Cedros Kayak Fishing- A Journey Worth Taking
Cedros Kayak Fishing
Last year I was lucky enough to have the opportunity to fish a few of the Coastal Conservation Association of California kayak tournaments around Southern California. I’ve been a kayak fisherman since the mid 90’s, but have been out of the tournament circuit for a few years. When these popped up, I was all in. The top raffle prize happened to be an all expense paid trip with Cedros Kayak Fishing, and you know what…I won!
Kayak fishing at Cedros Island has been a dream of mine for a long, long time. And to hear that I won, I was ecstatic! I’ve known the owner of Cedros Kayak Fishing for a few years. Jeff and Karie Mariani run a very great operation. They are based in Southern California but have a spectacular house right in the main town on Cedros Island.
The Trip
The trip starts off at a meeting point at Fastlane Kayaks in Mission Bay San Diego. Jeff greets you right at the store and gets you all set up once the shuttle arrives. This is the time you get to meet the rest of your group for the week. He can only take a max of 4 people, so it is a very intimate group. Once the shuttle arrives you pack up all of your stuff and you are on your way. Its only a 30 minute drive from Fastlane Kayaks to the Mexico Border.
After you cross the border into Mexico you make a quick stop to pick up your travel visas and continue on to Ensenada. Along the way Jeff will give you the rundown on the itinerary for the trip and what to expect once you land on the island.
We arrived into Ensenada at just about noon and had a chance to stop at Jeff’s favorite little haunt for a quick bite and to do some currency exchange. The place is small, but the food was good and staff was very friendly.
They had a nice little menu and brought us a great little Salsa selection to get us going.
I opted for the Torta and it was absolutely excellent!
The Flight
Once you finish your lunch and make your currency conversions you continue on to the airport. The airport there is at a small military base. We checked in and waited for our plane to arrive.
The plane arrived and we got all loaded up and on our way. As we were passing through the doors, Jeff asked if I’d be interested in sitting in the co-pilot seat. Heck yeah I do!
One quick selfie with our group and we were on our way.
We take off for the quick hour and a half flight to Isla Cedros. I’ll be honest, I was pretty excited to see the island pop up on the GPS. As soon as the island came into actual view, we all got really excited.
We pass over the island and get our first full look of the incredible scenery that the island has to offer. Lots of coves and fields of kelp. Pretty beautiful. We suddenly make a hard left bank and have the runway came into view. I nice soft landing and we were set to start fishing.
The House
After Jeff’s crew meets us at the airport and packs up all of our rods and gear, we are on our way. They outfitted me with a Mexican soda of some sort called Tecate. Pretty tasty…wink, wink.
The guys bring us up to Jeff’s house and we get the first view of the kayaks. Now I’m really excited.
We are greeted and introduced to Jeff’s full crew and staff. We are also greeted with a big ol’ plate of fresh yellowtail ceviche which was absolutely delicious.
Jeff gave a quick tour of the house and let us know his mi casa es su casa policy. Pretty much, if its there, its yours. The house consists of two separate houses. The front house is a two bedroom one bath house with a big kitchen where all of the dinners take place.
The first bedroom is Jeff’s and features a nice big bed.
The second, which happened to be mine, is a nice big space with two double size beds. Very comfortable and roomy.
The back house is a three bedroom house with two bathrooms. One of the bedrooms has an en suite bathroom if you desire a little privacy. It also has a nice kitchen and is a full home in its own right.
The Meals
Jeff has a couple of full time staff who take care of all of your needs. They whipped up the ceviche as soon as we got there which was excellent, but the dinners were an adventure of their own.
The first night we had some fresh beef and chicken kabobs, grilled asparagus, salad and rice. They grilled these up and we all had full bellies going into our first day of fishing.
As we went into the first day of fishing, Jeff told us that we needed to catch our own dinner for the evenings meals. He told us each to keep a good Calico bass and we each did. When we got back, the gals whipped up some really incredible Calico Bass Veracruz. It was exceptional, and probably my favorite meal of the trip,
The final night they cooked us some fresh chicken enchiladas along with a great little bowl of fresh fruit that I smothered in Tajin as usual.
For breakfast ,we were pretty eager to get out the door and go fishing, so we had breakfast wraps once we were on the water. But there was always delicious coffee and cookies available each morning.
The final days breakfast wasn’t too shabby at all. In fact, it was really good and consisted a little of everything.
The Fishing – Day 1
The first night we sat around and worked through some ideas about fishing. In asking around, Jeff found out that the yellowtail fishing had been pretty slow the last couple of days. He had a really cool idea to pack up the kayaks and head up to Punta Norte. Once that decision was made, he had his crew working.
The guys got the Hobie Mirage kayaks all loaded up and off we went.
