Pesca Maya Recap 2002 

Since our drive down the Punta Allen Scenic Highway was cut short due to bridge construction we were forced to take the Pesca Maya boat the rest of the way to the lodge, what a pleasure that was.

Pablo, greeted our group at the lodge.   The lodge manager/partner, Brian, had been ill since my visit last year and was in England recovering and getting his health back in order.  It was not the same without Brian, with his English charm and humor, but Pablo was an excellent replacement and took care of our every need. 

After settling into our rooms, unpacking our equipment, it was time for dinner.  As usual the meals each day, prepared by Alturo were superb
 At dinner, I introduced a new concept for the week of fishing, a “Points Tournament”.  The group liked the idea and anteed up the $20 entry fee.  If anyone is interested in the scoring of the point’s tournament just send me an email. 

The next morning we all met our guides and were off for a day of fishing.  I was teamed up with Gary, a new angler to the saltwater world.  Our guides for the day were Chucho and Tommy.  Two great guy that spoke very little English.  We soon learned that with there limited English and our limited Spanish it would be a hilarious, fun filled experience that we would not soon forget.   As an example, we learned that if we stalking bonefish not to say tarpon otherwise we were off to a new location.  Chucho would be going through my fly boxes, leader material and re-rigging one of the many fly rods on the boat.  By the end of the first day we had covered many miles of water and countless locations but we still managed to land a variety of fish.  Later that evening we regrouped and discussed our day of fishing.  I was surprised to hear some grumbling about one of the guides.  After we talked through what had taken place, we decided to rotate a coupled of anglers the next day.

Words of experience:  All of the guides at Pesca Maya are very accommodating.    They will ask you several questions each morning.  First, what kind of fish would you like to fish for, i.e.  bonefish, permit, tarpon.  Second, do you want to wade, pole the flats or fish the deeper water from the boat?  From your answers, they will make a decision where they are going to take you.  If you have a preference as to the location, type of fish, Please Speak Up!  These guides are there to serve you and take pride in doing so! 

Just another day in paradise, our guide was a third year captain name Jose Luis.  With no wind in the morning, the Caribbean side of the peninsula was our destination.   The idea was to locate some permit in of the many lagoons that dot the coastline.  Gary was on deck, while I served as another pair of eyes scanning the glassily water.   The bottom was a mixture of sand and turtle grass, perfect habitat for permit.  As we poled in one of the lagoons I couldn’t help but notice all of the fish just off of the turtle grass.  I moved to the back of the boat and rigged up a shrimp pattern on a long leader.  A roll cast was all that was needed to catch many good “point” fish.  I even caught a small permit (big point fish), the points were adding up fast.  Gary was getting very disturbed and was concentrating more on what I was doing that his hunt for bigger permit.    By the time we reached the bride the wind was starting to blow, so we made our way inside the protected water of Ascension Bay.  Luis pole the boat down one long mangrove flat, where we had some decent shots at a few bigger permit and lots of hunger bonefish.  Off in the distance two big permit were tailing, the strategy was to wade into casting position.  Gary made a cast at the fish, no hook up, they were gone.  There were many small barracuda in the area so Gary changed to a small wire leader.  He needed points.  It didn’t take long to get one hooked up.  Luis was calling us back to the boat; he saw some nervous water that he wanted to check out.  Both of us thought it was a school of permit.  We were armed and ready.  As we approached, I could see tarpon rolling, I yelled at Gary to get a tarpon rod.  The fish were right on top of us when he made his cast……….hook-up ………Tarpon on.  A few minutes the tarpon was landed (major point fish).  With the school of tarpon still around it was my turn.  I made many casts but not takes.  As we were heading to the “mud” we made a detoured into a small mangrove bay where we caught two snook the day before.  Unfortunately the snook didn’t want to come out from under their cover.  We jumped a big permit, but it was gone before Gary could make a cast. 

“Mud Rules” The angler on deck get 10 cast, no hook-up you rotate positions.  Rarely did we ever make more that 5 casts before we had a hook-up.  It was a fun way to end a very good day. 

At the lodge we met up with the other member of the group to share fishing stories.  Everyone was having a great time catching lots of bonefish.  Leo was just after permit, which he found that day.  A school, maybe as many as 500 fish, that they spent some time chasing.  Leo did manage to get two hook-up and landed a 15 lb permit.  The bigger fish 30+ lbs broke him off; he thinks it’s now some where in Belize.  Sallye was still recovering from a shoulder injury and was content just to sit in the boat and encourage her husband Bruce.  The father and son team, Willie and James were having a blast, catching lots of bones and other species.

The 1st Annual Pesca Maya Points Tournament was won by Gary, second place, Leo and third place, Bruce.  It definitely a must do for next year.  Leo and I fished together the final day.  Boy it sure was windy.  We tried to fish some mangrove islands for snook but the wind was a killer.  I thought I would never hear these words from Leo mouth, “Let’s troll for some big barracuda”.   Since it was really windy it wasn’t such a bad idea.  After re-rigging with 30 lb wire leaders, we started to troll.  It didn’t take long for Leo to get a hook-up.  It was just the first of many barracuda landed.  We kept two for the Armando to prepare for happy hour.  They sure were good.  The only problem was we still had dinner to eat.

Our luck ran out, we had to drive the whole Punta Allen Scenic Highway, No Boats!  On the way back we stopped for a short visit to the Mayan ruins at Tulum, a real treat.  Then off to the airport for our long journey home

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Guests

Willie Tsusaki
James Tsusaki
Gary Declusin
Leo Gutterres
Sallye Rollans
Bruce Rollans
Al Smatsky