Puerto Peñasco

About⌗

Trip to Puerto Peñasco with Kenta, Kenta’s dad (John) and Tristan.

12/26:⌗

Played some poker the night before and got up around 7:20. Ally woke me up. Packed up the last bit of my stuff and had Ally drive me over to Kenta’s. Met up with Kenta, his dad John, and Tristan. Piled in the four-runner and headed to Mexico.

It was about 4 hours to get to rocky point. We got the rods set up and went to the pier. The pier was right next to wrecked on the reef. It was basically a ton of massive concrete blocks haphazardly stacked on top of each other.

We cast for a bit, I lost my lure and we didn’t catch anything.

We drove over to el pollo Lucas and had amazing roasted chicken with tortillas.

After that, we drove through the touristy part of rocky point which I remembered from when I was a little kid (have a photo with Alec there).

We drove to our resort and brought our stuff in. We grabbed the rods and headed down to fish directly in front of our place which was right on the beach.

We didn’t catch anything but Kenta caught a pelican. I practiced casting, lost a lure, and successfully tied a new one back on. So that was good. I’m definitely a bit embarrassed at being so bad at fishing.

As the sun started setting we went back up stairs and then headed out for dinner. We went to some taco place and got aguachiles, quesadilla, and tacos. After that, we want to Al capones and watched a crazy 49ers vs bears game and I had a guava beer.

We went home, chilled, watched despicable me 3 in Spanish and went to bed.

12/27:⌗

We got up around 7:30 and got out of the place around 8:30. The water wasn’t working in our resort which delayed us a bit.

We went to Reggie’s and got some breakfast burritos which were a little dry but pretty good if you added some salsa.

We took the highway three, passed las conchas to the second estuary “la pinta”. The highway is a tiny two lane road that follows the hills underneath it. We were cruising along and it kind of felt like a roller coaster at 70/80 mph.

To get to the second estuary we turned off the highway onto a dirt road marked by an abandoned house and mile marker 32. Taking the road for five minutes we drove passed another shack looking house with a green tractor. We were also met by a dog that got up real close to our car and barked as we entered.

John drove up the beach a bit until he felt the sand was a bit loose and then parked the car to avoid getting stuck. This would have been a problem as we were completely alone. This was a popular spot where normally you could see other people fishing, but today being a Monday morning close to new years it was completely empty.

The morning was a blast. I got a handle on casting the spin rod and closing the bail fast and keeping the tip up to avoid getting my lure stuck. I did get it stuck early on and John and I made almost every mistake possible getting a new one on there it was hilarious (not really) because I was useless and keeping John away from catching fish.

We then instantly started catching fish. John caught a corbina, a small grouper, and a leather jack. Tristan caught similar fish and so did Kenta. I caught one good size corbina when John gave me his rod that had some fly fish feathers obscuring a hook that the fish seemed to really like.

The tide was going out all morning so while we were able to cast farther out the fish stopped biting. Seems like knowing where the fish are going to be is a complicated ordeal… but we had a better chance as the tide was coming in and just after it started going out.

We also saw a dorsal fin pop through the water which seemed to be a dolphin but kind of looked like a shark. This was a problem as it was eating all our fish!

After about 1 o’clock, I was basically just practicing casting, nothing was biting. John even brought out his fly rod but it was a bit too windy. Around 1 we called it and headed to Tortas Siria.

We walked in with our water shoes on and just ruined their floor with mud hahaha. We asked for a mop to clean it but the lady told us it was no problem. We got tortas and John accidentally got something off the breakfast menu. I got a torta millenesa which was good. Kenta got some prepared drink which we think was made with local water but he seems fine, it was kind of funny because he got a bit nervous at the time.

After lunch we drove over to malecon or the tourist area that I remember as a kid and walked around. It’s kind of annoying just a bunch of people asking you to buy useless shit. A bunch of guys asked if we wanted to go fishing. I told them we had been fishing all day. He then said “what about finger fishing!?”. After walking around a bit we got some ice cream. And drove back to the resort.

We turned on Scarface. Tristan and Kenta went down to the hot tub which was apparently not hot, and I talked with John.

We decided to fish/walk down the beach from where we were staying and go to a bar for some beers. It was rocky and difficult to catch much with the large waves, but we cast out a bit and got to the bar around 6. We watched this guy at the beach get his stupid jeep unstuck and the cops ran out to give him a ticket. We had a few beers and Kenta, Tristan, and I had mango margaritas.

We walked back up the road to the car to get dinner.

For dinner we drove to Diego’s tiki bar. Which was back up toward la cholla. We got shrimp tacos, coconut shrimp, bacon wrapped shrimp, etc… there was a theme! Our waiter was nice and Tristan is basically fluent at Spanish at this point. We got his backstory and he told us about puerto Peñasco and Mexico, how most places are safe, that he plays soccer and the restaurants all play soccer against each other. He also let us know how many ladies he was getting.

We were super full after dinner. We headed over to a super market to get some breakfast for tomorrow as we plan on getting an early start. We got some beef jerky and conchas… breakfast of champions.

Watched a bit of Scarface and then showered/headed to bed.

12/28:⌗

Got up around 7, a bit before Kenta/tristan but after Kenta’s dad who had already gone down and prepared the gear.

Had some old coffee and a bit of a concha for breakfast. Started having a headache about an hour after I woke up. It was the usual sort, pain in the temple and lasts for 4-5 hours. I think due to all the salt/dehydration from the day before.

Got packed up and then we drove over to the second estuary. Started fishing and I caught one fish. Wasn’t feeling great and my stomach was starting to churn.

I saw the splashing of some fish about 25 yards off shore and attempted to cast my lure out right in the middle of that area. I cast shittly and left it about 10 yards short of where I wanted it. I quickly reeled it in and sent it out again and hit the spot perfectly… almost too far. I started reeling it in and immediately got a fish on. It was a pretty good sized corbina, I didn’t have the tension right so I was struggling to bring it in. Tristan came over and increased the tension a bit, and I managed to bring the fish in and gently drag it ashore.

The fish was hooked twice in the mouth and once through its right fin. They were pretty easy to get out and I quickly let it back into the water.

At this point, I gave John my rod (it was better than the one he was using as he wanted us to catch fish) and watched for an hour or so. Around 11:30 the wind picked up and we called it a day. We got the gear packed up and drove back to el pollo Lucas for lunch.

I wasn’t feeling great so I didn’t eat, but got some tortillas to bring home. After lunch, we got some gas and headed back to the border. We drove passed all the people trying wash our car and sell us puppies to have our passports checked. Tristan had an emergency passport and the agent said at first he came up as an interpol person of interest before he manually typed in his info and found that to be wrong. We drove through why and ajo before one more border patrol checkpoint look at us and let us through.

Driving back from Gila bend, John told us about his skateboarding and snowboarding days. As well as Living in Hawaii and Japan. He also talked a lot about his work at perforce, enforcing abuse of rogue wave’s software licenses (ALWAYS BE CAREFUL WHAT SOFTWARE YOU DEPEND ON AND READ LICENSE AGREEMENTS)

Summary:⌗

Amazing trip, I need to get better at fishing and knot tying. Puerto peñasco is an amazing resource within 4 hours drive of where I live that I had underrated before. Spending time in nature with friends is one of my favorite things. I really enjoy speaking Spanish and generally like speaking local languages it’s so much fun.

Whiskey that John likes: Weller, Eagle rare

Rod: Phenix redeye