Made It to The Big Leagues

AZRob

Guest
I'll give you a tip Joe..........

EVERY TIME you get a hit with a trolled jig reel her in and cutoff four or five feet of line and retie the lure. The smallest ding on mono is where it is going to break. I have a habit when fishing in any environment to put two fingers on that last few feet and give it a feel. You are going to save a lot of expensive lures and bring in more lunkers like the fine one in your pix.

I guess we will be eating beer battered Sardinero manana en la noche after you setting off my grouper alarm!

Great catch Joe and you didn't even have to run forty miles out.

JJ
yep its worth losing a weight then a lure. Lighter break off line. When bouncing off bottom drifting with a cold one in your hand.
 
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Mexico Joe

Cholla Bay 4 Life
BUMP!

Trip Report February 14th, 2022.

We left Phoenix at about 430am Saturday morning with smooth sailing all the way to the border. Got the red light inspection which was courteous and professional and made our way through Sonoyta doing 20mph. Apparently nobody wakes up in Sonoyta until after 8am because at 7am the streets were as empty as I've ever seen Sonoyta. I mean there wasn't a soul walking, riding or driving. It was kind of creepy actually. We did see one cop in marked car kind of hiding off of a side street but because I was going 20mph we didn't have any issue. We arrived in Rocky Point by 8am or just after. We dropped the boat off at Safe Marina and then went and checked in to our Air BnB that we've stayed in a couple of times for the amazing price of $22/night. We were trying to make this trip as cheap as possible so we went back to our roots and stayed in the barrio. Safe Marina makes that possible with $5 overnight parking for the boat. The even better part about the overnight storage with SM is that I don't have to break down the boat after each use. I can leave everything. Literally everything in the boat without fear of anything getting stolen. Makes my life 1000% easier at the end of each day VS. Cholla Bay launching. I hate to admit it but I doubt we'll ever launch in Cholla Bay again.

We arrived back at the boat and were in the water by 930am. It was HOT and inside the marina there was no evidence of any wind. As we made our way out of the harbor, Oscar with Del Mar Charters had just embarked and was about 200 yards in front of us. Once we were out of the harbor we powered up and caught up to them to say hi. Oscar got on the radio to let us know where they were headed in case we wanted to find them later if the fishing wasn't good or we wanted to see the whales. He had been finding the whales about 9 miles out SE of Rocky Point. We told him we'd radio him later if we were going to meet up. We really wanted to see whales this trip but it just didn't work out unfortunately. Our destination was the 16. Once we arrived at what I believe is the North part of the 16 Claudia began trying to catch bait and I began jigging 16oz Diamond Jig. This must be normal for the winter months but not only was I not seeing anything on the sonar, we were struggling to catch any bait. I did however manage to catch 2 California Lizardfish on the 16oz jig which was surprising. From what I could find on the internet these CA Lizardfish look to be BIGGINS.... Weird, ugly looking fish with huge, soft mouths. I could barely get them unhooked without destroying their whole mouth and gills. By 2pm the wind had started to pick up pretty strong gusting upwards of 20mph and the sea was now starting to white cap. It wasn't bad enough to want to go in but definitely not good enough to want to keep fishing as our 16oz jigs were starting to scope out from the wind and current. At that point we decided to give up fishing and either try and find Oscar with Del Mar Charters to see some whales or head in to the harbor. We couldn't raise Oscar on the radio after a few attempts so we decided to call it a day and head in. The ride in was definitely a little wet but we were prepared and our Columbia rain gear did it's job and we stayed dry and warm!
 

