The Watery Rave

Day One of this trip was a total bust.  I guess I should have expected it, flying straight in from Jackson Hole, Wyoming and hopping on my boat the next day with no prefishing time or even a chance to drink a beer with the other local captains and squeeze them for the current intel. Given last year’s incredible fishing the same weeks and my knowledge of the fisheries, I felt confident that we’d have no problem getting a fish or two that first day. That goes to show you that confidence is only as good as your last time on the water.

On another note, I must have a hole in my head because I headed straight back to Montuosa on the ass of a stale first day. I have two scientists on board and they’re both looking at me like I just kicked their lab rats, but I have a feeling that the belle of the dance is there, and in this game, it’s best to trust your intuition.

The weather is beautiful and we blast out there like Ricky Bobby with a full tank of nitrous. If there’s one thing I learned from the previous day, it’s where the bait was holding. In a matter of minutes the tuna tubes were full and we were ready to send a bait down.

The hours roll by. One hour…two hours…three hours…It’s a desert.  A disco song comes over the radio. It’s a song by Lipps Inc., a good sign. We’re gonna rip some lips.

Gotta Make a move to a town that’s right for me, Town to keep me movin’ keep me groovin’ with some energy…

Not a fish in the spread, and it was looking much like the same as the previous day, but I have confidence in this spot. I have caught loads of fish here in the past, but right now I can’t catch my butt with both hands. I need to change something. We have to make a move.

Well, I talk about it, talk about it, talk about it, talk about it. Talk about, talk about, talk about movin’.

Eleven miles away is Hannibal Bank, although it could be less than happening there as well. I’m an idiot if I don’t make the 20 minute run, if for no other reason than to rule out the option. I don’t want to get back to the dock and hear it was going off on Hannibal while I was a desert explorer in Montuosa.

Gotta move on. Gotta move on. Gotta move on!

On the run over I’m in the tower just dwelling about all the planning that has gone into this project and the people and organizations involved: Islas Secas, NOAA, The Billfish Foundation, Adopt a Billfish, the production company from JMOutdoors, and the list goes on. What if we don’t catch them? I’m grinding my teeth into paste.

As I go ripping by a turtle, I see two streaks of green. I spin the boat around and as I’m coming off plane Juan, my mate, has a popping rod in his hand and with one cast hooks up to a 40-pound bull dorado that we invite to dinner. With dolphin in the box, we know we’re having fresh fish, even if the marlintini’s are going dry.

That little break in the monotony was good. Although dorado are not the target species, a little action does a splendid job of shaking the cobwebs out of our heads. Now if we can just follow that up with some frantic billfish ballistics.

A few minutes later we are on the high spots at Hannibal Bank. Juan drops the first bait in the water. As he is rigging a second bait, the porpoises arrive. The porpoises of Hannibal Bank have one mission in life: to ensure a percentage of the black marlin population goes unmolested. They serve their purpose by eating every bait we put in the water some days.

I have been to doctors in Panama to see if I have a porpoise magnet somewhere in me, but they just laugh and say it’s more likely the fish have locked in to the sound of my engines. I’m actively looking for an engine noise modificator.

Juan quickly reels in the bait to keep the porpoise off it and has it out short, just behind the motors and wallowing in the prop wash when all at once there is a large dark shape tracking it. Funkytown has arrived, with authority. There’s a massive boil behind the boat and the bait takes a permanent leave of absence. I’m hoping the porpoise are pissed. It’s their turn for once.

Disco is not dead in the open Panamanian Pacific, as 400-plus pounds of sinew and fin dance the water to froth. Juan feeds the fish, the circle hook is set and the rodeo is on. In the first eight minutes the 400 pound fish jumps over 20 times.

After she settles down we are into a tug-of-war for another 40 minutes.

I talk about it, talk about it, talk about it, talk about it.

She is close. She’s also pissed.

Juan grabs the leader and skillfully wires her into range. A lot of crap can go wrong right now, not to mention the fish can just as easily opt to come on board. I’m ready to react to a leap for the cockpit as Doc Prince and John Hoolihan sting the fish. The Satellite tag is in, it’s well placed, and the black marlin looks healthy as it swims off.

I dance on the tower as Juan rigs another bait. At least we’re not going 0-for Pamana.

Well that’s the last time I fly in with guests at the beginning of the season and fish them the very next day. There’s a lot of money and effort invested in this black marlin tagging expedition and I should know better than to build expectations without a single day of prefishing, although given last December’s fishing I felt pretty confident we’d sting a handful of fish every day.

I normally come in a week or two before the season and do some fishing with the boat crews to get everything dialed in and everyone working their “A” game, but I saw a piece of weed stuck to a bait for 10 full seconds before it got changed out, so the mate is about two seconds off his game. I knew I could depend on my fishing crew to have boats and tackle ready, but it was a bit foolish of me to think I could nail down the fishing patterns without a few days on the water.

Islas Secas is a 16 island private resort 25 miles off the coast of Panama, and when you face west, there’s roughly 9,000 miles (give or take a mile) of watery frontier, so to think I can set out on a tank of gas and a cooler of beer and find a black marlin to tag is just a bit presumptuous. It often takes two tanks of gas and a cooler and a half of beer to ride the tides from zero to hero around here. Today, I am Senor Cero…0 for December.

I have this fishery pretty well figured out, and the two main areas I like to blanket (Islas Montuosa and the Hannibal Bank) are only eleven miles or so apart, so it’s a fifty/fifty proposition and you get a good idea right away if you made the right call. The only problem is that it’s tough to fish both locations in one day unless you’re willing to call a spot dead early and risk hearing someone on the radio ride the bites into the hot boat of the day while fishing right where you were earlier as you spend the afternoon trolling your way to humility. So once you make the call, you’re usually committed.

Going into today’s fishing, I chose Islas Montuosa as the starting point based on the science of historical black marlin catch statistics, current weather patterns, satellite water surface temperature charts and a game of rock/paper/scissors. I was wrong.

The second I got there I knew it, but I hoped to scratch a fish out, vying for that “dying quail” pop-up that falls between the infield and the outfield, and instead I fouled out to the catcher. The water was dirty, baitfish were scarce as salted butter at a fat farm, and the only bird we saw all day was the one the mate flipped at a passing boat that ran over our lines. In essence, we were fishing in the desert. What a crap way to start the Islas Secas and Billfish Foundation Tagging Expedition 2011.

The casitas on Islas Secas run on solar power, so if we had one thing going for us it was knowing that a hot shower and cold beer were awaiting or arrival home. Despite the fact that many Panamanians still do not have air conditioning, there is something to be said about propping your feet up after a long day on the water and feeling the ceiling fan blow a blast of artificial refrigeration over your toes. It feels like…home.

With Day One behind us, it’s time to blow the top off a frosty one, think about what we saw and put together a game plan that will let us put some technologically superior jewelry into a fish or ten.