[| Contents | ]
Date: Warm Remembrances...
Title: Dec 2004
Date: 17 Dec 2004
Time: 00:43:48 -0500
“Warm Remembrances during Cold Fronts” Cold weather sucks the life out of things. When I look around I see trees without leaves, fewer birds, grass flats without pinfish, no bait pods dimpling the waters offshore it is very apparent that chilly weather knocks down much of the life we take for granted in Steinhatchee. Winter fishing can be fantastic during those blue bird days between cold fronts but regardless of how great the trip it still doesn’t measure up to warm weather days on the open Gulf. In warm weather, I remember cruising in at 30 knots on a southwest ripple, with the smell of warm salt air blowing through my nostrils, listening to James Taylor, looking around the console to see lumps of fishermen on the bean-bag chairs, witnessing dolphin leaps in the boat wake, feeling the sun sting on my skin, and turning my head to watch the sun dropping like a tea bag into the warm Gulf; magic moments at helm. It gets better once we’re closer to shore when folk revive and cluster around to re-hash stories back and forth. Big fish pay-offs and smack talk toward the unfortunate angler(s) break smiles. Life is good; regardless of how screwed up it may really be, for any of us, on hard ground. The good times are the rides home on the catamaran. At the dock we off load the crews gear, rinse the rod/reels, hang fish on the board, get the Kodak moment, have the fish dressed, check and clean the motors, wash the boat and fight whatever seasonal insect is in need of our body fluids. Every trip has a predictable order of events but some warm weather trips stand out. Here are some fun fishing remembrances from last year. Names aren’t used because some have had a hard enough time already. I hope you enjoy some of these quips; maybe you can relate. Humorous events are best fresh. I’ll do my best trying to color it in with words but let your mind run freely. Thirty eight to forty miles offshore, we were anchored over a good piece of hard bottom for grouper. The bite was steady; not a rally but enough that I didn’t care to move the boat for the next 20-30 minutes. The fellow next to me, toward the bow, reeled up an empty hook. I put my rod in a holder, returned with a bait for him, pulled my rod from the holder, laid it across the gunnel with the butt between my legs and proceeded to bait his hook when it happened... I got a bite. Not one of the those bites where the rod tip jiggles a little. One of those bites that jerked the rod down by black hole gravitational forces of marine-tectonic gag proportions that lifted the rod butt squarely through a poorly tuned and awfully played bag pipe, judging by the sound I exhaled. I went down as if my legs were cut off. The rod butt slide through my legs on the way down. I managed to get a left hand on the rod. I was on the deck with the rod being bent over the gunnel when the question was asked by the fellow I was baiting a hook for... “Do you want me to reel that in for you, captain?” No words just a head bobble as he took my fishing pole. This spring I took a husband, wife and their son nearshore fishing. It was supposed to be a grunt and sea bass activity day for the family. The wife wasn’t into the demands of the offshore gig and the boy needed animation. The father wanted a good together day. In a couple of weeks he was being sent overseas to war in the army. My dad was in the army in Korea, leaving my mom and I in West Virginia with my grandmother. I felt for them. We stopped and did some yo-yo fishing for pink mouth grunts and sea bass some 10 miles off Steinhatchee number one. The up and down catching pleased folks. I felt as comfortable with them as if they were kin. It was alright, but I thought of something else that might tweak the day, if they would give me some time. “Can you give me a couple of hours? Your boy may not find it action packed but the time will be worthwhile.” “Sure” was the answer. The sea was calm when we shot ten more miles westerly. There we anchored up, dropped a live bait down, picked up an amberjack and cut it up into two fillets, a head and back bone. I explained, as I rigged two 9/0 combo’s together for a single bait, that we were attempting to catch a goliath grouper of 200 pounds or better. The boy had a weird look when I put it in perspective that the fish would weigh 3 to 4 times what he did. The father, who was in excellent physical shape, had a skeptical look but otherwise, ‘OK, bring it on’. He and Little B were the tag team fishermen. They lowered the head to the bottom and within five minutes