ForbesOnTech

Curses! Peach Cooties Foil My 2012 Quest for the Perfect Peach

 

There’s more to my humble gardening efforts than pushing my various heirloom tomato plants  to pump out plump fruit, or sawing off fresh thistles from towering artichoke plants. My real pride and joy is in my front yard; irregular rows of juicy stone fruits now getting wvwr tubbier in the warm late spring sunshine.

I love most stone fruits, but any fruit tree that counters my dream gets an unceremonious fast trip to the wood pile or compost heap.

My first love is freestone peaches like the two Avalon trees along on the right hand side of my front yard. I’ve worried my Avalon trees along for the last nine years. The two twigs I planted when I first moved into this place are now about 20 feet tall by 20 feet wide. I’ve not been let down by the copious peaches my two Avalons produce most years.2012 promises to be banner year for the trees. This morning, I happily noted top and mid-level branches are beginning to bough down under the weight of ripening fruits. I do my best to make sure my trees are verdant producers.

During the ripening phase, I hand water my trees daily and give them a final feeding to boost sugar and fruit production. Hand detailing fruit trees like peaches and apricots forces me to examine the overall health of trees and which of their branches produce the most fruit on a yearly basis.

Hated Peach Leaf Curl

For the last two years I’ve battled peach leaf cooties (aka “peach leaf curl”). In the 2011 dormant season, I applied Bordeaux Oil three times to prevent peach cooties this year. So imagine my horror early this week when I discovered the reappearance of peach leaf curl on my most verdant peach tree. With about 150 pounds of fruit hanging on my tree right now, Peach cooties be damned, I won’t go peachless this year.

In the quest for the perfect peach, I feel compelled to eliminate peach cooties from my stand of trees. With five weeks left before the 4^th of July, I’m already thinking about the fresh peach cobbler I’ll make for my family’s post fireworks show desert. After the last peach goes into my harvest baskets, I’ll begin doctoring and eventually pruning my trees. All in advance of next year’s crop.

Gardening not only produces healthy fruits and vegetables, it’s a rewarding rehab acivity that forces me to work on my left hand’s stroke impaired fine motor coordination—Jim ForbesMay 27,2012 

Pie! the reward for growing fruit trees!

Demo Continues to Hit Homers for its Companies and Audience-- but Presentations Need Improving

Now in its 21^st year, the technology showcase continues to grow and remains a solid proving ground for launching new companies and technologies. But like any medalist athlete, Demo can improve in order to out stride competitors.

I’ve been part of Demo for most of its life (eventually becoming one of the producers of its event) and I have some pretty strong opinions about Demo’s strengths and its weaknesses.

Right out of the starting blocks, if there’s one thing Demo producers can do to improve the show for demonstrators and attendees alike, it’s to put more effort into coaching companies on how to give demonstrations. Delivering a great pitch to Demo audiences is absolutely not the same thing as pitching to investors.

Although most companies say access to investors is an important reason for coming to Demo,  it’s the show’s list working technology reporters and editors that give it its cachet.

A six minute stage presentation that’s aimed at Demo’s press audience can quickly position a company and its technologies in and answer questions on how a company can differentiate itself.

Recently Demo has undergone several improvements that increase its viability and value.

The most important of these is its use of scholarships for very young startups, known as “Alpha Pitch” Presentations. Demo’s scholarship program is underwritten by sponsors such as Microsoft and AARP, and has helped to bring cash strapped new companies into Demo.

The second big change in Demo has been partnerships with organizations like Microsoft BizSpark and StartupAmerica who prescreen potential Demonstrators and pass the cream of their crops onto Demo’s producer as candidates.

The net effect of the changes in Demo has increased attendance and opened the show to companies located outside of the West Coast.  You had only to look at the audience and the list of Demonstrators and their locations to see the proof is this change to Demo.

Demo has faced down several challengers in its 21 year history. Now in its third decade, this technology showcase continues to generate homeruns for its demonstrators and audience.

I make no apologies for my grandstand support of the show. The long list of companies and entrepreneurs who have successfully launched at Demo grows every year.—Jim Forbes on May 23/2012.

