[ksong]

I fished Midriff Islands on the mothership Erik last couple of years and always had a great time.

Saltwater Fishing Discussion Board Including Inshore Fishing, Offshore Fishing, Saltwater Fly Fishing and Kayak Fishing

I couldn't join this year's trip due to exploratory jigging/popping trip to Gulf of Mexico, but guys who went on the Erik just returned with extraordinary reports. See their reports below.

Simply put.......

The best trip of my life!

Soup to nuts....from great charter deal! to fish rags and everything in between.....Jack had it covered and worked his azz off to ensure a fantastic time for all on board including the crew....WHO KNEW they were SO INTO golfing. lol
Thank you Jack! As I said when the trip was over "This one's gonna be hard to top!"

Pre-trip dinner in San Felipe was fun and got to meet and drink with the guys and ladies from the West Coast who were joining us on the trip. They were for the most part doing a combo fishing/diving trip and sure didn't lack anything in the fishing department. Great meeting and fishing with them and hope to get together with them again sometime. Always fun to trade stories over cocktails about how others fish and what they fish for. Learned lots of good stuff about how to fish Northern California.

The new boat is without question a few clicks up from the Eric. Much larger staterooms, huge air conditioned galley lots more cockpit area for fishing humbolts, making bait, laying out the days catch.....and golfing .

I'm not too good at remembering which spots we fished on which days so I'll let others fill in that part but what I can say is that every session was productive and we all got into every fish we targeted. Lots of fun flatlining whole macs for cabrilla. Our guide Shorty gave us (Sean and me were panga partners) the low-down on the best techniques and we has a blast.....cabrilla would hit the baits like a fire alarm....hold on and don't let em back into the rocks!!!!
When I'd get rocked the first thing you'd hear from Shorty was his snoring sound "Zzzzzzzzzzz" lol, ballbuster.

One session I ran out of bait and jigged for cabrilla and to Shorty's surprise.....took four nice fish on a silver/orange Braid jig that Kil gave us on last years trip. Cabrilla teeth weren't very kind to the paint on it however.

My biggest cabrilla for the trip was a beefy sucka that I caught on day one.....weighed just over 19lbs after it was gilled and gutted...so it was 20+

Also caught a big ray that totally kicked my ass on chunk mac (head). I never want to catch another one! lol. Easily over 100 lbs, I couldn't lift it off the deck. Those things are STRONG. Our pangero said to boil it for a few minutes and then pan-fry in butter and they're "DELICIOUS"

Yellowtail bite was sick on jigs. I used Salas and hammered diamonds with equal success. Bigger than last year but didn't see lots of the 30-40 lbers of the trip the week before ours. More in the 15-20 lb range....but they fight like hell and basically there were as many as we wanted to catch.....just follow those birds!

I brought my 6'6" boat cod rod, my 8' tuti-fruity cod rod, a Trevala rod, a 5'5" stand-up roller rod and that's it.....I think . Used a Torium 20, Saltiga 40, Pro-Gear 545, and a Newell P447F

Can't wait to see the pictures. We had a new photographer on this years trip....a crazy little young Canadian guy named Dayo (sp?)...aka Dae-Woo...aka Woo-Tang....aka you name it....lol...he had lots of names by the end of the trip. Great guy, funny bastid. As Max said "Who knew Canadians had personalities" LMAO.

So anyway, my 'variety' tally for the trip was pargo, cabrilla, yellowtail, small bonita, barred pargo (elusive daytime variety , sorry Mike), grouper, that big ray and.....oh ya....HUMBOLT SQUID.

I'll give someone else the opportunity to comment on the food we ate....all I'll say is FANTASTIC!!!....due to Jack and the galley guys.

I got to touch a whale shark ....Sean has the pictures. Also took an afternoon fishing session off and went snorkeling by myself. Beautiful reef fish. The only problem was that Shorty dropped me off in a cave that with the sea surge was like being in a washing machine ....but I finally escaped out a hole in the back. lol

Lastly, but certainly not least....SUPER TIME fishing with the EAST COAST KREW.....Jack, Max, Ryan, Mike and the best panga partner anyone could ask for....Sean!

Like I said at the beginning......this one's gonna be tough for me to top!

Sea of Cortez/Midriff Islands Charter

Six East Coast guys and thirteen people from California, Nevada, and Mexico chartered the mothership Andrea Lynn from San Felipe, Baja, Mexico. The West Coast group from Cali was Ellsworth, Jessie, Iver, and Eric Lien, John B., Butch and Connie Wolfe. From Nevada was Mike Cassidy and family. From Mexico were Wayne and Delphia.

From the East Coast, Charter master Jack C.(HungryJack), Max D.(Max171), Mike D.(newyorkcityman), Ryan H.(tkfbk), John F.(shebeen), and myself. Also onboard, from Canada, was our photographer Dao.

The mothership, Andrea Lynn, 135ft, ten air conditioned staterooms with private baths, a full wet bar tended by Jesus, a huge galley/dining area with first class meals prepared by Chef Poncho and Daito… we ate good!!!! Top deck was a 1000sq. ft. sun deck. The Andrea Lynn is also a fully equipped dive facility, PADI training available onboard, compressors for filling tanks, Nitrox, scuba rentals, provided by Cruise Director/ Dive Instructor Elena Rodriguez. The West coast group did several dives on this trip. The mothership also had the ten 24’ pangas with guides for each for our fishing. This ship was excellent, no comparison to last years ship, the Eric. The crew and whole operation was top notch..

Fish handling/filleting…. When we came in from fishing a session, our catch was off loaded from the panga, and immediately fillet, put into a ziplock, and into a freezer. At the end of the trip, all the fished was pulled from the hold, and there was a massive pile of fish on the deck. We filled our coolers, dry ice topped it off. Any extra I had was given to our guide Shorty.

I can not thank Jack enough for organizing this trip. He covers every detail and more, unbelievable the effort he puts into these trips. Everything you needed was there, and then some. Someone wanted to kayak this trip, Jack arranged for 4 new top of the line kayaks to be brought aboard, and were left onboard for future trips. Bait, coolers, tackle, ice, dry ice, soap, shampoo, bottle water, etc., Jack made sure it was there, whatever you needed. The West coast group was very impressed with Jack, many nice comments from them. Thanks again, Jack!!!!