Guatemala is a fishing wonderland. It’s calm, productive waters are home to the world’s best sailfish fishery and perhaps the best volume billfish fishery on Earth. The blue marlin fishing here can be really, really good. If you hit it right, you can catch all the dorado and yellowfin tuna you’d like, too.
This result is an action-packed, well-rounded offshore destination that is perhaps as consistent and reliable as any place you will find. Of course, fishing is fishing, but when it’s good here (which is quite a bit of the time), the blue water fishing in Guatemala can reframe your perspective.
It is this fishery—in all of its numbers and its consistency—that has been attracting anglers from around the world to Guatemala since the 1980s. It is this fishery that serves as the foundation of the Sailfish Oasis experience.
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What follows is some context as to what makes Guatemala such an incredible destination. When you preface an article with the phrase “home to the best volume billfish fishery in the world” you ought to provide some context.
Part context, part invitation, what follows is a breakdown of why we love fishing in Guatemala so much. Part invitation, part context, this is also an explanation as to why we’d like to take you fishing in Guatemala.
An All-Around Fishery
When it comes to catching sailfish, there is Guatemala and there is everywhere else. The fish stack up here and are present year-round. Year in, year out, Guatemala produces sailfish numbers that are not matched by any place in the world.
The peak sailfish season starts in late November and runs through early March. It is these months that often produce the best numbers of the year. That said, we catch sailfish—and can have waves of really good sailfish numbers—throughout the year.
The fish do not show up here by accident. The Pacific Coast of Guatemala is home to quite a bit of bottom topography. When underwater currents deflect off of the canyons and ridges, they bring nutrient-rich, oxygenated water to the surface. This upwelling feeds phytoplankton that supports lots and lots of bait.
All of this bait, in turn, feeds sailfish, blue marlin, lots and lots of dorado, schools of yellowfin tuna, and marine life of all sort. While fishing in Guatemala, you’re likely to see all manner of bird, plenty of sea turtles, perhaps a shoal or two of spinner dolphin, and more.
The sea is alive in Guatemala. All of the life is not here by accident.
It all relates to the bait. It is this bottom topography and the steady presence of bait, that make the fishing here so consistent, so well-rounded, and so good.
Sailfish Oasis: Lodge Records
When it comes to offshore fishing, there is no such thing as a guarantee. As a rule, you should perhaps distrust an operation that promises a certain number or outcome.
At Sailfish Oasis, we guarantee that we’ll be prepared for whatever the day has in store. We promise that we’ll be prepared and that we’re good at our craft. We catch lots of fish and we do so quite often.
Our lodge operates in some of the fishiest water on Earth. While we can’t guarantee a 30-release day or that you’ll raise 100 fish over three days of fishing (you very well might or you might see or release quite a few more), we can provide our lodge records as context to just how good the fishing in Guatemala can be.
These are our best days. They have taken place fishing here and have all occurred since 2009.
Most Sailfish Releases In A Single Day: 73
Most Sailfish Releases On Fly In A Single Day: 23
Most Blue Marlin Releases In A Single Day: 7 blues released from 13 bites.
Biggest Yellowfin Tuna: 269 pounds
Biggest Dorado: 61 pounds
Most Sailfish Releases on a Trip: 520
This was a group that fished a total of 10 boat days. Three boats fishing for three days, one boat fishing a day prior. The clients hooked fish themselves. It was a Hell of a trip.
The Context of Lodge Records
We provide these lodge records here not as a promise or guarantee that you’ll release 70 sailfish in a day. That’s not likely…
We provide them as context for just how good the fishing in Guatemala can be. These are the best days we’ve ever had. These best days occurred through the years and through many other really good days of fishing.
That we’re able to so consistently provide trips that are really good has been part of our ability to stay in business so long. We take quite a bit of pride that.
There’s nothing like putting clients onto a day of fishing that is good enough to reframe their perspective about good fishing. And that’s part of what makes Guatemala so special.
But these lodge records provide something else. They provide proof of just how much different Guatemala is from other destinations.
