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Last year, when we were planning our annual family vacation, we faced a major dilemma about where we should vacation. After putting much thought and discussion into it, we finally decided on a place that would fit all of our needs. It would be the beautiful, hot, and sunny city of Zuhuatanejo, Mexico. Our research had shown that this was the place for relaxation, sun worshipping, great dining, shopping, and most of all world class fishing.
Zuhuatanejo is a small fishing village known as the Sailfish capitol of the world, as they post the biggest Sailfish record every year. Sailfish, which are one of the fastest fish in the ocean, can grow as large as 6 to 8 feet long, making it one of the most difficult fish to catch, whether you are shore fishing or boat fishing. It is not uncommon for a hooked Sailfish to take several hours to get to shore or onto the boat.
Having done some research about Zuhuatanejo before we left home, paid off. We knew right away what we wanted to do. So, my son and I left my wife to sun worshipping and shopping, while we went to the pier to check out the local fisherman. Each local we spoke with had a fascinating tale of catching the biggest Sailfish ever. If this was true, there would have been over 30 records.
On our adventure, we came across Luis, a local fisherman with his own charter company. Luis and his first mate, Antonio, had just arrived at the pier, with some vacationers from South Dakota. With them they had an unbelievable catch; 2 Sailfish, 3 Yellow Fin Tuna, and 14 Mahi-Mahis. We couldn’t believe our eyes. There, right in front of us was the catch of our dreams; the only problem being that it wasn’t ours. The fish belonged to the man from South Dakota and his son. I was excited and bummed all at the same time. Man, what an emotional roller coaster!
Within the next few minutes I overheard Luis explaining the mounting process to the South Dakota man. Within 4 weeks and $1500.00 later, he was going to have his very own professionally mounted Sailfish, and a plastic one at that.
I went for it right away and booked Luis for the next available fishing trip. My wife thought I was crazy, spending $900 on a fishing trip, so she decided she had to join us to discover on her own what the hype was all about. About 4 hours into our trip, the only thing we had caught was the bait. Highly depressed and lighter in the pockets, I asked Antonio what was going on. In Spanish he replied “you can’t catch all the fish in the sea.” That’s when it happened. Luis yelled “FISH ON” and we all jumped out of our seats and were yelling in excitement. Antonio strapped my son into his seat and handed him the rod. 2 hours later, he landed a record sized 9 foot Sailfish. The only question was what in the world were we going to do with this huge fish. I was not interested in spending $1500 to mount it and hang it above my fireplace. Once we returned to the pier we settled on taking a multitude of photos, our inexpensive alternative, to remember this wonderful day and my son’s remarkable catch.
We ended our wonderful vacation with a great tan and about 100 different pictures. My son, a high school senior, wanted something unique to always remember his great fishing trip in Mexico. He had told a friend of his about his wonderful experience and his friend told him about iPixxl. He explained that iPixXL’s a website dedicated to enlarging photos in various sizes and printing them on a vinyl photo sticker. As soon as my son told me about iPixXL I knew it was the perfect idea. We wasted no time in ordering the 4 ft by 96 inch vinyl photo sticker. The iPixXL cost me much less than mounting the Sailfish would have set me back. Within 10 days, we received a breathtaking, perfect replica of my son’s great catch. It now lives in his room above his bed; not above the fireplace. The best part of it all is that when he decides on a college, he can peel the removable vinyl photo sticker off his wall, and move it to his new home. You wouldn’t be able to do that too easily with a 9 foot Sailfish.
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