Mexico's Campeche Tarpon

December 19, 2007 By: Marshall Cutchin

“After just 10 minutes at full throttle, head guide Neko Pastrana motioned with a flick of his hand to cut the motor. As the boat settled in the water, still dark beneath a purple sky, we jumped to our feet to see if we could discern what had caught his attention. The slick, black backs of a school of tarpon were visible a ways off, slicing through the dead-calm water.” Writer Sam Bacon describes the approach to one of Mexico’s most favored hot spots for small tarpon, the coastal lagoons and mangrove creeks near Campeche, on the western side of the Yucatan.