WEEKEND ESCAPE : Getting Hooked on Fishing Off Ensenada Coast : Four novice anglers helped confirm Mexico port city’s claim as ‘yellowtail capital.’

I read a lot of travel guides--skim them, really--and I was intrigued by a sentence I came across not long ago in Fodor’s guide to Mexico:

“Hunting and fishing are popular sports around Ensenada, which calls itself the ‘Yellowtail Capital of the World.’ ”

Yellowtail, huh? I’d heard the fishing off Ensenada’s coast was excellent and, since the port city is only 200 miles from my Los Angeles home, I decided to see if it lived up to its billing.

Offering no guarantees of a big catch and with no fishing background to speak of, I was nonetheless able to convince several of my friends to join me in giving it a try.

And so it was that the four of us--two journalists, a screenwriter and a schoolteacher--found ourselves climbing aboard a boat on a Saturday morning in late November, a cool breeze aloft but the warm Mexican sun beaming down. We had made the three-hour drive from Los Angeles the day before in the screenwriter’s VW Jetta. Now, we were the last to board Gordo’s I, a 40-foot trawler with almost as many people--and it looked overcrowded.

“This wasn’t what I expected,” said Russ Manzatt, the screenwriter, as he surveyed the boat. “Is this what you expected?” his wife, Irene, the teacher, asked me pointedly.

I had to admit that it wasn’t, but I didn’t feel misled. I’d called an agency that promotes Baja California and was told that for $143 per person, I could spend two nights at a nice hotel in Ensenada, dine at two of the city’s best restaurants and fish off its coast. Breakfasts and a T-shirt were included. They’d said nothing about having a skippered boat to ourselves.

The package seemed like a good deal to me, and the clean, centrally located hotel--the Villa Fontana on Avenida Lopez Mateos, Ensenada’s main street--where we’d spent the previous night was pleasant. But here we were, anti-motion-sickness patches stuck to our heads, rockin’ ‘n’ rollin’ on a crowded boat heading out to sea.

Our moods changed as quickly as the scenery. Within minutes, Gordo’s I had cleared the breakwater, leaving Ensenada’s unsightly shipyard behind. Before us, the tan islands of Tres Hermanos grew larger on calm, blue swells. Not 30 yards from our boat, a sombrero-sized sea turtle rode the swells toward shore.

Minutes later, a school of 30 or 40 dolphins appeared near the boat and raced us for a while. The sun glinted off their smooth silver backs as they wove through the water like a scene in a Jacques Cousteau special.

Our boat anchored close to the islands, which are about 30 miles from port, in a patch of calm green water known for fine fishing.

All around the four of us stood men and women opening enormous tackle boxes stuffed with hooks and lures and weights. Many had brought the Ferraris of rods and reels, brass-plated jobs with lots of detail work. Some wore utility belts sporting pliers, knives and the like.

A friendly man beside me, noticing that my group had cleverly boarded the boat sans gear, kindly told a deckhand to set us up. In short time, Russ, Irene, Annette Haddad and I were fully outfitted, down to the live anchovies that wiggled on our hooks.

We hadn’t been fishing for 20 minutes when the tip of Irene’s pole plunged and she was immersed in a tug of war. It was several minutes before her opponent came to light--a long silver bullet of a fish darting back and forth 10 feet below the water’s surface. Moments later, a deckhand pulled a large barracuda off Irene’s hook, dropped it into her gunnysack and, within minutes, Irene eagerly recast her line.

Russ caught a barracuda a few minutes later, as did Annette. I hadn’t caught a thing the first hour but I found the whole fishing scene very amusing, and I enjoyed watching a young otter play in a floating field of seaweed some 75 yards away.

The deckhands, who were in constant movement re-baiting hooks, untangling lines and the like, were particularly fun to watch. Most mixed humor with their work, and one, a very excitable old man with a broad grin, kept enthusiasm high by yelling out “Yellowtail! Yellowtail!” every time someone began reeling something in--even though others on board pointed out that the start of yellowtail season was a month or so away.

And then it happened. Annette got a yank on her line that nearly took her rod. The pole whipped into an overturned-U pose and her reel screamed as line spun out.

The give-and-take, with everyone on the boat looking on, continued for 15 minutes or so, with Annette gradually winning the fight for the line. Suddenly, there it was: a tuna weighing some 30 pounds and flashing a sunny tail. A month later, the waters would be filled with such fish, we were told.

During the remainder of the five-hour fish harvest, the four of us caught sheepshead, ling cod and more barracuda, but by 1 p.m. (when lines were brought in and the boat turned for shore), only one other person on board had caught a yellowtail. And it was considerably smaller than Annette’s.

Although our “work” had ended, to our delight, the deckhands’ had not. After throwing the remainder of the live bait overboard, they set up a counter toward the back of the boat and took to fileting fish with great speed. By the time we’d docked, they’d fileted everyone’s fish, placed it in plastic bags and given it back.

I’d have been satisfied with our package plan if it had ended right then. After all, we’d had a memorable dinner the night before at the popular Casamar restaurant (where our set menu included one margarita, soup or salad, a choice of three entrees, including baked crabmeat and clams, broiled fish in oyster sauce or broiled sea bass, and dessert). We’d had a night at the very American, air-conditioned Villa Fontana Hotel, where every room is smartly decorated and has cable television and a firm bed, and a fun-packed day of reeling ‘em in on not-so-high seas.

But that night, after placing our catch in ice-filled coolers we’d brought along for the task and after drinks at Hussong’s Cantina (the famous Baja watering hole that used to cater to a crowd with real character--bikers, adventurers, lost souls--but now primarily serves college kids and middle-agers funneled in from cruise ships), we had a delicious dinner at El Rey Sol, an elegant family-owned restaurant across the street from the Villa Fontana.

We left Ensenada early the next day with fond memories and two coolers stuffed with fresh fish. If not a great escape, it was certainly a fine one.

We got our packages through Baja California Tourist Information (a marketing firm that promotes Baja California for the Mexican government), 7860 Mission Center Court, Suite 202, San Diego 92108; in most of California, call (800) 522-1516, in the San Diego area, (619) 298-4105. outside of California, call 800-225-2786.

Weekend Budget

Gas per person from L.A.: $5

Package per person:: 143

Three margaritas: 9

Two tacos: 3

FINAL TAB (per person): $160