the bait package was picked up; by bus. A synchronized hook-set followed by the guys being being jerked down to the gunnel. The ‘locked down’ drags thankfully allowed short burst of 200 pound test to grudge off the spool. I was holding on to the back of their fight belts as we were drug up to the port bow where they both seemed to kneel in prayer for a minute before we were lead, by the spirit, down the port side to the transom. Then over the Honda’s to starboard and up to midship. The line hummed with tension, veins popped with tension and sweat flowed due to tension. “Ready?” “Up” “OK” “Up” “OK” “Up” “OK” were the grunted directions as they would lift up ten to fourteen inches and quickly reel down. That would work for three or four times in a row, then line would be peeled off the reels to their chagrin. After an eternity, ten minutes, their efforts were getting rewarded foot by foot. A large mass could be seen twenty feet below the boat. It got bigger as it got closer. It took the form of a 250 pound goliath grouper. Weak high fives were followed by pictures. I removed hooks left by other encounters before I pulled out our hook and revived the fish. It took a few seconds before that broom size tail jolted to life and sloshed us with water. As we were leaving I asked the young boy, sitting between me and his dad, what he thought about that? “It was cool” he said. “But, we’re further out than were supposed to be... Is this going to cost my dad any more money?” “No” I smiled. We had picked up a good box of amberjack and had moved south to hard bottom as the seas increased from 3-5 foot to 4-6 foot. On anchor, we were being tossed some but fish were hitting the ice. An hour into the experience, the teenage boy informed me he had to pee. Usually, men just step out on the dive platform to relieve ourselves but conditions were too rough for that. “Use this yellow bucket” I said (the bucket is actually yellow). Well, he set his self up toward the bow. Exposed to nature, the first wave came over the nose and washed him. Before he had time to express himself, the second wave came over, hit the windshield, and took the bucket away from him. He slopped back with an expression you’d expect to see after the ride at Wild Water’s. Not missing the moment, Little B said “Dude, you missed the bucket.” ‘Welcome offshore, if you hadn’t ever been here before’. The boy loved it. She sat in the back of the boat on the ride out after saying little to nothing the entire morning. I was concerned she might be sea sick or just not having a good time so I asked her if she was OK. She nodded yes. Not satisfied with that, I asked her companions the same question about her. “Oh, she’s fine” On the first stop, we picked up a few fish but she didn’t catch anything. Not being that experienced, she missed or didn’t feel the bites she had. She seemed more quiet than the quiet she was before. I tried and Little B tried to talk with her but she wouldn’t speak but the bare necessities of words to communicate. Not good, I thought. At the second stop, she remained in the back, by herself, fishing. Then, thank God, it happened. A suicide grouper hit her bait and jerked the rod down. She commenced to pulling and reeling. A ran over to her to help in anyway I could. Her face defined determination; stern and focused at the task. It was a struggle. I was thinking...Please, please, please God, let this young lady catch this fish when she blurted out, for all to hear, “Come on up you @*$^@#)^”. Still in shock, I looked over board and yelled “Yea, what she said”. Amongst a seven boat party trip with the Korean Fishing Club of Atlanta, we had made anchor on an amberjack hole. Live baits had soaked for 10 minutes before the first hook up. A fellow on the starboard side had bucked up hard; drag chirping. I stepped over to give support. “Pull up” No response. He was static with the rod thumping against both arms. I thought language might be an issue but they spoke Korean english. “Just reel” I stated. “Just reel” I stated and played it like an air guitar. No response. “Reel, man, reel” I voiced. He turned and shouted “I have no POWER!!! You reel, NOW!!” in perfect Korean english. Those words will live a long time. Anyway, the best part of charter fishing is people. People are what life is about. I wish I could better recant some of the boat times to you but often times you have to be there and then time polishes the laughter off the rough edges. Fishing is good on so many levels; isn’t it a privilege to go fishing and be there when ‘it’ happens. Take care of yourself, the ones you love, and the tackle. Capt. B