 

More Demo 2012 Stand outs--Arqball Spin, IGen Apps,Tourwrist

Looking over my notes from Demo2012 there are several technologies and companies that really stood out.

Very High on my list is TourWrist, which demonstrated a platform that boosts opens new vistas in the visualization softare category.. TourWrist is something I suspect will have a huge impact on any organization that uses visualization to help sell or promote products or services. TourWrist lets consumers or any other visualization software user fully explore an image of a physical space. Designed initially to run only on IOS powered devices, this new technology turns computer-based visual walkthroughs into personal experiences. TourWrist’s technology lets anyone create videos that allow viewers to pan, zoom or tilt views when played on devices such as an IPad. TourWrist may have been the best technology demonstration I’ve seen at any Demo in the last 15 years and I wasn’t surprised when TourWrist left Demo with the attendee-driven People’s Choice Award and a Demo God Award for TourWrist’s CEO/presenter, Charles Armstrong.

Arqball Spin, really shined at Demo 2012. This Virginia-based startup (initially financed with a $150,000 grant from the National Science Foundation) makes creating 3D images easy and very affordable. It also lets users create 3D images using a camera phone, a concept that smashes 3D image creation barriers. Previous methods of creating 3d images have often required the use of expensive specialized equipment such as model tables, sophisticated digital, or film-based, cameras and software that’s prohibitively expensive. Moreover, Arqball Spin includes basic tools that make it easy to create and use 3D images for promotional materials, video games or any mixed media, Arqball Spin is a new technology that makes creating and using 3D images so easy, it’s now within the reach of  film school or graphic arts students. I can easily imagine using Arqball Spin to create and use 3D in promotional material for numerous products. Because Arqball Spin redefines a category. I believe it may have been one of the most important technology launches at Demo 2012.

IGenApps is a platform that lets anyone—most of all people without programming experience—create applications for smart phones. The IGenApps platform provides a set of software tools that can be used to develop custom apps using devices such as Apple’s iPhone. The apps  are stored on IGen’s cloud and created as HTML5.0 code. What sets IGen apart from other application development platforms is its ease of use, flexibility and a patented feature that detects what type of cell phone is requesting application access and then serves the app in a native format. The IGen platform also loads iPhone apps onto Apple’s application store. I Gen execs reported the platform will grow by the end of the year to support Android and Microsoft Windows phone. What IGen can do is let marketing and communications agencies quickly roll out branded applications for a variety of clients. IGenApps’ demonstration – which relied o AT&T 4G cell service--was one of the smoothest at Demo 2012. Part of this San Diego startup’s backstory is that it has been selected by Apple to participate in the Apple Developer’s world tour and it’s caught the attention of a large technology company who wants to use IGen Apps to improve the capabilities of forthcoming smartphones.

InterPhase Corporation’s Penveu was a hardware product launched at Demo 2012 that deserves a very close look.  Penveu is a handheld electronic pen that can be used with electronic whiteboards, computer monitors are other display technologies to communicate and teach. Although electronic whiteboards have been around for nearly a decade, their prohibitive cost has reigned this technology in. Penveu’s ability to be used with a variety of display technologies could help to bring white boarding to where it’s needed most, public school and university classrooms, as well as business settings. Earlier attempts at handheld pointers and input devices for white boards have lacked the ergonomic design, 40-foot transmission range, and the ability to remotely store lessons or presentations—features that are ubique to this Texas company’s Penveu device. Another big Penvue plus is its entry-level  pricing, less than $700 for a device with 8GB of memory ( equipped with 32GB of memory it costs $800)  the entry level Penveu system appears to be  inexpensive enough for many most school district IT budgets. One of the many things I liked about this Demo 2012 company was that it came to the event not just to show new technology but also to announce distribution and channel relationships.

There were more than 70 companies launching products at Demo 2012 last month and at 21 years old this continues to be the venue that generates the most buzz for it presenters.

If it seems like I’m a Demo supporter, I am. I produced Demo branded events and editorial products until 2002.—Jim Forbes 05/16/2012.

