Dirtbags

It wasn’t even light yet and we were already arguing about directions. Heavy fog filled the air as well as my head; the remnants of that extended bourbon nightcap. I turned “Running with the Devil” up a little louder on the CD player as The Beast barked out directions and tried to get the navigational app up on his phone. I drove to the end of the road the house he had rented was on and turned right toward coffee.

“We should have turned left…” was all I heard from my navigator.

“I have the ugliest wife in fly fishing”, I said as I rolled down the window to let fresh air hit my face. He either didn’t hear me or was saving a reply for later.

I first met Mark Seymour out on the Vineyard during the Derby five years ago. Outside of fly fishing we don’t agree on much. It makes for some interesting conversations. Somebody mentioned a while ago that we are like the Odd Couple.  I hope it’s the Lemmon/Matthau version. Regardless, there’s a mutual respect between us built from spending a lot of time together in cold water, cramped quarters, crowded bars, shitty fishing conditions and Steve Bechard’s hedges. The guy doesn’t stop. Wind, weather, breaking fish, no signs of fish…he just keeps at it.  Because of this I started calling him “The Beast” a few years ago.

On this morning we were headed to the Cheeky Fishing Schoolie Tournament. Beast has been my fishing partner in it since its debut in 2012. Our team name is “Team Dirtbag”. He’s a wine guy, I’m a tequila guy but we will both drink warm cheap beer, especially if it’s free. It fits. We have never done well. Not for the lack of effort – in the 2013 tourney we caught over 100 fish between the two of us. They were just all really small.

I had spent the previous two weeks working everyone I knew on Cape Cod for information on where the fish were. I had a plan and felt confident. At the pre-tournament get together the night before at The Sand Bar I had talked to some guys who had fished that day and what they had run into fit right into all the intel I had been gathering. Beast and I looked at maps on his fancy phone, agreed on an access point and settled down with fish tacos and PBR’s. With good intentions we left to turn in early. Good intentions were met with bad influences when we got back to the house and Beast’s business partner Stephen greeted us with a bottle of bourbon. The night was long and sleep was short.

 

Photo courtesy of Cheeky Fishing

After getting coffee we found our way back to The Sand Bar and stood in the parking lot with 140 other anglers waiting for the start of the Tournament. It was an impressive group gathered there in the fog. At 0600 the official “start” was announced and seventy one teams spread out over Cape Cod. Beast and I headed to our secret location and found a few teams already there in obvious spots. We had two options; stay in one place and fish it hard all day or go gypsy and keep moving around. Beast and I had agreed based on the reports, wind forecast and tide that we would stay in this place and just keep at it. The water looked fishy. I had a good vibe going. We kept moving as the fog burned off and blue sky appeared. We found a flat off a sod bank with good visibility and structure that was holding bait and settled in to grind.

 

Photo courtesy of Cheeky Fishing

And grind we did. At 0823 I was tight to eighteen and a half inches of striped bass. Not a great fish but it was a start. It was also the end. The only fish brought to hand by Team Dirtbag that day. I took shots at a couple more fish on the flat as the morning wore on. One even turned on my fly, looked up at me, flipped me the bird and slowly swam away. Crickets.

The Beast and I moved around and covered a lot of water in the final two hours. It just wasn’t to be. Over a beer back at the Jeep we agreed we had made the right decision on staying put given the information we had. Then we argued about the best way back to The Sand Bar and who was buying fish tacos.

And that was it. But that’s what it’s like. Fishing is called fishing for a reason. With the twenty-four hour fishing news cycle and real-time-from-the-water-posting that technology and social media afford it can be easy to forget that there are days you’re not going to catch anything. Nobody posts about those days.

Some days it’s epic. Some days it’s just you and the water. You won’t know if you don’t go.

During the festivities of the tournament I got a chance to hang out with my buddy Ben Carmichael from New England on the Fly. For a better look at the Cheeky tournament check out his write up here.

And please check out The Beast’s retirement project at High Hook Wines. Look for and ask for his wine at your favorite packy and restaurant.

