We have a 30’ Dorado which is now available for charter here in Progreso, Yucatan, Mexico. I recommend small groups of 4 to 6 guests for this vessel. It has a tower, cuddy cabin, live well, built in fish box almost 8 feet long and built in drink and food cooler boxes. It has spray curtains to keep you dry and give you shade. It has 2 newly rebuilt Yamaha 200 HSP 2 Stroke Outboards for power. Cruising speed is about 20 knots.            

With my 14 years of experience fishing from Progreso, I know most of the fishing reefs, ledges, rocks and shipwrecks for 45 miles east and west. We also have Alacranes Reef due north of Progreso. It is a large reef system shaped as a half moon with 5 islands and an arcing reef of about 16 miles in length on the east side. It is 66 miles north of Progreso to get to the south end, which has a lighthouse and Mexican authorities on Isla Peres. The north end of the reef is about 80 miles north of Progreso. The reef is about 6 to 8 miles wide. Visitors can fish, snorkel, scuba, swim, walk on the different islands and even camp overnight. There are different fees to be paid for the various activities to be paid before you go for your permissions. It is a Mexican National Park. We hope that the Mexican Government continues to allow visitors to come enjoy this beautiful park. The reefs are spectacular and many say that they are better than Cozumel. Visibility is usually 100 feet or more. The water depths are about 160 feet deep off the south end and about 210 feet off of the north end of Alacranes. I have personally made over 100 2 to 5 day trips to Alacranes. I am more of a fisherman than diver although I have made about 15 to 20 dives at Alacranes. You could dive everyday for a year and still not come close to seeing it all.             

On the fishing, Alacranes has yellowtail snapper almost everywhere. You can troll for black grouper and barracuda along the reefs. There are scattered bunches of amberjack and other types of jacks as well. You can sometimes catch yellow fin tuna, black fin tuna, and Wahoo just offshore of the reef. I have numerous fishing holes away from the reef which are excellent for big amberjacks, big black groupers, etc. We have caught amberjacks to 66 lbs. and blacks groupers to 73 lbs. There were a 158 lb and a 99 lb black grouper caught last season away from the reef. Running northwest from the northwest side of Alacranes the depths fall rapidly from 600 feet to more than 2400 feet of water. I have fought several blue marlins from 250 to 600 lbs in this area. There are also white marlin, sailfish, Wahoo, Dorado and tuna around out there. I have a long liner captain friend of mine who has caught several blue marlin well over 500 lbs. in this area. Swordfish are also available for those interested enough to do what it takes to catch them.             

Inshore fishing around Progreso is primarily bottom fishing for yellowtail snapper, red grouper, with occasional black and gag groupers. Trolling is for Spanish mackerel, bonito, barracuda with some jacks, etc. King mackerel are more abundant in the winter.  Fishing inshore has been very good lately with good catches of bottom fish.           

At this point, all photos of fish in the photo gallery are from the Sea Queen that I run. Most of the sailfish and marlin shots were taken off of Cancun or Cozumel. The best sail fishing in North America is just northeast of Cancun. I know exactly where they are. I saw at least 10 sails and caught 2 on my last trip back from Cozumel and we caught 9 dorado to almost 30lbs.  

Lastest update on fishing report is November 2008.  The inshore bottom fishing is good and we have seen mackeral and stuff biting on top but didn't have guests who wanted to troll for them.  We did catch a jack of about 8 to10  lbs. last time we trolled right around the channel buoys about 5 miles out.

Tight Lines,

Clifford G. McCaa