 

The Veteran's Administration Comes Through-- What a Great Organization!

 

I’m a veteran who only recently allowed myself to be embraced in the comforting arms of the Veteran’s Administration.

My path to the VA involved me coming to realize that the VA was incredibly equipped to help me deal with some uncomfortably personal issues.

The most frightening of which was my repeated exposure to Agent Orange defoliants throughout much of 1968. There’s nothing quite like the fear of Non-Hodgkin’s Lymphoma and the appearance of swollen glands to grab your attention.

But that was just one of several service-related issues that made me go to the VA. Another is that I’ve been hearing impaired since 1968—when as a young man I was assigned to a much a combat base on the border with Laos called Khe Sanh.

 I remember three distinct things about that period; we were hammered by incoming NVA artillery (like up to 450 rounds daily) , we lived in underground bunkers and I was in one that got hit

In addition to being pretty deaf, I am also claustrophobic. Long term friends and colleagues think my letting them go through a doorway first is gallantry on my part.

Ha! It’s not; I need to feel like I have an escape route.

So I finally went to the VA to talk to someone about the little leftover surprises from my service in the Marines. I was advised to register at the VA clinic in Oceanside, CA (about 20 miles from my home in Escondido.).

What an incredible experience!

I was made to feel respected the moment I walked in the door. But more importantly, it was made very clear to me that the VA was there to help me.

I had my first consult with a VA doctor this afternoon. He patiently went over my personal health history and I answered his questions very honestly. The VA doc spent about an hour with me. At the end of the appointment he referred me to the audiology unit who will test my hearing next week and got me up to date on immunizations.

The short take on my experience with the VA is that it’s a first rate organization with incredibly competent and very dedicated doctors, nurses and other medical professionals. But more importantly both of the VA facilities I’ve used were clean, cheerful facilities that really do provide vital services to armed forces veterans.

A nice benefit I’m using is a smoking cessation clinic. It’s time I put down monster nicotine and the VA thinks it can help sever my connection with that Jones.

See what happens when you look at all the things you hump around in your backpack and become ready to unload it?  Life gets better.  Moreover, I am very confident that the children and other descendants of my generation who are veterans can count on the Veteran’s Administration to provide great services and incredible medical care.—Jim Forbes on May 14, 2012.

 

Geo Tag and other Meta Data technologies Really Shine at Demo 2012-- John Fortt's Intuit Q&A Sets New Standard

Demo 2012 was a little like watching a road being revealed in the bright light of high powered quartz halogen high beams – what’s unveiled by the light is sometimes overlooked the casual observers

Up front, I need to disclose I have strong opinions about Demo. I produced Demo branded events and interviewed thousands of companies in conjunction with this family of technology showcases.

There was a lot to see and experience at Demo 2012 last month. More than 1,000 attendees saw about 70 companies with new consumer, business and enterprise technologies. What was shining brightly in Demo’s hi beams was CNBC business reporter John Fortt’s interview with Intuit’s CEO, Brad Smith.

Fortt was at the top of his game. His interview of Smith completely reversed my somewhat negative view of conference Q&A sessions. It was the best CEO interview I’ve seen at a conference since the days of Stuart Alsop’s legendary one-on-ones with Bill Gates at the Agenda Conferences.

Fortt’s preparation for his one on one with Smith was stunning. By the time his segment ended, I fully understood what drove Intuit’s usability efforts and had new insight into the company’s intrapreneurial and external acquisition strategies. Frankly, I’m surprised Intuit’s executive management hasn’t been selected for any executive technology show case one-on-one conversation before now. This veteran technology company is literally the 10,000 pound gorilla that dominates a large part of the Silicon Valley jungle.

The CNBC correspondent’s Q&A with Brad Smith illuminates the uneven nature of most conference panels. When a discussion leader and panelists prepare for their discussions and are not allowed to venture into self-serving pitches on portfolio companies, panels can provide attendees with deep insight into emerging trends or real market opportunities. And ultimately it’s up to an event’s producer to map out their expectations on the purpose of the panel.

