Description
Martinez Lake encompasses 300 to 500 acres, but it’s hard to tell where the river ends and the lake begins. The resort started as a fishing camp nearly 50 years ago and is now a year-round attraction catering to sightseers, snowbirds, anglers, hunters, boaters, water skiers, rock hounds, and nature lovers. There are few places where tourists can spend their day traveling river waters while viewing natural desert wonders; this is one of them. River tours and paddleboat adventures get underway a short distance from the lake, with both launching at Fisher’s Landing.
The lake itself is a watery oasis in the desert sand, and there are other, smaller lakes such as Hidden Shores, Ice Box, and Bullet Hole close by. Summertime boat traffic can be vexing because of the site’s popularity with residents on either side of the river. Waters are patrolled by both Arizona and California Game and Fish, the California Safety Patrol, and the Yuma County Sheriff’s Office.
Bass fishing can be worth the effort of detouring around other watercraft because huge bass of several varieties live here, co-existing with even larger whisker fish. Largemouth bass weighing in the teens have been recorded as have striped bass over 30 pounds and flathead catfish in excess of 75 pounds. Greg Hines of Mesa grew up in nearby Parker and fished these waters as a kid. As a grownup, he makes his living as a professional bass angler. He still has good memories of fishing on Martinez Lake. “This place is a blast,” he says. “It’s spinnerbait utopia and a flippin’ heaven with all the available backwaters.”
Almost any part of the lake, from the river mouth to shallow sloughs, contains what marine biologists would refer to, scientifically, as “fishy stuff.” The dean of Arizona’s outdoor writers, Bob Hirsch, calls the structure in the lake “a bass fisherman’s dream.” There are jetties and docks where fish can hide. There’s a weedy shoreline with lots of tule cover. There are vast, flooded flats filled with brush and shallows that contain a forest of tree branches and stumps filled with collections of fishermen’s favorite lures.
“You can come around a corner of the lake and run into the Colorado River,” says Ken Goodwin, a guide who has fished the waters for 40 years. “It hasn’t changed much in four decades. It’s silted in a bit and the sand moves around enough to require some dredging, but it’s still a quiet body of water surrounded by tules and wildlife.”
At 200 feet elevation, warm temperatures and river humidity combine to produce the area’s most common summertime denominator: sweat.
There are two ways to get there, both via US Hwy 95. From Interstate 10 up north, it’s a good 50 miles down to the lake turnoff at Mileposts 46/47. From Yuma and Interstate 8, it’s 20+ miles to the turnoff at Martinez Road. After 10 miles, the road forks with the launch ramp, boat dock, and restaurant to the right and Fisher’s Landing to the left—both about a mile from the fork.