You know people travel miles, spend lots of money and invest
in fancy fishing equipment to catch the fish of their dreams, but in Cabo it’s
not always necessary; you just have to have your wits about you and be in the
right place at the right time as long time Cabo resident, John Parks an
American in his early 50’s can attest to. He got a surprise whilst taking his
nightly power walk along the beach near his home in the Cabo Real area. The waves
were big and the surf crashed loudly on the beach between the Dreams Resort and
Casa Del Mar, when he saw something thrown onto the beach by the powerful
waves, he could see that it was a sizeable fish and thought it was a halibut,
as it flapped and struggled trying to make it back into the sea. John knows a
meal when he sees one though; he dropped his hat and sunglasses and sprinted
towards the fish, before it was sucked back out to sea, passing three surprised
local beach fishermen. He grabbed the fish which was pretty slippery and got
his hands into the gills, cutting his fingers on the dorsal spines in the
process and deftly snatched it away from the water; he threw it up onto the
beach as it spewed sardines from its mouth. As he hoisted the still struggling fish up, he
realized that it was a snook, around 20 lbs and one of the best eating fish in
these waters. He did think about throwing it back but then he thought “barbecue!”
We can just imagine the looks on the faces of the three local fishermen and
what went through their minds, “we’ve been fishing here for years, we’ve never
caught a robalo (snook) and along comes this foreigner, who doesn’t even have a
rod and snatches one up with his bare hands”. John trudged back along the beach
with his prize, which wasn’t easy going in the sand, but he found a little
piece of rope and tied it through the fish’s gills, to give his hands a
respite. It took him fifteen minutes to get back home, where he excitedly
called to his wife to “bring the camera”.
They snapped some photos then took it to the kitchen where the fish was
still struggling to the horror of John’s wife, Adali, who was supposed to cook
it. Seeing as they didn’t have fishing
equipment at home, John dispatched it with a wine bottle, before filleting it
and cooking some on the barbecue and they still have enough for several meals.
Snook are known to converge where fresh and saltwater merge; seeing as the
exact spot where this one was found, is where an arroyo empties into the sea,
it makes sense, though we’ve never heard of one caught by hand, but then as
John said “this fish made a fatal mistake”.
