Deep Sea St. Kitts

“Have you ever deep sea fished?” I get this question a lot when I talk to people about fly fishing; I’m not really sure why, I speculate that people think if you fish, you would like to go after big fish, and we all know the biggest and baddest fish live in the sea—fish like the barracuda.

The answer is “no I have not, I am a trout fisherman; but I’d like to someday.” After all my blog says fishing the world one river at a time… That doesn’t mean all the fishing I do is in a river, and it doesn’t always have to involve a fly rod. As you can see from my pics, I can now answer that question with, “why yes I have deep sea fished in the ocean.” 

Frank was the man and booked us on a ship with captain “Speedy” on a small private boat that took out only the four of us off the coast of St. Kitts. This was the initiation for his son Zach into the “Bro Club” while the ladies went on a rain forest excursion.  Our  families decided to take a group trip, a cruise through the Caribbean; starting at Puerto Rico hitting a bunch of Saint islands, ending in Barbados. St, Kitts was man time and chance for me to add deep sea fishing to my list of fishing experiences.

We were out of the dock not 15 minutes and fish on.  Zach was first up; a beautiful tuna. Speedy and Mervin, his mate rigged about 8 poles some on out riggers, some set with what looks like huge plastic flies some with small fish.  They set some deep, mid-level and some pretty much on top water. In a nut shell it was dad fishing--where the dad does the fishing and the kid reels it in. But no complaints here.

The next fish was my turn, which turned out to be a king fish. I want to say it fought like the devil and almost ripped me right out of the seat; but the truth is it felt more like a heavy weight that kicked a little here and there. Although I must say at first I did feel a like captain Quinn in the first Jaws, sitting in the classic fishing seat located at the end of the boat.  But if we’re going to reenact Jaws and assign characters I would be Sheriff Brody, Frank would be Hooper and Zog would be Quinn. And if memory serves me correctly it was Quinn who was sitting in the fishing seat when they first hooked the monster.

Frank’s fish followed about an hour after mine. Wow this fish seemed big from the get go; and it turned out to be a Barracuda. The teeth on that bad boy were wicked; in fact Speedy wouldn’t let Frank get his hands anywhere that things mouth.

The only one we have left is the naïve, simple, all American county boy Zog. We reached the end point of our route, zig zagging back and forth along the coast line. Speedy had fish finders and the like, but I noticed he followed the birds more and read the location he was at more than anything. They were working it hard for Zog, baiting and re-baiting, adjusting lines. It was looking like Zog’s patience would be pushed to the limit. I was doing my best to rattle his cage, although I have no idea why; it’s never worked in the past, but why not try.

We have about 5 minutes left before we reach the dock, and the boys are working it hard for Zog-- bingo fish on and as fate would have it a big fish. This one is taking line, and it’s looking like might have that epic battle. I’m going to switch stories from “Jaws” to “Old man and the sea” battle between man and fish; why not Zog is the old man, and he deserves that place among us in the “Bro Club.” His fish is huge, a barracuda. Check out the teeth on this monster. Oh by the way a “Cudda” look as mean on the boat is it does in the water.

The rest of the trip Zog and Frank were real sports about being the “Cudda boys” but then that’s sort of how they roll anyhow.  Although I still don’t think it was a coincidence that the night club singer performed Heart’s Barracuda on the ship that night.

Good time was had by all; kids had a chance to sort of reconnect and chill on beautiful white sand beaches, we all got a good taste of the island life. Who knows maybe next time I’m in that neck of the woods, I’ll get a chance to make some long distance throws at Bone fish.