Photo by Mud Dog Saltwater Flies

The Wine Cellar
17 November 2015

Green

The weather the past few days has been perfect. The air and the light at this time of year combined with the Indian Summer temperatures do something to me. It probably has to do with the change in seasons and my northern blood.

Driving over the bridge this morning and looking out across the glassy surface of the river, over The Spit and out into Cape Cod Bay brought to mind days past and running to the outside with the dogs in the bow to engage bluefish off of Third Cliff and Peggotty. The dogs have all passed and the boat is gone but I have the memories. The images of Jack and McGee pointing when they saw fish breaking, of Bekka not knowing what the hell was going on and the feel of that boat beneath me and at my hand...that was living. Those times were gold. Cash money. I parked at the office to start another day “making a living” and laughed at the irony of it all.  

Shortly after going through the morning’s emails my iPhone lit up. My buddy Capt. Hal Herrick and his crew from Sankaty Head Fishing Charters are down at Harker’s Island, NC this week chasing albies and he sent me some photos of the start of their day. Fifteen pounds of green. On my fly.

Photo by Sankaty Head Fishing Charters/Capt. Hal Herrick

 I tried to get back to work but my mind wandered back into the archives and I thought about the first albie I caught. It was also in NC, not far from where Hal had caught the monster this morning. I cracked another cup of coffee, found the photo of that first albie on the computer and let myself relive that day for a few minutes.

It was 2007. I had taken time off to spend a full week in Morehead City with Henry (previously written about here) and his friend Barry albie fishing. Being down there also gave me a chance to hook up with my good friend Capt. Bill Strakele, a Cape guide who had relocated there. I had met him a few years earlier when I bought his boat. It was an eighteen foot Lund Alaskan center console. Custom rigged with fore and aft casting decks and a poling platform. It was a fishing machine.

I knew of Billy through fly tying articles and word of mouth. He was part of a group of guides and fly tiers I looked up to. To be honest, I was nervous about meeting him. That nervousness disappeared three seconds after meeting him in his driveway. Through the process of taking the boat out for a splash and making the transaction we learned we had some common history as cops. We had both been detectives when we got out and had some similar stories. In law enforcement, at least back in my day, it was common for a veteran to take a rookie under their wing and be somewhat of a mentor. The veteran was referred to as your “uncle.” Bill Strakele became my “uncle” in Fly World.

Once H, Barry and I arrived in Morehead City, Billy came by the hotel and gave me a few of “the flies” that the albies were keyed in on. There were probably 40 other fishermen staying at the hotel, many also from Massachusetts, and we all met for breakfast each morning. I had packed my vice and materials and sat in my room each night drinking beer with Billy and twisting these flies to hand out to the guys at breakfast.

I think it was day two or three and I had yet to catch an albie. We had found some, cast to some but I was still on a learning curve. At breakfast it was decided that I would go out with Billy on his Pro-Kat and meet up with H and Barry on the water later in the day. The day was gray, windy and cold. There were no classic bait balls to be found. After a couple of hours of searching and waiting we found a few albies moving fast along Atlantic Beach. They were up and down and unpredictable as they tend to be. Billy set up a drift and told me to just keep blind-casting until we saw them break and then try to lead them with a long cast. It took some time but it allowed me to mellow out a little. Eventually a few fish broke in front of us and I got in a good cast and was hooked up. Drag screaming, line flying all over the place…now I knew what “albie fever” felt like.

Photo by Capt. Bill Strakele

 The fish was small but I felt like I had just slain a dragon.  Billy tailed the fish and handed it to me. It was one of the most beautiful things I had ever seen. Even as small a fish as this one was I could feel its seemingly infinite strength as I held it. As Billy dug out my camera for a photo I looked up behind him and noticed that the clouds were giving way to blue sky and sunshine. Moments like that change you. I was glad I was able to share that moment with my “uncle.”

I think of that first albie periodically but I think of that morning with Billy more often. Being on the water with him for a few hours and talking about life and having him there as I let that fish go…that’s cash money.

Capt. Bill Strakele 

Photo courtesy of Capt. Bill Strakele

North River, MA

4 November 2015