The year isn’t quite over yet, but I feel pretty certain when I say that Tuesday, November 11 was my best fishing day of 2025. In fact, I’m just about certain, that the time spent around Magdalena Bay in Baja California Sur, Mexico, was one of the top five fishing trips of my life – possibly the best of them all.

The November striped marlin bite on Mag Bay is notoriously excellent – so much so that less than a decade ago a single boat with nine anglers tallied 330 in a single day. Since I’d never caught more than one in a single day, and hadn’t caught any since a 1995 trip to Costa Rica, I didn’t know quite what to expect, or what might push the needle to 11. As you’ll read below, it was ridiculously good.

The Steps Leading Up to the Big Day

About five years ago, when I first started getting into offshore fishing, my friend Terry Battisti mentioned that his high school buddy David Brackmann had a boat down in Cabo. I filed that away, but didn’t really think anything of it. With regular trips to Guatemala and Panama, we didn’t necessarily need to add another destination.

But then our friends Samantha Sukupcak and Mike Yee brought it up. They have the same travel bug that we do – and they’ve been to El Salto, Guatemala and Panama with us. Sam wanted to go to Mag Bay to celebrate Mike’s 40th birthday on a multi-day trip on Brackmann’s Caliente. Would we like to go? They’d barely gotten the details out when we claimed the spots.

That was over a year ago. These trips get booked far in advance and they were lucky to get prime dates for ’25 in ’24. So we waited, and I think I watched every video out there about marlin fishing in Mag Bay. I was beyond excited, but there’s always a wrinkle.

When the government shutdown hit, some air traffic controllers started calling in sick, and two days before we were set to depart the FAA called for a reduction in flights. We panicked. Fortunately, neither our flights nor Sam and Mike’s from Wisconsin got canceled or delayed. One bullet averted.

We got to Cabo safely and Sam started to obsessively track the wind, fearing we’d be limited to three day charters instead of the 200 mile haul up the coast. It looked bad, then it looked good, then it stayed good and Sunday afternoon we were on the boat, steaming north overnight to get to the fabled fishery.

Captain Jaime and Mate Silverio on Caliente Cabo San Lucas

The Day Before the Big Day Was Also a Big Day

Of course, once we got on the boat, we inquired about the fishing. Usually you expect a captain to make some sort of excuse or to hedge his bets: “The bite is tough” or “We may catch a few if everything goes right.”

Captain Jaime didn’t blink: “It’s wide open,” he said.

The only thing that would’ve been better is if he’d added the F-Word in between “wide” and “open.” I slept surprisingly well, but it didn’t take an alarm clock to get me up.

We started fishing around 7am on Monday and each had our first striped marlin within 90 minutes. It was thrilling to be out there, pulling ballyhoo, adding another fish here or there. We didn’t know what we were about to see.

Leaping Striped Marlin Mag Bay BCS Mexico

At noon, the full wrath of nature opened up. Dolphins started pushing bait, frigates and other birds started diving, and we could literally see marlin swimming beside the boat – some just cruising, others completely lit up and slashing into bait balls. The closest thing I can compare it to is the watering hole where we saw lions protecting a fresh kill against jackals and vultures in Zimbabwe in 2016, as the rest of the animals circled nervously.

Instead of trolling, Captain Jaime started moving the boat from one bait ball to another. Some were the size of a bar table and others were far larger, but as you neared them you’d see marlin swimming around, virtually glowing. Pitch in a bait and sometimes you’d be hooked up in a matter of moments. Otherwise, you moved to the next bait ball and tried again.

By the time we had to leave for the anchorage around 5pm, we’d tallied 24 marlin, plus my first wahoo. Two coveted new species for my life list.

Samantha Sukupcak fighting striped marlin Baja Mexico

Cold, Then Firecracker Hot

After a dinner of carne asada and wahoo tacos, we got a good night sleep on the boat, and woke up ready to start where we’d left off. Unfortunately, the food chain had different ideas. While we did troll up a handful of wahoo running out to the marlin grounds, nothing else was happening. No dolphins. No diving birds. Certainly no marlin. By noon, we’d caught one trolling a ballyhoo.

At times like that, you start bargaining with the fish gods:

“Please let us each get one apiece” or “All we want is double digits to say that we managed that both days.”

It’s sad that happens after a great 20-plus fish day, but those kind of results just make you greedy.

Then the light switch went on shortly after noon. Birds suddenly materialized. Marlin fins were seen here and there. A few free jumpers showed up. Bait started to gather. All of that gave us hope, but we still weren’t getting the bites we needed.

Then Jaime had the presence of mind to back down on a bait ball and scoop up a ton of live bait. That was the difference maker. I’m convinced that the fish were active enough by that point that we still would have caught some, but from then on I don’t think we pulled up to a bait ball and did not get a strike until it was time to stop fishing.

We had doubles. I think we had triples, too.

We tried to keep count, but it was challenging.

At one point I hooked what we thought would be number 36 or 37, but the fish bulldogged and would not relent. By the time I got to the leader, we figured it was either number 42 or 43, as my boatmates managed to tame several in between. It never got old feeling the fish take the bait and then run or watching them greyhound across the landscape.

It was a magical day when things just got better and better and never let up. By the end, we’d also even caught a pair of sailfish.

As for marlin, I’m not sure how many we landed. We thought it was 58. The captain said he tallied 68. It really doesn’t matter, but I’m guessing we topped 60. In total, we had at least 80, and possibly 90 striped marlin.

That’ll be hard to top. But we’d like to try.

The only thing I’m sad about is that – as my friend Elliott Stark told me – Mag Bay will ruin you for just about anyplace else.