The Children's Crusade

If you ask a man how his fishing trip went and his response begins with, "It was a pretty day", you can bet the ranch he didn't catch squat. Thursday was a pretty day on Hammerhead. But that doesn't tell the whole story.

In 2010, the problem that plagued offshore fishing in the northeastern Gulf was oil from the Deepwater Horizon.  In 2011, it was fresh water from the rain swollen Mississippi River. This year so far, it is wind from an apparently angry Aeolus.  There is day after day of 15 knot plus wind and uncomfortably high seas, at least for a 35 foot boat that weighs only about 25,000 pounds and is captained by an elderly gentleman with a low tolerance for suffering. But ever so often there is a weather window - a day and a night of calm, maybe two days.  When that window opens, well, carpe diem, not to coin a phrase.

Last week and this past weekend were particularly snotty, with three smaller boats actually capsizing in East Pass on Thursday, June 7, and two more disabled, forcing the Coast Guard to guard the coast, which so annoyed them that a warning was issued to the effect that anyone exiting East Pass did so at their own risk, which is kind of like the Fire Department putting out the word that it's too hot to fight fires, so you are on your on.  I was reminded of Major Major in Catch 22, who was always in his office if no one needed to see him, but always out if they did.  But I digress.

The forecast for Wednesday night and Thursday was for wind 5 to 10 knots and seas 1 to 2 feet.  Beginning Thursday night, the wind was going to pick up and be blowing like Billy B. Jesus again on Friday and through the weekend. I began early in the week to recruit crew so that when the diem came, I could carpe it. Which brings me to another bone stuck in my craw.

Folks say to me all the time, "Take me fishing. Call me. Any time. Seriously."  I ended up calling 22 people, and I got two takers. That's right, two: my 11 year old grandson, Freeman Songer aka The Freemanator, and Jonathan Coupe, a lanky 16 year old who moved to Destin in January and has fished a few times on the Bella Maria.  The other 20 all had an excuse, the most prevalent being, "I have to work", which dumbfounds me, as it makes a mockery of often mouthed words like "priorities" and "values".  The second place finisher in the excuse competition was, "Sorry.  I promised my wife I would (fill in the blank)", which is at least better than work as excuses go, self preservation being instinctive in all of us.

So, it was just me and the two boys or stay at home.  Did I mention the seas were going to be 1to 2 feet? The  Children's Crusade was on.

Hammerhead left the slip at 0430 and had cleared the sea buoy and was up and running at 0500, headed for a rumored weed line about 65 nautical miles out, just southwest of the Spur. The crew was excited, optimistic and alert, as you can see in the photograph below.

As we approached the Spur, I could hear Kevin Kaple, captain of Just Teasing, chatting with nearby boats, and, true to form, he was shredding every FCC regulation in the book relating to profanity on the radio.  Just Teasing had gone out Wednesday, and overnighted to sword fish and chunk for tuna. They released a white marlin on Wednesday, and, again true to form, pounded the tuna Wednesday night, catching five or six blackfin and a yellowfin over 100 pounds.

Kevin was working a weed line that was just making up, and he called me over to share the discovery, being as generous as he is profane.  Hammerhead pulled in behind Just Teasing and went to work, but nada.  Nary a knockdown.  Just to make it clear that the problem was me and not a want of fish, Just Teasing boated a nice mahi ahead of us as we watched, and then moseyed off over the horizon to the west, where it later caught and released another white.

Before trolling south toward our original destination, we did stumble across the FAD (fish attracting device) pictured below.  Think about it: a beer keg with a red float attached anchored in 1400 feet of water, one of four that marina gossip says someone has put out near the Spur. 300 feet, yes, but 1400?Amazing.

And we still didn't catch squat, although there were numerous reports on the radio of sails, whites, mahi, and what not being caught here, there, and everywhere but where we were. Discouraging. Emasculating even.

But we persevered. All the live long day, we persevered. To no avail.

So we tried Plan B.  There were about a dozen hard tails in the live well that Jughead on the bait boat had dropped off for me Wednesday afternoon.  Back to the FAD we go, lickety split. It is mid-afternoon when we arrive.  Tuna are busting in the area. Now we're talking.

