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On a dark night amid a nasty and rabid thunder storm early last week three hardened crew members stood at the transom on the Conquistador...stoicly braced against the weather and damn determined to get the agreed upon quota of bait...namely caballitos...before finally buckling before the storm and heading to the nearest anchorage for some much needed rest...it was nearing midnight when another nuclear thunderbolt crashed to the water 100 feet closer to the boat this time...likely killing one of the dozens of porpoise that fed around the lights...when the captain turned towards his loyal crew and proclaimed...
"CHINGA SU MADRE CABRON!"
And then...
"LET'S GET THE FUCK OUT OF HERE!!!!"
Hard talk for dangerous times while strapped to the helm of a 40' lightening rod...what a storm by god...but something in the air changed that night...as good as we thought the fishing was before...well my lord Thor had something else to say about it...
I finished up a surprisingly enjoyable week of jet skiing and scuba diving with the big guy last Monday...despite the fact that we couldn't see past our regulators due to the Mississippi water inshore on the dive spots and the nasty fact that we sunk the jet ski overall the week went well...the boat only broke once and it was a minor stitch...and the kids only managed to mash 6 to 10 snickers bars into the boat this time...which is a marked improvement...
So things are looking good i'm thinking as i convince the big guy to head out for his last afternoon for a little blue marlin fishing...we load the catered food...the cocktails...the kids...the DVD's for the kids et al and vamanos offshore...it's about two in the afternoon and the ocean is as tranquilo as she gets...the clouds have that warm summer afternoon glow to them as if God were in fact a photographer and demanded perfect light all day long during big fish season...well she was a beauty put it that way...
We roar offshore and right to the marks i was working on developing during the last report and set out the 6 lucky numbers behind the boat...we might have trolled an hour before the Marlin Magic marlin breakfast gets demolished in the short left rigger...i was actually just instructing the big guy on what to do if a fish bit...how to control the throttles etc because i was in dire need of a thoroughbred piss when i kid you not the fish demolishes the lure and the big guy turns to me and goes...
"Oh...like that?"
He said it calmly...so i'm pretty sure he wasn't expecting the drill sargent shit storm that came bellowing from me nanoseconds later chasing him down the tower and into the chair in record time...
"MOVEYOURASSGETINTHEGODDAMNCHAIRTHATISANICEBLUE-SONOFABITCHDIDYOUSEETHATJUMP!-MOVEMOVEMOVE!!!!!"
The big guy's a fairly laid back, comfortable in his wealth and power type of guy...so i wasn't sure how he would handle this situation when it came...but he did remarkably well and as we chased after that beast vibrating and grinding things unseen i thought to myself this is about as good an ending to a week with the CEO of JT Industries than anyone could have hoped for...
Lo and behold the hooks stuck and we managed a milestone for a guy who's led a colorful life worthy of a Tom Clancey novel to say the least...i can't tell you how happy that stuff makes me...i feed off that vibe...it's a big payoff emotionally and just pretty goddamn exciting any way you look at it...
I figured "OK...DONE!"...better to leave on a high note right?...but we put the lures back out anyway and before we could get three lines in the water another savage blue marlin comes slashing through the spread...
The big guy...who is in the tower with me just taking his first sip of the celebratory beer is subjected to another tyrade that sends his lime wedge flying and racing down the tower once again...
Mrs Big Guy straps into the electric chair just as the vibrant blue demon crashes through the wake...having it's way with her...and i think we'd all agree she was enjoying it...
For a woman who has never seen a blue marlin prior to her husband catching one just moments before she puts the hammer down...and in tournament fashion i'm backing down hard for the leader to ensure the release...
Bopa reaches out after a dramatic chase and just as he takes his first wrap the EAL lure comes free and we've done it...make that two for two and a cinderella ending that keeps people in love with fishing...and boating...and all that comes with it...
I've been known to say good things continue to happen to good people from time to time...so chalk blue marlin up as another reason to stay mostly on the good side of the force...(although a little foray over the fence now and then never hurts)...
Needless to say the final run home after 7 days of boating adventure with the big guy and family was filled with good talk and hard bonding that takes place between two people who have transcended employer/employee relationships and become friends...time passes too quickly in moments like these in the tropics...and i think both of us gunning along from the tower at 30 knots wished it could last a little longer...all it took however...to snap us out of it...was the 2-G turn around the corner at Punta de Mita where the late afternoon sun lit up a forgotten surprise and our favorite eastern pacific pirate's 60' Miller aptly named the "HANG EM HIGH"...
"Oh SHIT...!" i blurt out... "I forgot Tony B was coming to town..."
As if the madness couldn't get any deeper...
Yes...that's right kitty...i TOLD you...DO NOT PLAY IN THE STREET...