Mexico Joe

Cholla Bay 4 Life
The next day, Sunday morning we arrived at the marina by 8am. Although it seemed there was no wind and the wind report was accurate the launcher at Safe Marina suggested that we shouldn't launch today because the sea was still disturbed from the previous day. The suggestion kind of took me back because it appeared to be a beautiful day. We decided to drive over to the Malecon to check out the conditions for ourselves. The water appeared to be fairly calm so I wasn't really sure what Safe Marina was telling us. Once we launched the boat and got out of the harbor we could tell that it wasn't rough but it wasn't as calm as it looked from the Malecon. It was kind of a rolling sea out of the west with no wind though. We decided any day out on the boat in Rocky Point is a good day and we'd stay inshore and dick around over by Cholla Bay. So we motored over to Cholla Bay going straight into these rollers at 16-18mph. We decided to fish CB for Flounder and after a few hours of no bites we called it a day and headed back to the harbor early so we could get the boat ready for the next day and still have enough time to catch the SuperBowl. By the time we left CB the sea had started to settle down. We were able to do 24mph on the way back to the harbor and both the ride out and back in were dry this day. We were both super tired from the previous day so we decided not to go to a bar to watch the big game and just settled on Pollo Lucas and bedtime movie instead.

Monday turned out to be the day. The wind report held true and Monday was glorious! I think we were on the water by 750am and decided to hit the 16 again. The sea was calm but not quite glass. It was definitely a little chilly but we were prepared and overall we stayed warm and dry for the ride out. We cruised out to the 16 at our new gas saving cruising speed of 22-24mph. Once we arrived at the southern point of the 16 I began marking ledges and figuring out the drift. This must be a constant theme in the winter time but absolutely no life on the sonar and we had a very very hard time catching bait. I think after a few hours of trying we were only able to manage about 4 or 5 Spottail Grunts. The new set up on the bait tank worked flawlessly and we never had to worry about it the whole day. We only managed 3 Grouper bites the entire day. The first came on my medium spin set up that I was using with 16oz Diamond Jig. The fish hit the jig so hard that on the first immediate pull the rod just snapped like a twig and I lost the fish and the $12 diamond jig.... 0-1. The second bite came hours later on our new Fiblink 120lb conventional rod set up with live bait. I had just reeled the weight up off the bottom at least 20 or 30 feet to tend to the other live bait rod with intention of resetting our drift. While I was reeling up the live bait rig on the starboard side of the boat the new Penn309 w/Fiblink 120lb rod that was now easily 20-30ft off the bottom got slammed!!! Complete bendo! Fish on! I went to remove the rod from the gunwale flush mount rod holder but the fish was so big and fighting so hard that I couldn't remove the rod from the holder. I immediately decided to just fight the fish with the rod in the gunwale. I was able to reel down on the fish and was 100% making headway as I felt massive head shakes or tail thump not sure which but as the fish was fighting the whole gunwale or rod holder started making cracking sounds as if the gunwale fiberglass was starting to crack. Right about that same moment the fish gave another big head shake/tail thump and BOOM! Snap! The fish snapped the 100lb mono leader right above the Mustad 10/0 live bait hook. Really discouraging but that's fishing. Our third and last bite came around 2pm and was the only one I got on video with the GoPro. Another massive fish! Claudia was taking a nap in the bow and I was seated at the helm backwards tying a new jig on to the jig rod when all of a sudden, BENDO! I missed the initial hit and was able to get the rod out of the gunwale rod holder and started to let out a little more line when the fish struck again. This fish was giant! I've never felt a tug like that before! Unreal! The fish basically pulls me out of the seat and I had to let go of the rod to brace myself against the gunwale while the rod slams down on the boat with intense strength. Unfortunately, again, I lost the fish. It's crazy how you can go hours without a bite, become slightly bored and almost start to doubt yourself if you're good enough or if you know enough or if you're even fishing over the correct area and then BOOM! Bendo! And all of a sudden your heart is racing and you're reinvigorated. You're reaffirmed that yes, you are good enough, yes, you have enough information and understanding and yes you're in the correct area. The learning curve for this fishery is pretty steep but the positive takeaway is that we're on the fish and using the correct techniques. Now I'm starting to learn more about what we will need to boat the fish. Always learning even when you fail is the important part. We are so close now that I feel it's only a matter of time before we boat our first Super Grouper. We decided to call it a day around 3pm. Unfortunately, the fuel delivery issue that we had in the beginning of owning this boat showed it's ugly face again. We fired up the motor but the boat just did not want to get out of the hole and full throttle we couldn't go over 8-10mph. You can clearly hear that the motor is starving for fuel. After about 5 minutes of driving towards Rocky Point going 10mph not on plane you could hear the motor getting periodic amounts of fuel flow because it would start to rev up and then back down and up and down until finally the blockage or whatever is happening in the tank cleared and the motor started getting fuel flow and then it was running normal (good condition) the rest of the way into port. I decided to drop the hammer and run full speed into port to see if the fuel flow could clear up any debris in the fuel pickup inside the tank. We were able to do 32mph almost the entire way on FLAT GLASSOFF conditions. The motor again bogged down (fuel starvation) right as we got to the mouth of the harbor. The motor idles and starts fine though so we had no issue getting into Safe Marina and onto the trailer but I will have to address this intermittent fuel starvation problem before our next outing. I don't want to feel that feeling again 15 miles offshore and the motor barely running...