We made the hour plus run up the coast and saw some really incredible landscape. It really is a pretty place.
The fishing up north was really on fire for Calico Bass. I personally had about a hundred bass for the day. At one point, I was reeling in a smallish calico and looked down to see a large shadow under it. It was a big yellowtail that was mouthing the bass. The big yellow was sluggish, but big. It would mouth the bass and make a short run, but I couldn’t get the hook to stick as my Sand Eel was buried in the bass. Oh well. Unfortunately the fishing was so good, I only snapped one shot from the first day, and it happened to be my first Cedros Island Calico Bass.
The Fishing – Day 2
After an incredible day of calico bass fishing, and a bad case of bass thumb, we wanted more. The yellowtail fishing was still pretty slow, but we wanted an adventure. Jeff had an area in mind called La Colarada on the west shore. It consists of a seaweed processing village.
We packed up the kayaks on Jeff’s custom built kayak rack trailer and off we went.
This was an incredibly scenic drive cutting across the island up the west coast. It took about an hour and a half to arrive at the village, and we were greeted with plenty of smiles. I don’t think they’ve seen a bunch of kayak fisherman before as just about everyone in the village came out to see what we were doing.
We launched the kayak down at a little cove on the rocks. I looked up at one point and we had 40 people standing around watching us. it was pretty cool. The local kids really got a kick out of the kayaks.
We made our launch and headed on out. This side had some really scenic huge boulders and gigantic fields of kelp. A kayak fisherman’s dream. The fishing was really good once again. Half our group made a left around the big rock out front and the others went right. We worked our way out along the deep water and would drop our Flat Fall, Squish Jigs and Sand Eels on arcs we’d see on our Lowrance fish finders.
We caught lots of good bass along the deep kelp, but suddenly our radios went off with Jeff’s voice yelling “Yellowtail on.” Needless to say, we peddled our butts off to get to their location which was still a good quarter mile away. The three of us rounded the corner to see Jeff handing off the 20lb yellow to the panga. It was awesome and exciting. Jeff is a diehard Daiwa SP Minnow fisherman and I’ll tell you what, I can see why. We all proceeded to throw the heck out of the SP Minnows for a lot more bass, but no willing yellows but the bonito bite was on fire! From a kayak, these are fun fish to catch. A little sketchy with six sharp hook points dangling above your legs, but a ton of fun.
I did manage to get into a nice calico on the SP Minnow. I’ll eventually post the video, but I had a small calico on and look down to see a huge calico follower. I was about to pull the little dude up when the big Calico attacked knocking the little dude off and taking the SP minnow for a ride. It was a nice fish that was close to 30 inches on the gaff measurement.
We fished the same area for more bonito and calico bass, but no prized yellowtail. We had fun shooting pictures and video in the spot. That SP was hot!
The Fishing – Day 2 Part 2
After hours and hours of casting for countless calico bass and no more yellowtail, we decided that it was time to start to work our way in. We were a few miles from the launch, so we had a long way to go. Jeff made the radio call that we are to each keep a few bass for the local villagers. Jeff and I being from SoCal have fishing thick kelp for quite some time. This stuff was thick.
We got in nice and tight and pulled in our Hobie Mirage drive peddles and glided nicely across the kelp. We decided to pothole for more bass. I can’t even imagine how many bass have to live in this kelp forest. Just about every drop of my Sand Eel was an instant bite. All you had to do was find a little spot between the kelp leaves and drop away.
We all worked the kelp and loaded up on bass for the village. They were very appreciative of the bass when we got back. It was cool.
One fun thing that happened while in the kelp was that I almost had my Komodo SS and SCT Inshore rod yanked out of my hand by an overly aggressive little calico bass. With my speed of light reflexes, I was able to recover, and still catch the bass.
Jeff and I worked the kelp all the way back to shore. It was a beautiful paddle in.
We made it back to the launch to have an incredible shore lunch waiting for us.
The View
The view around La Colarada was gorgeous. Sharp rocks, cliffs and kelp.
I also did manage this shot of the local panga that was sitting in the village.
In Conclusion
This trip is awesome! From the food to the incredible fishing, it is a destination to behold. The people in the village always offered up a friendly smile or wave. Don’t get me wrong, this definitely isn’t a family get away as there isn’t really anything else to do on the island. No restaurants, pools, etc. Its rustic for sure.
But if you are looking for an incredible kayak fishing destination, Cedros Kayak Fishing is the place to do it. For more information on Cedros Kayak Fishing, please click here.
Gear Used
Rods:
Okuma PCH Inshore Rods
Reels:
Okuma Komodo SS Lowprofile Baitcast Reel
Baits:
Kayaks:
For more fishing trips and reports please be sure to subscribe to Davey’s World.
Happy fishing!
Davey