A twisted episode follows the Mayor like a chubasco chasing an illegal Mexican long-line fleet towards the mangroves...and now here he was...in the flesh...Cape Marine Cabo Phil on one hip and a pair of sausage-fingered Baja crewmembers...former **** stars...on the other...you can't make this shit up kids and for one fleeting moment i pondered just how these two realities were going to mesh...but one hour and several cocktails into dinner at the big guy's oppulent beachfront mansion facing Corbetania Tony B still had exactly 57 hours of story telling left in the reserves...and was a matter of fact just hitting his stride...
The crew on the HANG EM HIGH had a lot to talk about for sure...having caught and released a slam...a 400 pound blue, fiesty striped marlin and a sail just outside el banco on the way into town...and nearly scored PV's second super slam when they lost a black later in the afternoon...
Those harrowing tales spawned from an arduous and pitfall laden voyage across the treacherous Sea of Cortez traded local tales of capture and exploration and it may have been the straight vodka cocktails but i seem to remember everyone having a pretty dern good time..an epic end to a much needed trip away for the big guy et al and a formidable start to another chapter in the Mayor's secret files...at the giant dinner table in the middle of it all i'm sipping my vodka and grinning into my drink...thinking about the fantastic fishing...and all the great stories it brings our way...
The next week after that night...since last monday...deserves an entire trilogy to justify it properly...but alas...it's GO time...the big fish are here...and have i mentioned yet there are a goddamn LOT of them...
The HANG EM HIGH and the CONQUISTADOR lit out on a week of fishing together that will leave all who were onboard with us to experience it changed forever...in one way or another they will all be coming back...because when the madness rears it's head and you are there to stare it in the blood-shot fearsome eyes for the first time it's something that registers in the hard drive...not to be deleted...and sought almost reverently to be repeated...
We stumbled upon something special out there amigos...something really, really amazing...double digit marlin days where our top day in the last 6 saw us release 12 marlin out of 19 bites...the kind of action Norm Isaacs and Larry Dahlberg have been looking for for a long, long time...perhaps the most heart-stopping billfish madness we have ever seen...you did NOT know whether the next bite was a 100 pound striper or an 800 pound blue...
I watched a fish yesterday afternoon approach our spread from 100 feet away as though it were the great shadow of a wayward cloud...the girl was so big she may have moved her tail one full sweep to cover a distance of 100 feet while we were still travelling along ahead of her at 9 knots...she came dilliberately and with great calculation at the Marlin Magic travelling along in flat calm crystalline cerulean blue water in the long right rigger position...she feared nothing...no man or the 40 feet behind him...
With a swipe of her bill she slapped the lure from the clip as though she had reached out and slid the entire bar table towards her to shorten the reach to the chicken wings...effortless...
She backed off and her pectorials lit up...the sound in my world had already turned off...defoned potentially by my own screaming...and in perfect silence i watched her engulf the Magic...
MY.......GOD........
ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ....
Jeff...who had previously been fishing Cabo and waiting over 15 years for this fish sat helplessly in the chair as line came from the reel at exactly the speed the boat was moving...the big girl was just sitting there chewing her food...and i hoped to god the small hooks in that little peanut would find purchase...
Too morbid to gun the boat, alter course...or do anything to throw off the harmonics of the moment for that matter...i did nothing but pay attention...and when the hooks popped free i screamed at the boys to clear the remaining lures and get those three live goddamn skipjack i'd been nuturing in my tuna tubes for the last five hours into the water...NOW...NOWNOWNOWNOWNOW!!!!!
Knowing i could have at worst barely stung the beast i was all but convinced she would gobble up a live skipjack faster than a latenight Cabo entertainer on a purple headed hammer...but no...
Nonononononononononononononoooooooooooooooo....she did not...and continues to haunt me to this day....
Well that was one of many...to give you an idea of what is waiting out there...we're calling 300 pound blues and blacks rats after battling with some true beheamoths out there...TRACY I NEED THE GODDAMN HEAVY GEAR we are in the Dragon's den my friend....and let me tell you...you get a little twitchy when more than half a dozen stripers at a time or a smaller blue or black crashes the spread...almost afraid to look over your shoulder in case they get any bigger out there...and well...i'm afraid they do...
As these years go by there will be a point where i crash and burn emotionally...it's enevitable...everyone has their limit...i cannot take these atomic surges of adrenaline forever without some form of cataclysmic siesure...because do not get me wrong...the fishing is that good out there...well over 100 marlin raised between the HANG EM HIGH and the CONQUISTADOR in a week of fishing is world class by ANYONE's standards...i cannot say enough about the opportunity to enjoy this life and the amazing moments we share because of it...
We have much to be thankful for my friends...
You deserve to see all the photos but as i'm now coming off 11 days of living on the boat and Cath has the laptop in Canada with the kids they will have to wait...someone will black-op me a laptop down soon and i'll fill the next report or so with only photos...
God so much more to tell...but i'm dead tired and headed out for tournaments, Marlin magazine, slews of charters and god knows what else the looming fortnight promises to bring...although i can pretty much guarantee you it will be interesting...
Rock on amigos...PENDULOS...
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