfalls and through the Mascota Canyon - it is simply breathtaking! You land on the top of the mountains near San Sebastion. First, we explored the Silver Mining Hacienda that was the heart of the community before the Mexican Revolution and learned about how they mined for silver in the 18 th and 19th century. The Hacienda has been converted into a Bed and Breakfast now so it beautifully landscaped with wonderful flowers and fruit trees. Then, we traveled to the local coffe plantation where Juan Sanchez (not Valdez from Columbia) told us all about how they grow, harvest, roast and package their coffee. It is a fanscinating process. Then, on to a local restaurant for a traditional Mexican meal of quesadillas, chicken mole and macheca with beans, rice and fresh tortillas! From there, we stopped by the cantina on the main square for a shot of "Raicia" (local moonshine) and a tour of the church. The highlight of the trip was saved to last, we stopped by to visit the home of Dona Choncita, who has lived in San Sebastion for 65 years. She was full of colorful stories about the history of San Sebastion! Next time you are PV ask us about this wonderful tour!

- posted by Kim @ 7:25 AM

 
Fsihing Report - Sept. 19, 2004
Puerto Vallarta Fishing Report – Sept. 19, 2004

Fishing in Puerto Vallarta continues to be excellent! Even though we were keeping watch on the two hurricanes moving up the coast all week, it didn’t prevent us from going out or the fish from biting! As the hurricane was passing early in the week, we had seas up to 4- 8 ft waves but they were mostly easy “rollers” so it wasn’t too bad. Later in the week, things calmed back down and seas were 2-4 ft. El Banco is boiling with big tuna, wahoo and blue and black marlin. 70- 300 lb. yellow fin keep hitting the docks. The action at Corbetena was good as well with marlin, sailfish and dorado coming in. About 6 miles off the Marietas Islands, on Wednesday, “Anticipation” picked up a 200 + lb. marlin and 2 dorado. We are enjoying partly cloudy days and late afternoon showers.


- posted by Kim @ 7:54 AM

 
Sept. 10, 2004
Puerto Vallarta Fishing Report – Sept. 10, 2004

Fishing continues to HOT, HOT, HOT in PV! Conditions are excellent with water temps from 86 degrees and blue water just outside the bay. We primarily fished El Banco this week. Big yellow fin tuna were ALL over most days – many boats brought in tuna in the 150 – 300 lb. range. Tuna were being caught with live bonitas. “Making bait” was quite a challenge this week. Several days we had to go to Corbetena in order to “make bait” BEFORE heading out to the El Banco. Those who had live bait did well, those who didn’t struggled. Seas were relatively calm most of the week with the exception of Monday. We saw several marlin but didn’t hear of any being hooked up this week. There were also lots of wahoo at El Banco hitting live bonita. Corbetena was fairly slow early in the week and then the sailfish and dorado were on the color change. About 3 miles off, the Tres Marietas there were trash lines that produced a lot of dorados and nice sailfish.

Merle Erickson, of Chicago, Illinois along with Doug Hanna of Dallas, TX fished 5 days with Charter Dreams this past week. We had a very productive tuna trip! Merle’s detailed report of the week will follow. The photos attached will give you an idea of the kind of catch they had.


- posted by Kim @ 7:51 AM

 
HUGE TUNA
Fishing Report – Puerto Vallarta, Mexico – Sept. 5, 2004

The TUNA BITE is ON! Nice yellow fin tuna action in the blue water at El Banco (55 miles offshore) this week. The yellow fin are biting mostly on live bonita but these have been somewhat hard to find certain days this last week. Several days this week boats were having to go to Corbetena (38 miles offshore) to “make bait” before they could move on to El Banco to fish. Merle Erickson of Chicago, Illinois fishing “Anticipation” with Captain Ed Moore on Sept.3rd landed 2 nice yellow fin tuna and a wahoo. One weighed in at approximately 192 lbs and 197 lbs according to the IGFA formula. The first one refused to give up and fought for 2 hours and 25 minutes before he was landed. Merle told Capt. Ed that “he would have liked to have fished more but he was hooked up ALL day fighting fish.” Merle fished El Banco and Corbetena on Sept. 4th and brought in another 2 tuna – one was estimated to weight about 180 lbs. and the other estimated to weigh about 70 lbs. Action cooled this day at El Banco when several Orcas moved into the area so they headed back to Corbetena. At Corbetena, Merle picked up 3 nice dorados. Corbetena has been producing some sailfish and dorado action and smaller schooling yellow fin tuna. This is only Day 1 and 2 of Merle’s 5 day fishing trip so we look forward to finding that 300 lb. tuna for him! Merle Erickson is very action angler who was awarded the 2002 Angler Award from the Billfish Foundations for most striped marlin released worldwide in 2002. Merle is a professor for the School of Business at the University of Chicago.

Trash lines around the Marietas Islands and even inside the bay have had some nice 25 – 40 lb. dorado on them. Water temps remain 85-87 F. Seas have been about 3-4 ft. early in the week as Hurricane Howard sat offshore southwest of us; thankfully this didn’t churn things up too much. Days have been sunny, warm and humid. Thunderstorms in the late afternoons cool things down and make for a “fresh” evening.

- posted by Kim @ 1:40 PM