After sitting through two presentations by companies with technologies that enhance the important of geotags I understand that there are still major opportunities in mining metadata information. GeoTrex—which lets organizations push enhance content to patrons’ smart phones and tablets based on their physical location in a facility appears to have good commercial potential and fulfills an underserved need. This company did the one thing that helps to validate a Demo stage presentations— a customer endorsement. GeoTrex’s first installation is Midwestern zoo that uses the technology to provide visitors with additional information on its animals or exhibits.

As a San Diego zoo and Los Angeles Museum of Science and Industry patron, I immediately understood why some organizations should adopt GeoTrex’s technology.

ShareWith911.com was an alpha startup at Demo 2012 with a Geotag related technology. The idea driving this Chesapeake Bay Area company is the capability to send photos taken with camera phones of scenes where emergency services are needed to a centralized site that’s designed to be accessed by emergency dispatchers.

If the idea sets off alarms in your head that this might be too much information, settle down. It’s not. Moreover, ShareWith 911.com does something that’s not been done before and provides several pieces of critical information needed by emergency responders—the physical location of an accident scene and mixed media (graphics and text)—that increases first responders’ situational awareness. But what really impressed me about this startup was a feature that extracts and displays the geotag data in about one second.

ShareWith 911.com came to Demo2012 via a partnership with StartupAmerica. This demonstrator’s technology may seem to have a small market, but the technology comes at a time when the federal government is pumping millions of dollars into first response agencies nationwide. Moreover, this is exactly the type of application that providers of computerized automatic dispatch systems can use to differentiate their products or make them more appealing and useful to law enforcement, fire departments and other services who serve rural areas with landmarks or mile markers that are not apparent to 911 callers.

There were sveral pother Demo2012 companies and tends I want to spotlight in tomorrow’s post—jim Forbes May 9, 2012.

Plinking,Pests and Pickles-- Garden Darwinism

When it comes to my gardening, I can be ruthless and cold-blooded. If a vegetable doesn’t thrive after bfor a month, I have a simple policy; it’s unceremoniously plucked from the ground.

This weekend I noticed the enemy vole army had attacked my broccoli, so I pulled their withering cadavers and put the greens under my peach tree, where my local cottontails gather in the morning sheltering from hungry birds of prey.

Clearing space in my garden is a very good thing. I get to try new plants and every year I learn a lot more about what my garden can and cannot produce. Rather than lose more young seedlings to tunneling voles, I proned out this evening above my garden waiting for the voles to surface; with my loaded and cocked Beeman pellet rifle.

When it comes garden predator control I have two choices, Type One poisons such as strychnine or sharpshooting sharp. A well placed high velocity pellet doesn’t have produce downstream effects in the produce I grow and eat, and the damn voles don’t suffer when you shoot them in their little buck toothed heads. 

 

I’ll come back to my wanton slaughter of voles in a moment
but what I wanted to write about is something I’m growing for the first time
this year, a hybrid cucumber called the “Perfect Pickle.” 

I've already been wanred; I may need to string the Perfect Pickle hybrid on trrellises because they have the reputation for bing verdant producer. SoI'm of to Hiome Depit later this moning to buy some PVC to make yet more frames for some lanky vegetables.

I’ve graved trout and salmon but I’ve never pickled produce.
This summer, I want to make kosher dills and pickled Mexican onions. Pickling is a, a process I understand. I have
my supplies stored in the garage and expect to begin pickling sometime in late
July or early August after my three new cucumber plants bear.

My garden is a source of extreme enjoyment. I enjoy making
dinner for my family with ingredients I grew just 50 feet from my house and I
love working in the dirt and seeing my plants grow.

Apparently the local meadow mice (aka “the enemy voles”)
like my vegetables too. Unfortunately for them, I’m better armed and still a
very good shot. So what do you do with a vole or gopher carcass?

I’m thinking about turning them into cases for eye glasses. Can’t
you just imagine the listing on eBay?, “Gardener’s Revenge glasses cases—includes
snout/latch so you never lose your glasses.“

I hate the damn voles about as much as I dislike the
visiting diamondbacks who show up here in the summer—Jim Forbes May 6,2012.

