A Harsh Mistress

Look up the term Sucia in the uban dictionary and it'll return the definition of an unclean woman of ill repute.  I must admit that though she's beautifull and ocasionally generous, I've felt that way about her at times.


Wednesday ran late.  Straight from work to loading Deepcolor’s vehicle.  Met up with Lee at Winco for the cooler pick-up and proceeded to invent a shopping list while traversing the aisles.  You could tell we were hungry because of all the junk food.  Luckily, I was able to dredge up a few successful camp cooking recipes along the way.

By the time we reached the boat it was midnight…..and time to start working.  Fresh out of storage, our home for the next 4 days needed set-up.  Gear was shuffled back and forth, window panels buttoned and zipped.  Gear and food arranged. She was beautiful when we finished, despite the sore, numb fingers and damp clothes.
 
1:30AM and time to toast our beginning with a little Glen Livette. Conversation runs deep at the wee hours.  Cementing friendships requires a touch more Glen.
 
Thursday morning dawns cold, wet and windy.  Ground glass in my eyeballs and tongue thick as a $50 steak but there’s still work to be done… and fish to be caught.


Shooting the gap between Little Sucia and Sucia proper we get our 1st glimpse of Slob Hollow and the broken rocks that eat jigs like monster lings eat greenies.  So much potential!  Rocky Points, blue rivers 100’ deep and kelp decorated walls.  DC points out his Money Hole, talking about bent rods and rubber arms.  OMG GET ME OFF THIS BOAT!!!!


The fishing wasn’t near as consistent as I’d expected.  DC grunted out multiple fish at each go-out while Zee and I climbed our ways up the learning curve.  Being a relative Straights newb, I made sure to pay attention to what my partners were doing.  DC had the local knowledge and the art of fluttering his RBS in all the right places.  Meanwhile, master Zee tortured little fish to the delight of BIG fish in the raging currents.  Though everyone’s rods bent deep and low multiple times, DC is the only one to net a keeper.


On shore, a campfire is coaxed and babied into existence.  Tinder… TeePee… Log Cabin.  Each iteration drying the next until it can sustain itself.  Potatoes and fish wrapped and cooked in the flames suffer the lack of a mineral omnipresent in our watery surroundings.  More spices needed next time.  The last dregs of Glen are gratefully consumed, warming wind weary fishermen.

Wind and rain blanket our sleep.  Dreams are vivid and technicolor, punctuated by brief moments of listening to the boat complain.  One might describe it as a poor sleep but I’m grateful for the reminders of my current location.

Dawn brings no relief.  The wind is straight south and our fishing grounds carry a miserable texture.  An impromptu hike is undertaken circling half the island.  Sucia is a place straight out of Disneyland.  So idyllic in its flora and geology as to have been formed in the imagination of a madman.  Scattered throughout the forest and beaches are well healed camp spots.  We check the crossing from Orcas and call Lee to let him know what they can expect.


By the time we return to the boat, conditions have improved.  Time to fish.
Each fish is hard won.  We still hadn’t figured out how to best work the ridiculous currents.  Unseen monsters would taunt us by stripping line and then evaporating.  Only underlings and copper rockfish hanging on until color, unless you were Marie.  Paddling out at mid afternoon, the pair joined us at the bluff.  Within a half hour, we heard the call on our VHFs.  “I think I’ve got a keeper.  Can you measure it?”……  A few short minutes later they were gone.


It’s Friday night.  The end of another challenging day.  Hot dogs for dinner defines how the fishing was.  They taste good after a hard day of fishing though.  And the Scotch?  The Scotch tastes even better.  Each swallow hard won chasing currents down the bluff, sprinting to The Point and thru the Money Hole to Hog Hollow over and over and over again. Time to hop in the dingy and invade camp Lee and Marie. Dang but she made it look easy today….

2:00AM  All of my life experiences tell me I should be puking right now.  Too much Scotch.  Constant pitching and rolling from the West wind barreling down the mouth of Shallow Bay.  Can’t see a thing in the windowless mid-berth but, with the exception of missing my kids and girlfriend, I feel pretty damn good. 

Saturday

“Being against evil doesn't make you good. Tonight I was against it and then I was evil myself. I could feel it coming just like a tide”
ERNEST HEMINGWAY, Islands in the Stream
Pt. 1: Bimini, Section 4

I knew that if I wanted my keeper, I’d have to make a sacrifice.  In the days of the Greek tragedies, it would have been the blood of an Ox and a thigh bone wrapped in fat.  On some volcanic archipelago, an incinerated virgin.  This day, it would be a hapless greenling.

Following Zee’s lead I cobbled together an Iron Maiden.  A cruel and merciless harness with size 8/0 hooks and a 6oz cannonball weight.  The victim was pierced and secured to the harness, then dropped to hover just above the craggy haunts of toothy predators 100 feet below.
 
When a lingcod approached, the victim darted about at the end of the line, trying to avoid certain death.  A sudden stop in the action lets you know that the ling has found its mark.  As the rod tip bends downward, several turns of the reel are taken to ensure the predator can’t reach its lair.  Time ticks by while the rod tip dips and bounces back until the greenling is engulfed.  At this point, you set the 8/0 hooks and hang on thru line stripping runs and powerful shakes.

I felt bad each time I checked the harness but the results were undeniable. DC scored first on his RBS in a spot called The River then I found my keeper at the Bluff.   Not to be outdone, Zee regrouped, headed to the point and secured his prize as well.  In the early evening hours, DC and I headed back to Slob Hollow where I CNR’d my best fish of the trip.



That evening, we celebrated our victories around the campfire with well spiced Lingcod, baby reds in garlic and sour cream, skin grilled greenling (aka bait) with mango salsa, crispy garlic bread and buttery, lemon pepper asparagus.  And of course more Scotch.
   
Sunday brought the best weather of the trip.  We still had a long way to go and a great deal of work to do but only a fool would leave these conditions.  Early on we were hard pressed to find the currents that herald a ling bite.  The first few hours were scratch fishing at best.
 
When the bite did turn on, I was still trying to jig up a fresh bait.  By the time I reached the bluff, DC already had the fish of the trip on his stringer.  Shortly after, Bryce peddled over with its twin.  And as quickly as it came on, the current shut down.


In a last ditch effort, I sprinted to Slob Hollow with an oversized dead bait.  Close on my heals was Zee with a perfect little lively greenling.  In a demonstration of what a great guy and true friend he is, Zee had raced over to make sure I had a good offering.  Dude you rock!  The fatigue of 4 days full of fishing and the frustration of my last day effort was telling when I fumbled the handoff and lost Zee’s gift to the depths.  To add insult to this injury, as I made the drift back to the boat, I had 3 solid hook-ups, each of which left me with half a swimbait….

As bad as my days losses were, they couldn’t detract from what was undeniably 4 days of shear fishing delight on a jewel of an island in the northern stream. 


-Spot-