The wife and I decided to spend the holidays staying with friends at their condo in Puerto Vallarta. While there I wanted to get at least 1 day fishing in the Pacific with the hope of catching one of my bucket list fish, a "Roostertail." Went out with my buddy for a 5 hour trip. Wow is fishing down there way different than up here! We fished out of a panga, the universal in shore boat. Good stable craft which are anchored and launched from the beach. The guides/captains are quite impressive with their boat skills.
We launched from Punta Mita and ran North about 30-45 minutes out around the point towards Sayulita. We were looking for birds and bait but only found one active ball being thrashed by the birds and what the guides said were bonita. Chased that for about 10 minutes with no hook ups until it disappeared. We then started trolling for the duration of the trip in close to the shoreline looking for Roosters or whatever else would bite. We only had 2 bites and the one fish landed. A Pacific Jack Crevalle. Speedy fun fighting fish! They even make some grunting noises when you're holding them!
The trolling techniques are way different than what we do for fish. They used stout trolling rods with a live bait and no weight whatsover. The strangest part was instead of the line coming straight from the rod tip while trolling, they let out the amount of line they wanted and then attached a rubber band to the line and ran the line loose down to the guide closest to the reel where they attached the rubber band! With the language barrier it was difficult to understand the rationale for that. I'm guessing it was to help them see the strike, and possibly as a spring mechanism to set the hook in case of a hard take? We also did some casting toward shore and the rocks with 6-8 inch plugs and poppers while trolling. Wish we could have had a hit on that technique. Unfortunately, our crew spoke only a little English so it was hard picking their brains about all of it.
All in all it was a real slow CATCHING day for all the boats that morning. The absence of bait was the primary reason, I guess. But it was a great learning experience, the scenery was outstanding, and it is fishing afterall. We also saw a lot of humpback whales too! Some were breaching just like the TV commercial! Another Rooster trip is in my future I hope.

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