I back up to the FAD, and Freemanator free lines a hard tail on a spinning rod. Big bite.  Line screams off the reel.  I have to back down.  Cut off.  Once more with feeling.  Another big bite and fight.  The Child Crusaders have the cockpit all to themselves, and they work it like naturals, Freemanator on the rod, Jonathan standing by with the gaff and calling out directions to Papa on the wheel.

Tuna? Wahoo? Mahi?  The excitement and the anticipation mount as the fight continues, and it lasts a good while.  "We have color," Jonathan shouts as the fish nears the surface.  Shark.  A big one, maybe five feet long.

I put on the gloves and leader him, telling Jonathan to cut him off, close but not too close.  The shark is caught, but not defeated. As we lean over the gunwale, me holding him and Johathan preparing to cut the leader, the shark goes postal.  Jonathan's hand is tail whipped, skinning his knuckles. I hang on, wanting to break him off. The shark goes vertical at the transom, and we are literally eye to eye for a split second. "Jesus, he's coming in the boat," I think, but the shark straightens out a pretty heavy live bait hook and is gone with a splash.

Break out a hard tail.  Freeman hooks a nice mahi in the 20 to 25 pound range that goes airborne with a shark on his six like the Red Baron on a French Spad.  Mahi don't like to be caught, but they damn sure don't like to be eaten by sharks.  Twisting and turning, he pulls the hook and flees with the shark in hot pursuit.

Now it's Jonathan's turn.

Cut off.  Then another big shark. And so it went until the boys tired of the game.  They wanted to spend the night and sword fish, but we listened to the marine forecast on the radio, and prudence dictated that we call it a day, so we began the three hour run home around 1600. Below is a photo of the Crusaders taken as we ran in.  I think you can see a pattern - ennui induces narcosis in young males.

But it ain't ever over 'til it's over.  The leading edge of the weather that had made me decide to call it quits was between us and the house. This is a photo taken as we approached East Pass, about three miles from the sea buoy, the coast line and the condos hidden by the thunderhead.

It was like being in a washing machine. Water was coming over the bow, onto the top and cascading into the cockpit.  It was leaking - no pouring - in around the zippers in the stratoglass enclosure.  The boat was pitching and rolling.  The Crusaders were the ideal antidote for tired, old eyes, picking out the buoys for me in momentary gaps in the sheets of wind driven water. They were imperturbable.  All in a day's work on the water if you are young, I guess.

When we entered the harbor, the wind was blowing hard out of the east.  We picked our way around a few anchored family cruisers that were waiting for a let up in the storm before attempting to get into their slips. I was too tired to be patient, so I just put my transom into the wind and went for it, one Crusader on the bow and one on the gunwale to grab the lines.  And into the slip Hammerhead went, first time, no problem.  Not a big deal for Pat Dineen, Kevin Kaple, John Tate and the other pros in the marina, I reckon, but a confidence builder for Papa.

We had no fish to clean, no flags to fly, but it was a pretty day nevertheless, one I believe the boys will remember. I know I will.

Snappa Time!

Red snapper season in the Florida Panhandle has become a no kidding phenomenon.  You don't need a big boat to snapper fish; you don't have to go far to find them; women and kids can catch them as well as men; and they are sinfully delicious to eat. So it is not surprising that fishing for red snapper is the delight of Everyman. And as the size limit has been increased (16 inches), the bag limit has been decreased (2 per person per trip regardless of age), and the season has been shortened (40 days this year), while, perversely, the fish have become larger and more numerous, an Oklahoma land rush mentality has set in about the opening of snapper season.  People in these parts talk about its approach the way children talk about the coming of Christmas. The week before last, Nick at West Marine said to me by way of greeting as I entered the store, "Eight days and thirteen hours until snapper season opens." When I arrived in Destin this past Thursday around 2 PM, Terry Cloer,  the building manager, stopped me in the condo garage to remind me that snapper season would be open in ten hours.  As if I didn't know.