 

Give Me Back my Peanut,NOW!

Squirrel pup grabass on my front porch Sunday morning

Beating the CA Trout Opener Combat Fishing Crowds-- Big Bites Now at Fuller and Manzanita Lake.

Woe is me, it’s the California 2012 trout opener weekend and I’m stuck at home nursing the worlds worse cold.

But my hacking and wheezing hasn’t stopped two friends in central California who respooled  their reels and restocked their tackle boxes and hit a couple of my all-time favorite California trout spots; Fuller Lake east of grass valley, CA on north of Highway 20 and Manzanita Lake in  Madera County CA.

I often write about Fuller Lake and my limits at this under fished Lake on the West slope of the Sierra recommend it more than any other spot in California.

Dam face at Fuller is at bottom of picture.

Fuller is a jewel it’s a shallow lake only 90 minutes from Sacramento and it’s the perfect place to introduce children to trout fishing. Over the last 15 years I have yet to go to Fuller and get skunked. Although I’m an experienced fly fisherman, Fuller is the kind of place that begs anyone to put a gob of chartreuse or corn floating bait on a #16 treble and toss it on a slider rig with a quarter-ounce weight into this lake’s crystal clear water.

One of the biggest reasons I recommend Fuller as a family fishing destination is that it’s seldom crowded—which means you can teach kids how to cast without worrying about them fowling another person’s lines by over casting. More importantly most of this lake has shallow shorelines—allowing you to take kids into the water while showing them where to  place their rigs in clear water away from aquatic vegetation shoals.

this is not my fish, damnit!

But the best reason to use Fuller as a teaching experience is that it’s loaded with tasty leaping trout. Although I’ve only once seen Fish and Game’s Trout mobile at the lake in all the years I’ve fished here, it has a large numbers of holdover fish that aggressively hit bait or spinner lures like light white or yellow Mepps spinners.

 

The two places where I’ve had the most luck t Fuller are from the face of the small dam on the downstream side, and from the shore just upstream of the dam. Another place to try at Fuller is the northeast corner of the lake where a stream empties into the Lake. The only place I’ve consistently caught hold over brownies at Fuller is fishing from a float tube in in front of the confluence of this stream and the lake.

There is a campground on the North end of this lake, if you want to make your trip to Fuller a family vacation.

Lake Manzanita is another family fishing destination I strongly recommend. Located north and east of Friant, CA near the town of North Fork. Mazanita is loaded with hungry stocker rainbows just waiting to be caught by a young or other fisherman on a no-frills West slope Sierra fishing trip. The place to go here is a small peninsula on Manzanita’s north shore near the face of the dam. There is a huge boulder near the face of the dam and trout seem to congregate in the deep between it and the dam’s face. If you’re throwing a lure in this lake, make sure you give it enough time to get near the bottom and use a twitchy return. On an average day you may be surprised to get hit by a two pound,20-inch, trout that’s been hiding in the deep cold water west of the boulder here.

th fishies at Manzanita hang out on th ight side of this boulder.

(Note, there are two Manzanita Lakes in California. The Manzanita Lake I’m writing about is in Madera County. The other Lake with the same name is much further north in Lassen County—jmf)

There is a nice campground at the east end of this lake.

typical Rainbw from Manzanita

I’ve never experience combat fishing at either Fuller or Manzanita. I’ve also always caught trout for the nightly frying pan at both locations. A valid California sport fishing license is required at both lakes, and if you’re 16,. or older, you need to buy a license.

It’s tine to restring your reels, buy some sharp hooks and clean up your old lures. I’ll be the old guy wearing a red, white and blue tie dyed t-shirt drifting by in a float tube, whipping the water with a proven fly, but carrying a bottle of floating bait, just in case. Tight lines, Jim Forbes on April 28,2012.

 

Why I Use Reforest.com's Feed and Forget Extreme Gardening Organic Feeder Packs.

Like most Southern California gardeners, I fight mineral deficient, alkaloid soils. Over the last nine years I’ve done a lot to my 90 by 40-foot garden patch to make it more productive.