Take Away: I talked to Shawno tha God and he thinks the third fish on the GoPro was likely a big Gulf Grouper. He also told me that I should be using 250lb mono leader and not 100lb. I will make that change immediately for our next outing. No more missing Grouper to breakoffs. If it's hooked it needs to wind up in the boat.

The other take-away is that I need to finally address and figure out exactly the problem with our fuel starvation issue. I believe it has to do with our fuel pickup tube inside the tank or the fuel tank CHECKVALVE assembly. Apparently the check valves on these fuel tanks go out and create a fuel starvation problem by not allowing the fuel to flow through the checkvalve the way it should.

Navigation worked well with the new phone mount however, the phone screen is hard to see during the day with this case I have over it. Screen glare is horrible. Eventually I would like to upgrade the navigation device from my phone to a Samsung Tablet and still utilize the same dash mount to run the Navionics on a bigger screen without screen glare.

Overall we had a great time and the weather was absolutely beautiful for February! We can't wait for our next adventure on the Sea of Cortez and hope to be down again next month. Until next time, signing off from the Sea of Cortez!

Joe
 
Excellent post Joe!

I can't tell you how many times that I've lost a fish and snapped a rod in half while trolling with a rod in the gunnel rod holders. Off shore I could handle up to seven trolling rigs while using my outriggers and the gunnels but inshore using more than two is asking for a disaster. Ain't nothing like hearing the drag ripping out then watching the whole rig go overboard! Remember to have a heavy weight bungee cord on every rig even when hauling ass over rough water.

Lizard Fish are one of my favorites, take one home and try to figger out how to eat it. As being mostly head and teeth they are bigtime predators on the bottom. I've had them rush my mask when Scuba diving and slash a finger or two when unhooking one on the troll. They will hit a trolled lure almost as big as they are. I had a tiny one in my salt water aquarium that ate every other animal in the tank to include crabs and snails.

The Murex hunters catch them by the hundreds in their chicken wire trampas. Then they end up in the carnal heaps behind the dunes along Salinas Point along with lots of toothy Wolf Eels.

As for your fuel starvation issue, I would most certainly look at the check valve in the fitting on your tank. I had the same issue on my boat and with two of those valves out of the tank to each engine it took over a year to pin it down. At plane speed the fuel welled up at the back of the tank and prevented the air to bleed out at the valve. I switched the fuel hoses from each engine then was able to confirm it was the check ball in the valve that was causing the problem. You just need to replace it and keep a fresh one on hand when needed. If you have the tools and easy access to the top of the tank it's an easy fix.

Again, good post!

JJ
 

Mexico Joe

Cholla Bay 4 Life
Excellent post Joe!

