DRIFTER: Los Locos
Inside the Wild, Fast, Beautiful Madness of Fly Fishing for Striped Marlin
Podcast and Writting by Hunter Leavine of the Captains Collective Podcast
Photos & Video by Ian Niklaus
Listen to the Captains Collective Podcast with the Los Locos crew HERE.
The Chase
After two hours of running through Pacific chop, the boat radio came alive. All I could make out through the constant static was, ‘Mucho Marlin. Mucho Marlin.’
Our captain throttled hard to the starboard, and the panga crashed through the water like an angry bull leaving his gate.
Frigates reluctantly picked at their pray from above. White water crumbled across the surface. Salt spray slapped my face. And every cell in my body shouted, “It’s on.”
It’s hard to explain this kind of fly-fishing, even harder to compare it to anything else I’ve done. I’ve stalked bonefish across white-sand flats, chased redfish up and down the Gulf Coast, been embarrassed by permit, watched tarpon crush flies, and untangled my fair share of leaders on trout streams.
I’m no expert, but I’ve been fortunate enough to see a lot of amazing things on the water—and nothing has been quite like this.
For the past week, between cups of coffee I’ve tried to find the words to explain what it was like. The best I could come up with is—
Imagine a rodeo, mixed with NASCAR, and a little bit of tarpon fishing…
I guess you could say it’ is something like that.
The Commute
After talking my way out of a customs tax on a small box of shirts in the Cabo airport, the Drifter crew piled into a Ford Transit and headed north to Puerto San Carlos.
Five minutes in, we stopped for essentials—beer, several varieties of spicy chips, and nicotine pouches. You know the drill.
Five hours and far too many bathroom breaks later, we rolled into Los Locos headquarters just in time for a late dinner—ranch waters, fresh seafood, and the kind of laughter that only comes after a long day on the road.
The setup was perfect: a small shop with fishing gear and merch, swell as open-air tables for rigging rods and swapping stories. It is simple in the best kind of way.
And the place was filled with the buzz of anticipation.
I could tell right away that this would be a great fit for what we are trying to seek with Drifter; community and experiences.
The Chaos
Before I get lost in the big-picture, philosophical, “this-is-what-fishing-is-all-about” spirals I’m prone to, I want to describe what the rodeo—NASCAR—style fishing is actually like.
Each boat has a captain and a guide. The captain team is made up of locals—former commercial fishermen who know this water well, and know how to run a boat in these conditions.
One of the things that makes Los Locos unique is how deeply they’ve invested in the local community, creating better-paying jobs and driving conservation efforts in Magdalena Bay.
The guide team comes from all over: from trout guides like to industry legends like Arno Matthee.
Together, the captains and guides move like salty synchronized dancers in the middle of controlled chaos.
Magdalena Bay is a special place. The mountains separate the water from the sky filled with colors that are worthy of a post card (if those are still a thing). The Pacific boils with bait and birds, and the fishery feels like you are in a National Geographic Documentary.
Once you’re in the zone, you jump from bait ball to bait ball searching for fish. Standing on the bow, I felt like a kid again—half pirate, half cowboy—preparing for battle. My sword was a nine-foot fly rod, ready to spar with a hundred-fifty-pound sea monster.
This isn’t delicate fishing. You don’t need a long cast or a soft entry. You need composure and awareness as the boat spins through shifting wind and waves. In seconds, the direction can change 180 degrees. So cast wisely.
It also takes grit. There’s no wading birds or glassy flats here. After hours bracing against the lean bar, I earned a bruise across my ribs that looked like a badge of honor.
When the bait ball erupts, you throw your intermediate or sinking line straight into the center. Pull the big EP fly clear of the chaos with smooth two-hand strips, then get ready to see a sea monster, as Arno puts it, “Crumb your fly.”
Striped marlin deliver some of the most visual eats you’ll ever see. The jumps are spectacular, the fights unforgettable—but the eats, the eats are what stay burned in your brain.
The Chew…
The one that was seared in my brain actually came from Blake Franklin. This particular bait ball was down to what had to be less than three dozen sardines.
As the bait balls are whittled down and broken up more and more chaos builds. The marlin were becoming more aggressive and sitting towards the top of the water. We each made a cast out in the madness and then saw a marlin shoot across the water like an olympic sprinter.
After completely missing my fly, this fish traveled what honestly must have been forty plus feet. It made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.
In between the hoots and the hollers, our guide exclaimed, “That is the longest charge I have ever seen!”
The Calm
As someone trying to build a travel fishing club—and hoping to do hosted trips for many years—I spend a lot of time discussing what we are really chasing.
For us, it isn’t about trophies, hero shots, or filling a digital sash with merit badges.
It’s about experiences that forge friendships and stories that last a lifetime.
The reward of this trip wasn’t one particular marlin—it was everything that came with it: the laughter, the bruises, the smell of salt and fuel, and the reminder that some of the best things in life are still earned the hard way.
SPECIAL THANKS TO OUR SPONSORS:
Skinny Water Culture, YETI, Turtlebox Audio, Florida Fishing Products, Purpose Built Optics, and My Captain.
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Website: https://captainscollective.com
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I’ve never experienced anything like this but the “NASCAR meets Rodeo” descriptor painted a clear image in my mind and dropped me right in the middle of it. Great story Hunter.