Saturday 0700 hours saw the FAT CAT "guatemala-sailfishing.com" Ready to get moving for a day of fishing. Our guests were the US Amabassador, Carslyle Johnson, and Frank The moring was dead calm and everyone was anticipating a "Dorado day".
"Dorado" is also known as "Mahi mahi" on the USA West coast or as Dolphin(fish)on the USA East Coast.
This time of the year is rainy season in Guatemala and we usually get daily rain showers in the city, but very little rain along the Pacific coast. While sailfishing in Guatemala slows down, the Dorado and other pelagic species move in closer to the coast. The rain showers in the highland areas wash down the rivers out into the calm Pacific ocean. All this runoff creates nice "cortes" of debris offshore where Dorado and other pelagic specis like to congregate and feed.
Sailfishing in Guatemala tends to be further offshore at about 30-40 miles where the sailfishing continues to be strong.
We had a great day with flat calm crystal clear waters and plenty of opportunities to cast for Dorado. We had many multiple hookups with Dorado crashing into the boat from both sides, making our mates become dancers of dodging dorado, unhooking then rebaiting lines. The Dorado ranged in sized from 10-15 lbs and made for incredible fishing.
When things slowed down a bit and we were back to trolling, I decided to set up a Whahoo line. To a lot of doubt from our guests we rigged a "special whahoo" lure with wire and put it behind the boat, after trolling past a nice floating log the reel screemed and a nice 30 pound whahoo skimmed accross the surface. The whahoo left little doubt as to the efficiency of my "whahoo lure".
During the day we had about three sailfish rise to the baits, but they were picky and really were not to interested in the ballyhoo we were offering.
We got in at about 1500 hours richer with good stories and plenty of Dorado fillets as well as some nice whahoo steaks for the grill.