The list of things I’ve done isn’t short. It begins with cubic yards of compost I’ve tilled into the soil and from there jumps to big bags of worm casings. I can grow enough tomatoes, spuds and sweet onions to meet household needs, but at the end of the gardening season, I’m often disappointed by the size of the root balls of my heirloom stock. For as much effort as I put into my garden, I think my plants could be better.

In the middle of last year I was at my favorite local nursery here in Escondido sniveling to one of their gardeners. As I put a couple of Brussels sprouts seedlings and some fast growing cherry tomatoes  into a box, he reached below the counter and threw in two  packets of a new organic feed supplement and told me to “stick one of these packets in the bottom  of each hole and put the plant on top of the (teabag-sized)” packet”.

I’m not beyond experimenting in my garden and I was reasonably confident that I couldn’t go very wrong.

I set four Brussels sprout stalks—two using the packets and two in further down the row in identical soil.

Wow, I’m impressed. The control plants in my little experiment topped out at 34 inches. The two subjects of my experiment grew to approximately 48 inches and were loaded with ripening little miniature cabbages.

The damn voles chopped down one of my freakishly tall sprout stalks, but the surviving stalk is just huge.

Thr name of the supplement is Extreme Organic& Natural Feed Packs. It’s developer is Reforestation Technologies Inc.,(www.Reforest.com)  in Salinas, CA. Extreme Organic Natural Feed Packs are slow release and have a 6-4-4 rating.

This is a “feed (in the starting hole) and forget product.” The packet containing the organic feed is biodegradable and the roots absorb the feed that dissolves into the planting medium.

Sequoia-like Brussels sprouts are nice, but what really drove me to buy a 100 pack zip lock bag of Reforest.com’s Extreme Gardening Organic feed packs was its effect on my tomato vines. After I picked the last of  of San Marzanos in late November, I carefully excavated the plant.

It’s taproot was 13 inches long and its lateral roots were appx 18 inches. And the two Italian heirlooms I grew using one packet each out produced my control plants by three pints of fruit each.

I recommend RTI’s Extreme Gardening Organic & Natural Feeder Packs. The only thing I’d like to see in this garden feed is a vole repellent. But that’s why I have a Beeman .177 air rifle and a scoped single-shot .22 as a backup rodent control solutions.—Jim “Farmer” Forbes on April 22,2012.

 

How the American Legion and the VA Made my World Better

 

As a result of opening my eyes and agreeing to come in from the cold in the last month, I’ve had a long standing view of two organizations completely upended.

There was a time in my life when I didn’t talk much about the fact that I was a Marine Corps veteran who served at Khe Sanh and Hue at a time when both places were battlegrounds. I wasn’t ashamed of my service; in fact I’ve come to realize that it had a profound impact on my life; some good and some bad.

Very few people I worked with during my early days covering technology in Silicon Valley knew I had been in the Marines and fewer still knew I had been at Khe Sanh and elsewhere  in South Vietnam long ago.

I didn’t hang out with other veterans and I had resisted joining either of the two most well-known veteran’s organizations.

I  used one very few part of my veteran’s benefits’I went to college on the GI Bill. And in 1971 I went to a VA clinic to see a doctor, an experience that soured me on the VA for many years.

But my life has changed recently and I wanted to find out more about my veteran’s benefits. And my quest led me to a local American Legion post here in Escondido where several members pointe me to the VA and made sure I knew what to do to take action. So I joined the American Legion and I use it as a “club house” of sorts. Whenever I need to socialize an can get away from my duties around the house, I pop up to the Legion, read a  book and have a Coke in the patio.

Over a soft drink one of the officers of my local Legion Post patiently explained to me how the VA worked, plus how much it had changed in the last 30 years. He provided me with the information I needed to make a VA enrollment appointment at a local clinic and patiently explained that Legion volunteers were on hand at the two largest clinics here in San Diego County and there job was to help guide me through the VA’s organization.

So I had my first appointment with the VA today, had my picture taken for a VA ID card and was incredibly surprised by the experience. I waited two minutes for my appointment, was courteously treated by an enrollment officer who made the point of telling me “we’re here to help you.”