I can't tell you how many times that I've lost a fish and snapped a rod in half while trolling with a rod in the gunnel rod holders. Off shore I could handle up to seven trolling rigs while using my outriggers and the gunnels but inshore using more than two is asking for a disaster. Ain't nothing like hearing the drag ripping out then watching the whole rig go overboard! Remember to have a heavy weight bungee cord on every rig even when hauling ass over rough water.

Lizard Fish are one of my favorites, take one home and try to figger out how to eat it. As being mostly head and teeth they are bigtime predators on the bottom. I've had them rush my mask when Scuba diving and slash a finger or two when unhooking one on the troll. They will hit a trolled lure almost as big as they are. I had a tiny one in my salt water aquarium that ate every other animal in the tank to include crabs and snails.

The Murex hunters catch them by the hundreds in their chicken wire trampas. Then they end up in the carnal heaps behind the dunes along Salinas Point along with lots of toothy Wolf Eels.

As for your fuel starvation issue, I would most certainly look at the check valve in the fitting on your tank. I had the same issue on my boat and with two of those valves out of the tank to each engine it took over a year to pin it down. At plane speed the fuel welled up at the back of the tank and prevented the air to bleed out at the valve. I switched the fuel hoses from each engine then was able to confirm it was the check ball in the valve that was causing the problem. You just need to replace it and keep a fresh one on hand when needed. If you have the tools and easy access to the top of the tank it's an easy fix.

Again, good post!

JJ

Thank you sir! Yea those Lizard fish are aggressive to say the least. They were hitting a 16oz diamond jig almost the size of their body so yea. I had never caught one before but I got on Mexfish.com and identified it pretty easily within a few guesses based on names. Love that website for newbs like me. You have any recommendation on books about sea life in the Northern SOC with pictures preferably? I would like to learn more about the reef fish and also mollusks... trying to illegally harvest some for a snack in CB. I know they're there. I helped someone out one time and gave them a tow on the YET SKI from a half mile out and later again saw the guy in CB a year ago and he had a bucket with some CALLO DE HACHA in it and told me they can be had at low tide or by free diving. Yo busco ostiones natural tambien en la Cholla... I believe low tide snorkel sessions are in effect this spring.

About the anti-siphon and fuel tank situation. I don't even want to tell you the full situation on that gas tank... it's embarrassing. There's a whole fuel sending unit floating around in there plus debris that was in there from previous owner not having the fuel sending unit sealed. The gasket was shot for god knows how many moons and water and all types of crap were getting in the top of the tank tank every time I washed it in the first three months I owned it when I was doing all the work on it. I do have an 8" round deck hatch accessing the fuel sending unit and anti-siphon. I already replaced the fuel sending unit and gasket before we ever went out on our first lake tests and did filter a bunch of crud out but never replaced the anti-siphon check valve so it's either that or I have something stuck up in the fuel pickup tube. I will be looking at it soon in the next week or so when I have time. I think I'm going to do this the correct way that I should have done from the start and buy a cheap fuel pump from Amazon and run the gas through two filters back into the fuel neck and keep cycling the fuel until I feel it's good and then replace both the fuel pickup tube inside the tank and the anti-siphon check valve. I installed new fuel lines back in July and they're already cracking and look like shit so I'm going to do that again as well just in case there is maybe a little air getting in there. Spring is coming so I need to get this done ASAP!!!

Joe
 
So Joe................

Some other major fucked up shit you can plan on dealing with relating to fuel issues will be as follows:

The gasoline in Arizona has alcohol in it and here in Yuma the pump "says up to 11%" of that brainless tree hugger climate change shit as well as a shitload of fucking water just to rub the rip-off in. Think your Jap outboard can handle it??.......NO! Check your fuel/water filter every time you head out!

When I started noticing small chunks of sticky black debris in the small fuel filters on the motors I started freaking thinking all of the internals made of so-called "rubber" were deteriorating. Thanks to Allah it wasn't. It was all of the fuel hoses into and from the tank thru the filters and finally to the motors. So-called automotive grade fuel lines/hoses get melted from the inside by our Arizona gasoline.