Sailfish
The numbers, when taken individually and within the context of their collective, illustrate something fundamental. You could fish your whole life in most parts of the world and not see 500 sailfish. Most fishermen do.
If you fish along the Gulf Coast or the East Coast of the U.S., if you fish Australia or New Zealand…. If you fish the Mediterranean, the Caribbean, the eastern Atlantic… or most anywhere else in the world, you’d be lucky to see 50 sailfish in a season, let alone have the chance to release 50 in a day.
We hosted a lucky group of anglers who released 500 sailfish over the course of a single trip. That is the type of thing that can only happen in Guatemala.
We see enough sailfish, consistently enough, that we can target them on the fly. In most other parts of the world, this would be impractical. You simply don’t see enough fish or get enough chances to target billfish with a fly rod in most places.
Our lodge record is 23 sailfish released in a day on a fly rod. The sailfish are thick enough here, often enough, that we are practiced with it and keep it ready.
You just can’t do that in most other parts of the world. There just aren’t enough billfish.
Blue Marlin
We catch lots of blue marlin, too. Our best day, we raised 13 and released 7. That’s without a real-time sonar and without FADs.
Most times throughout the year, there are enough blue marlin around that we have the chance to catch one or two on a trip. May through August they are here in their best numbers. We’ll get waves of marlin throughout the year beyond that window.
There are not many places in the world that offer even the slightest chance to release 30 sailfish and two blue marlin in a trip—let alone a day. We can’t promise it will happen for you in Guatemala, but it happens quite a bit. And we are always ready when the opportunity presents itself.
Dorado and Tuna
Sailfish and blue marlin are the foundation of Guatemala’s bluewater experience. But the dorado fishing can be really good here, too. The biggest we’ve caught at the lodge was 61 pounds.
We catch plenty of dorado in the 30-40 pound range, too. There are times when the 15-25 pound dorado are thick enough to be a nuisance.
We’ll find trees floating in blue water that are covered in dorado. It’s great fun. It’s also quite a bit of fun to see the blunt head of a big bull dolphin, all lit up in yellow and neon blue, knife its way through the spread to pile on a long rigger or crash a teaser.
The lodge record yellowfin went 269-pounds. That’s a solid tuna anywhere.
We often find schools of tuna offshore, frequently with pods of spinner dolphin. We troll around them and catch lots of tuna in the 60-100 pound range. It’s great fun and makes for an exciting boat lunch.
Again, the tuna fishing can be really good here. When you take it within the context of the incredible sailfish numbers, the consistent blue marlin presence, and the dorado fishing, it illustrates just how unique and well-rounded the offshore fishing Guatemala really is.
Were that not enough, the seas are generally calm here, too. There’s a lot to like.
What All This Means For You
Guatemala is the world’s best volume billfish fishery. It is also remarkable in the length of its fishing season. There are plenty of places that are good for a month or three, Guatemala’s offshore fishing is good nearly year-round.
What does this mean to you? We’ve got a lot to offer to many types of fishermen.
Many of our clients are tournament teams who come down to practice. It’s a great place to learn bait and switch because we get so many shots.
It’s also a great place for people who want to understand what offshore fishing is all about. If you’re after your first billfish, there aren’t many safer or better bets than right here. We’d love to show you the ropes of what makes offshore fishing so fun and so captivating— and we do that for many anglers from all over the world, every year.
Because the water is calm and there are so many fish, Guatemala is a great place to bring kids or older anglers. Sailfish are not only great fun, they are also not as physically demanding as a big tuna or marlin. This makes the fishing and the experience accessible to people of more physical backgrounds.
Are you after your best day offshore? Want to catch a billfish on a fly? Want to experience an exotic, fully-catered fishing trip… calm seas, cold beer, chef-prepared meals, and boat lunches made from your catch? We got you.
Perhaps most fundamentally, Guatemala is a fun place to fish. We really enjoy it. If you’ve read this far, I’d bet you’d like it too.
Come and see us. At Sailfish Oasis, we’ve made our reputation providing the full Guatemala experience, delivered in a way that makes you the star of the show.