I quickly outlined the three service-related reasons I wanted to enroll with the VA:

I believe long term exposure to incoming and outgoing artillery caused permanent hearing loss in both of ears;

I think that as a result of having been in a bunker that took a direct hit from an incoming North Vietnamese artillery round, I have profound claustrophobia—aka PTSD;

Most of all, I was exposed to Agent Orange at least three times during the time I was in Vietnam.

I’ve always felt slightly ashamed about going to the VA with this. However, the enrolling agent at the clinic set me up with the appointments I need to get the ball rolling, and, he made sure I understood I should feel no shame for seeking help from the VA.

I’ve never felt more satisfied with any government agency interaction than I have with the VA clinic in Oceanside, CA.

Wow, they just knocked my socks off.

And it all started with the simple act of spending $35 to join a local American Legion post and asking for help from other veterans who had been in my shoes.

After a lot of years, I’m beginning to understand what it means to have been thanked for my service and to really have been “welcomed home.”-- Jim Forbes April 4, 2012.

 

 

Embrace Your Inner Steinbeck-- Sea of Cortez Fishing in Loreto, Baja Sur

Every year about this time, my mind wanders as waiting for schools of tasty yellowtail to swim north from the warm coast of Baja California.

If the fish won’t come to me, I think about going to the fish. And one of the best fisheries in North America isn’t very far from me, it’s just south of the Border with Mexico in Loreto, Baja Sur, Mexico. It’s hard not to have grown up in Southern California and not know about the fishing in Baja and the sleepy Mission village of Loreto on the Sea of Cortez.

Loreto isn’t Cabo San Luis or Mazatlan, it’s a nice safe little town that in my lifetime has developed a reputation as the place to go for  limits of yellowtail, pargo nd other snappers, ‘cudas, trigger fish or mackerel family members that will spool or fry your reel. Yes the fishing in Baja’s Sea of Cortez is really that good.

The first time I ever lost a reel full of expensive line and fried a reel was in Loreto. It was a life-altering experience that forged my bond with this town. I was young and didn’t understand that there are times when a used $25 fishing reel and cheap hooks are sometimes completely inadequate. I know better now

A big yellowtail inshore at Loreto taught me that lesson.

Getting to Loreto is now as easy a booking a flight on Alaska Airlines out of Los Angeles International. Alaska now offers two 737 flights a day to Loreto. It’s a short 90 minute hop down Baja from LAX to this fishing paradise. Hotel accommodations range anywhere from about $(US)55 a night for a basic room in a nice hotel to $(US) 100 a night for an upscale establishment. Don’t fret catching El Tourista in Loreto. The food is fresh and  tasty.

Every hotel in Loreto is capable of getting you on a panga from the beach out to the fishing grounds. Panga fishing is synonymous with the Loreto experience. Pangasfa are open boats so be sure to bring your sunscreen and a hat. In all the years I’ve fished Loreto; I’ve never been skunked or come back to the beach with fewer than four nice fish.

But while Loreto has a well-deserved reputation as a fishing destination, it’s also flat out beautiful and the site of marine ecological preserve and one of the oldest and prettiest  California missions, Mision de Nuestra Senora de Loreto Concho.

Loreto is full of surprises, one of which I made hiking up a stream coming down from the brown hills to the west of the town. My mellow was harshed when I saw two foot-long trout jump from a pool chasing an afternoon hatch. Trout in Baja? Si, all things are possible here.

If you go to Loreto and stay more than three days you need a visa, which is available for $24 from any Republic of Mexico consulate or embassy. In addition, a valid US passport is required for travel in an out of Mexico.

If you’re nervous about airline baggage fees, fishing tackle and gear can be rented in Mexico. More information on traveling to Loreto can be found at http://www.mexinsider.com/loreto-tourist-information.html.

Don’t forget to bring your camera, sketch pad and embrace your inner Steinbeck on the Sea of Cortez. Tight lines. Jim Forbes on April 1, 2012.

 

 

 

be still my heart, a nice loreto tasty fish