Casa Blanca Fly Fishing Lodge Hosted Trip Report – October 2023

Casa Blanca Fly Fishing Lodge is a one of a kind fly fishing lodge with its unique and remote location that is easily accessible from Cancun. Access is only via a private landing strip on the island of Punta Pajaros, located on the Southeast tip of Ascension Bay. The island is home to two sister lodges, Casa Blanca and Playa Blanca. Casa Blanca accesses and fishes Ascension Bay while Playa Blanca accesses and fishes Espiritu Santo Bay to the south. To simplify logistics, most anglers arrive in Cancun a night early and stay Courtyard Marriott. Travel from Cancun to the lodge is a easy 45-minute ride in a Cessna 206 from the Cancun FBO to Punta Pajaros. Guests are always welcomed to the lodge with open arms and a delicious margarita. This first day is spent getting settled, unpacking, putting rods together and sometimes walking the flats at the lodge for some DYI bone-fishing. Unfortunately for us, the flats around the lodge weren’t fishable on our first day due to some foul weather the days prior to our arrival. Some of us drove down to Playa Blanca that afternoon to visit with some old friends and check out some changes to the lodge. Once the rest of the group arrived at the lodge, we had appetizers and finished getting everyone’s gear dialed in for the week of fishing. A relaxing and great way to start the trip.

Sunday starts your first of 6 days of fishing at Casa Blanca. Our guides for the week were David, Pato and Eladio and we planned to rotate guides through the week so everyone would get a chance to fish with different guides. We had great weather on day 1. Good sunshine and mild winds. Sun is major factor when flats fishing. Without sun, visibility and seeing fish is extremely difficult. In reflection, this was one of our most productive day of the trip. Both Jon and myself caught permit and other anglers from the group catching plenty of bonefish. Everyone in the group had opportunities for permit shots and there were several tarpon encounters as well. I was lucky enough to get a Grand Slam this day! Jon’s permit catch happened on his first cast of the trip and was the first permit he has landed in his life. Permit fishing is easy, right?

The fishing program at Casa Blanca is a lot about routine. The lodge staff is happy to start your day with a wake-up call with coffee. The morning program consists of breakfast service, lunch and gear prep and then meeting the guides at the boats. Lunch is buffet style that includes cold cut sandwich options and a variety of local Mexican dishes with options for anyone. The lodge can accommodate any dietary restrictions or allergies as well. Everyone targeted different species this day, with mixed success. The permit fishing was a little fickler this day due to broken cloud cover. During the sunny periods, everyone were seeing and engaged in permit shots. By the end of the day, the clouds ended up pushing our 3 boats towards calmer, shallower water more suited to fishing for bonefish. The nightly happy hour, appetizers, and dinner program at Casa Blanca is enjoyed by everyone! After settling back in to the lodge from fishing, anglers enjoy a beverage of choice and delicious appetizers. All of the food on the island is made from scratch and is honestly the best some of the best lodge cuisine many anglers have ever experienced. The dock fishing madness began on Monday night after dinner. Rob managed to hook a few tarpon off the dock and even landed one!

Tuesday/Day 4 turned into a very special day on the water. All anglers spent the morning looking for permit, which didn’t prove to be all that productive and everyone adjusted their focus to other species. Jon and I spent most of the targeting snook. We likely had 30-40 shots at snook! We landed a few and had a ton of fun in the process. Then the wind died around lunch time. The entire bay went slick calm to what the locals call “bonanza” conditions. Jon and I adjusted our tactics to begin looking for permit. Within the first 2 minutes of searching, we had our first shot! Often during these calm conditions, the permit will float to the water surface and begin tailing – a sight to behold! While it is awesome to see tailing permit in slick conditions, fishing for them is extremely difficult. They are easily spooked in these calm conditions. We saw permit spook just from putting our line in the air to false cast. Nevertheless, the beuaty of a tailing permit and these calm conditions is an experience in and of itself. The night time dock madness continued after dinner, with a couple more tarpon getting landed. The dock is a special part of the Casa Blanca program. Fish gravitate towards the lights on the dock after dark and you can often see a mix of permit, tarpon, jacks, barracudas and bonefish.

Mid-week, the weather turned south on us. We woke up to pouring rain with wind and decided to delay our start by a couple of hours to wait out the storms. Rob and Chris ventured down to the tarpon lagoon on the south side of the island. The other two boats stayed close to the lodge in the Santa Rosa lagoon system. Santa Rosa is a very unique attribute to Casa Blanca. It can provide a refuge from strong winds where other lodges are exposed. We would be fishing in Santa Rosa for the next 3 days as rain and very strong winds would continue for the remainder of the trip. Santa Rosa is home to bonefish, tarpon, and snook; however, it is mostly a bonefish fishery. The bonefish in here are larger than what you may find in the bay, averaging somewhere in the 3 to 4 pound range. They are usually found in smaller groups or singles, which make the fishing a bit more challenging than the schools of smaller fish found in the bay. The fishing day was a short as the rain got intensified once we got on the water. Most of us returned to the lodge a couple hours early to dry out. Despite the weather outlook, we enjoyed a great dinner of traditional Mexican dishes and margaritas. The Wednesday night “Mexican Night” has become a staple tradition on trips to Casa Blanca and Playa Blanca and it is often the favorite meal of the week. You just have to go to experience it!

A literal “rinse and repeat” of the day before, we again woke up to a soaking rain and strong winds. We decided to wait out the morning storm and headed into Santa Rosa around 8:30. Paul and I ventured deeper into Santa Rosa and through its unique mangrove tunnel system that connects each lagoon. We had an awesome day chasing nice bonefish back in some areas of the lagoon that we had not visited the day before. Although there aren’t a ton of snook and tarpon in Santa Rosa, we managed to find a few and land a nice baby tarpon. Despite the rain, clouds and wind; we all salvaged the fishing day. We had a blast this day cruising through the mangroves and exploring some new territory. Once back at the lodge, the anglers down at Playa Blanca invited us down for cocktails and a soccer game. We jumped on the opportunity and drove the 30 minutes down to Playa Blanca to enjoy watching the staff/client soccer game as well as some cocktails and appetizers. It was great to mingle with the anglers down at Playa Blanca and great addition to the weekly fishing routine.

The rain and wind continued for our final day on the water. Friday was tough all around. The rain was continuous and we never got a break from the clouds. Despite the conditions, everyone was successful targeting bonefish to complete a great final day of fishing. Everyone’s gear was thoroughly soaked from the day, so the lodge got everything dried out for us before we packed our bags. Due to the foul weather, our pilots for our departure flight arrived this afternoon to spend the night at the lodge so the planes would be ready to go Saturday morning. They had dinner with us this night with great conversation and stories about flying in and out of the dirt landing strip on Punta Pajaros. After dinner we enjoyed one last margarita and parted ways to get our bags packed and prepare for our departure on Saturday.

All that was left for us at Casa Blanca was a final awesome breakfast, coffee and a plane ride off the island. With the weather being “spicy,” the pilots saw their window and off we went to Cancun after saying out goodbyes to the lodge staff who had welcomed us so graciously for the week. Until next time, Casa Blanca!

For those interested in Casa Blanca Fly Fishing Lodge, please contact WorldCast Anglers. Be sure to stay updated on the WorldCast Anglers Hosted Destination Travel Offerings!