Now consider that the PP pangas almost all run Yammies to include 115's similar to mine, yet never have an issue even though I don't run them with dirty raggedy old t-shirts draped over the engine covers. The reason being that the overpriced Pemex has no alcohol in it! So when I was filling my 150 gallon tank here in Yuma all I was doing was screwing up my fuel system. So nowdays, after draining the tank and flushing it THREE TIMES, I only use Mexi gasolina now.

During the tank draining here in Yuma I noticed a shit load of reddish brown silt being pumped out when the tank was almost empty. That stuff turns out to be powder like silt that is in the big underground tanks here in Yuma. I was at the point that I had to change the fuel/water separators after each run and sometimes at sea! Try that game with six foot swells and filling the filters canisters with gas in order to prime the system!

As for the check valves to the lines exiting the tank, all were gooped up with a reddish sticky kind of crap that I finally identified as the "ring free" additive that Yamaha said was an essential requirement. That stuff breaks down and gets hooked up with the water in the AZ gas and causes the steel balls in the valves to get gooped up stuck and stop doing the simple job of closing off the system when the fuel demand stops.

So anyways, I'm-a root'n on Putin!

JJ
 

Old55

Guest
Corn based ethanol is a midwest republican red line.They love the stuff. ….we shouldnt burn food….One good thing about Trumps buddy Putins war is we see the true costs of oil….war…….solar and wind baby!
 
We gotz 4 or 5 tons of cut and dry Mezquite, a dozen big propane cylinders, at least fifty mini propane cylinders, 22 thousand gallons of pool water and only have to drive ten feet from the bedroom to the office in order to go to work.

If the sky is clear one might get six hours of usable solar here and the wind don't blow every day any where on earth Baby!

Those two ugly eyesores in PP haven't turned a single rotation in at least a year now and the wind there has been howling for many a day.

I do miss the 15 ears of sweet corn for a buck days Sr.55.

JJ
 

Old55

Guest
We gotz 4 or 5 tons of cut and dry Mezquite, a dozen big propane cylinders, at least fifty mini propane cylinders, 22 thousand gallons of pool water and only have to drive ten feet from the bedroom to the office in order to go to work.

If the sky is clear one might get six hours of usable solar here and the wind don't blow every day any where on earth Baby!

Those two ugly eyesores in PP haven't turned a single rotation in at least a year now and the wind there has been howling for many a day.

I do miss the 15 ears of sweet corn for a buck days Sr.55.

JJ
Havent paid a electric bill at my ranch in 8 years…solar baby….and our cheap NG now isnt because of the pipelines to Mexico..Also picture how much gas you burn collecting that mesquite filled with scorpions…finally your neighborhood kids most likely pee in that pool!
 
Actually the wind mills aren't turning because the operators can't/won't sell the power produced cheaply as CFE sells it.
You might see them start spinning again if there's a power shortage in Sonora.
 
Havent paid a electric bill at my ranch in 8 years…solar baby….and our cheap NG now isnt because of the pipelines to Mexico..Also picture how much gas you burn collecting that mesquite filled with scorpions…finally your neighborhood kids most likely pee in that pool!
So Fifty Five..........

We collect our Mezquite from the trees that I have planted on my property here in Yuma. Some are forty years old now. We trim/harvest them for fire wood regularly and when the late summer chubascos tear them out by the roots they are as they say a "windfall". They can be planted from seed and produce harvestable fire wood in three of four years. No Arizona Bark Scorpions here in Yuma as it's way to dry. As for the hood rats I shoot them on sight if they are dumb enough to scale my eight foot wall topped with wrought iron agaves, the tips slathered with liquid dog shit. My three wolf dogs make quick work of them and I only have to dispose of the bones on our weekend desert trips. None have ever scaled the wall and made it to the pool.

JJ
 
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