Fishing with Cap'n Tim


Ok, you're reading this...you know I survived.


Cap't Tim wanted to go fishing.  He wanted company.  He recruited Ian and me.  And Joka.  Joka never showed up.  Ian and I figured, hell, we'll go out for a few hours, wet a line, catch no fish, be back for supper.  


Oh no.  Tim wants to go overnight.  Fish in the dead of night.  That's when the fish bite.  Oh.


Second question was 'where?'  "Go past house, white house, fish reef."  He gestured out past the creek entrance.  Ok, seems modest enough.  We'll venture out into the harbor and bob around for awhile.


Oh no.  'White house' was actually 'lighthouse' when we finally pinned him down.  He was talking about going out past Cousteau, where we go snorkeling.  Ok, that's a whole different ballgame now.  Ian and I look at each other.  A mute understanding passes between us:  Oh shit.


Tim says we need ice.  Yeah, in this climate if you don't have the fish on ice you're going to smell like, well, dead fish when you come back.  So, third question:  How much ice?  "Maybe...half ton."  Wait a minute here!  Which led to the fourth question:  How many fish do you intend to catch?  "Many," he said with a huge smile.


Ian is from Saskatchewan.  He fishes pike like I do.   Catch a few, bring them home.  Not Tim.  He wants to sell fish to make money.  Which by the way is illegal in Fiji.


Fifth question:  What do we use for bait?  "We catch bait in net."  Big smile.  Ok.  As Lesley, Ian's wife put it:  "It's about time you boys had an adventure."


It was decided the prudent thing to do was to have me take Peregrine out to Cousteau, anchor it and then hop on Tim's boat for the fishing.  Neither Ian nor I had enough confidence in Tim's boat to even make it that far and we wanted a bail-out plan.  


So Tim went and got ice from some commercial outlet.  He had a bag of 30 kilos stuffed in an old non-working freezer when I pulled in after shopping.  He wanted us to move the freezer down the dock to his boat, put it on the deck and use it for fish.  We tipped it and ants came out everywhere.  Tim said "No good.  No ants on boat."  Yeah, that's right, but where do we put the ice?  I suggested an old sail bag that was lying on the dock.  I suggested the dinghy.  Finally Tim remembered that Jose had offered the use of her big cooler.  So off I go to Jeff and Jose's boat to get a cooler.  And it was a big cooler.  But it wasn't big enough, so a third of the ice melted on the dock.


Ian and Tim took off with Tim's boat and I went back to Peregrine to get it ready for going out.  I met them outside the creek mouth and we chugged our way up to Cousteau.  I got there early, set the anchor and dove in to check the set.  All good.  


I got back in the boat in time to get a bag together:  The Inreach, iPad, iPhone, bug spray, headlamp, flashlight, extra shirt and my fishing gear.  And a 2L water bottle. Up pulls Tim's boat with Ian at the helm.  He did a nice touch and go and we're off to catch many fish.


...to be continued.

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