Great experience fishing the lagoon. Caught red snapper, barracuda and permit

My wife and I read several reviews and settled on Cancun Light Tackle and Fly fishing. I wanted to try my hand at salt water fly fishing and since my wife gets sea sick easily, this felt like the best option.  We were impressed with the reviews we read and were excited for our trip. 
We went out and I told Mauricio that I’m proficient with fly fishing for trout (I have my own drift boat and fly fish regularly) but this was my first experience with salt water. I caught a small Jack on my 2nd or 3rd cast.  I was asking for pointers and direction and got very little feedback from our guide.  I asked if my wife could fish as well and he informed me that only one person can fish if they are fly fishing so at that point we switched to spinning set ups so we could both fish.  Fishing so close against the mangroves, we got tangled up a few times.  We basically felt like we were on our own.  We both asked multiple times about where to cast, how fast to retrieve etc.  He gave very little information. He said if your lure is on the bottom reel faster. That was the only direction he gave to us. Which wasn’t much at all.  I personally feel like we fished areas for way too long with no success.  Mauricio was much more concerned about texting on his phone than anything to do with us. We were untangling our own lines, etc.  Mauricio started fishing as well and wasn’t getting anything either.  We eventually ended up in an area we were catching Lady Fish. It was a welcome reprieve from having no bites and no fish for several hours.  My wife and I both caught several Lady Fish.  Mauricio didn’t unhook or handle any of our fish. We were on our own which was pretty much the theme for the day.  If we weren’t proficient fisherman this would have been an extremely frustrating trip since he wasn’t helping whatsoever. 
I’ve been on many guided trips before and unfortunately I have to say this was the worst experience I have ever had. I have had trips that I didn’t catch many fish but learned a lot, had a good overall experience. This was basically a do it yourself trip for us.  Mauricio drove the boat. That’s pretty much where his involvement ended.  The reviews we read from some of the other guides sounded great, but ours sounded like the few negative reviews we saw with the guide smoking, not helping etc. That was our experience with Mauricio.

Starting with the positive - the captain put us on fish. There was a ton of tarpon activity and we were in a position to catch which we did. The style of fishing from this boat requires a degree of skill and accuracy well above a standard deep see charter or even freshwater angling. That said my wife quickly realized she wouldn’t be able to really participate - not the end of the world but I was sort of hoping to keep her engaged even though she only agreed to go because I wanted to. What was most problematic with this particular captain was that he effectively scoffed at and rolled his eyes every time I made a mistake —- and I made plenty. He started at the beginning asking if I’d ever fly fished before to which I answered once. When he motioned for me to pick up the fly rod and I attempted some casts it was obvious I was struggling. Instead of helping he literally just just sat there and stared at me while I failed. When I asked what I was doing wrong he just looked at me sideways and said I’d never be able to make a cast. No pointers or coaching just made me feel like an idiot. Once we switched to a spinning rod I was much more comfortable but again sight fishing requires significant accuracy far beyond any other type of fishing. We ultimately wound up in this mangrove grotto that was very tight and covered and frankly I hit a lot of trees. Each time I made a mistake the captain looked just pissed. I’d ask him if he wanted me to snap the line and he’d just point at me and say “you’re the one fishing”. The braid got a tangle in it on more than one occasions and instead of him grabbing it and handing me another rod he took the same posture - saying verbatim that I’m the one fishing I should figure out how to untangle it. For all of my experience chartering boats the captains response should always be hand to take the rod and fix it so the guest can get back to fishing. All in all it was almost humorous by the end how stupid he made me feel and my wife and I laughed about it the whole day later. That said I hope no one has to have that experience as of the dozens of charters I’ve taken this was one of the most memorable and maybe a little bit for the wrong reasons.