The fact that June 1 was blustery and the forecast was for 2 to 4 foot seas that were in fact more like 3 to 5 deterred almost no one. As the first hint of light signaled the approaching dawn, a veritable torrent of boats large and small began to pour out of East Pass into the Gulf of Mexico.  They came first by the dozen and then by the  score as I watched from my balcony. ( I said almost no one was deterred by the forecast, but I was, as my crew included a four year old girl and a sea shy seven year old boy.) In ten years of watching, I have never seen such a swarm of vessels of every size and description debouch from the Pass, nor had any of the locals to whom I have since spoken.  The photo below is a very thin slice of the very wide panorama of the hundred plus boat fleet that bobbed in the Pass or just beyond fishing for live bait on Friday morning.

And Saturday and Sunday were worse, as folks did not have to go to work and the weather was fine. At dawn on Saturday, Wayne Lewis called Jughead on the bait boat to see about picking up some live bait for Bella Maria, only to be told that the bait they had spent all night netting had sold out by 4:30 AM. Jughead said they were trying to net more, but had 57 boats on the wait list. There were even two sailboats intent on snapper fishing in the Pass catching bait, for Christ's sake. From East Pass Towers Marina alone, six boats joined the fray - Bella Maria, Just Teasing, Anonymous, Captain Kidd, Outta Here, and, yes, Hammerhead.

Aboard Hammerhead were Papa, his Miss Mary (aka Mama), the Songer grandchildren (Freeman, Marcus, and Daisy), and their father, Eric. We departed at a leisurely 8:00 AM, and headed for our go to secret spot (the Navarre Barge), which has never let us down and where we have never had more than one other boat for company, and then only twice in probably ten trips.  There were four boats on the wreck when we arrived, but we wedged in and went to work with a will. It was very slow going for the first hour and a half, during which time all of our neighbors but one moved on to look for greener pastures.  We were practically gunwale to gunwale with the remaining center console when the rod held by the obvious father and captain of the young family that was crewing the center console bowed over.  Nice snapper.  As soon as his bait was back in the water, deja vu all over again: fish on.  We were so close I could almost read the lettering on the pocket of the guy's tee shirt, but a whole lot of nothing was happening on Hammerhead.  What was wrong with us? Maybe we weren't holding our mouths right or something.

"I am beginning to get an inferiority complex" I called out to no one in particular. Mary responded with a grunt as a big fish inhaled her bait, bent her rod, and pulled drag.  And I noticed Eric was wedged into the corner of the cockpit pumping and reeling on what appeared to be a good fish.  The bite was on.

There then ensued some fine examples of Cooperative Fishing, a rapidly emerging family sport best practiced while bottom fishing. Below you see Mary and Marcus working in tandem to bring a big sow snapper to the boat, with Freeman standing by with the gaff.  Mary has Marcus wedged between her knees and is pumping the rod.  Marky has the rod butt in his fighting belt and is turning the handle on the reel.

The fruit of their labors, including the handiwork of the Freemanator on the gaff, is shown in the photo below.

Not to be outdone, Eric and Daisy used the same technique to achieve a similar result, Papa on the gaff.

And so it went until it was done, at around noon. Bang, bang, just like that.

When the weekend was over,  all the boats that had ventured out from East Pass Marina limited out on red snapper. The palm for the largest fish went to Bella Maria, which in addition to limiting out, caught an 80 pound cobia over natural bottom on half of a dead cigar minnow.

The nod for most fish went to Outta Here, a 65 foot Viking with 21 people on board, who caught 42 red snapper.  Below is the arm of Grasshopper (know to his mother as Andrew Dover), the mate on Outta Here, who kept score with a magic marker to make sure they did not go over the limit in the excitement of the slaughter.

But the Biggest Red Snapper Sweepstakes, which I just invented, was won by Hammerhead, which placed first with a 19.5 pounder, second with an 18.5 pounder, and tied for third with Bella Maria and Outta Here with a 13 pounder. Below are the first place fish on the right, the second place fish on the left, and the Junior Angler of the Day, Female Division, in the center.

Now, by my lights, snapper fishing don't hold a patch to blue water fishing when it comes excitement and satisfaction, but it's a ton of fun for all hands, and something to look forward to each summer. As I write, there are only 38 days and about one hour left in this snapper season, but you don't need to mention this anywhere west of Tallahassee. Everyone knows how much time is left. To the minute