Art And Fishing

Fishing south of the order

The sun is rising over the hilltop and the seas are calm, we are just out of the port and the talk of the big one dominates the conversation over our morning coffee. 4 guys from different parts of the world all here in Manzanillo Mexico in search of the elusive Marlin.

The morning starts out with a few small tuna, the adrenaline running wild when you here the scream of line coming off the reel. The captain is excited and we don't why, so we ask in our broken Spanish, and some how, through some sign language we concur that he wants those tuna for bait. Again, our adrenaline starts to flow as he hooks them up and lets them out behind the boat and throttles down the engine to a crawl.

The sun is rising over head, the morning coffee rush has worn off. A few of us are fighting the urge to drift off to sleep with the sway of the boat. And Then! In an instant the captain is screaming and the deckmate is rushing to the rod screaming Marlin!!

We all bounce up from our grogginess screaming and beaming. The fight is on! The Marlin tearing line off the reel and doing cartwheels 300 yards behind the boat. The reel starts smoking from the tremendous friction, the deckhand is pouring water on the reel to keep it as cool as possible. The captain has swung the boat around as the line on the reel is almost gone. Only three minutes has gone buy and this fish is about to take the line, hook and bait swim off in to the depth with moby dick laughing at us for giving him the free and easy tuna for breakfast.

We are gaining on him, he makes a quick turn and heads straight for the boat. Jack reels as fast as he can but can not keep up. The slack in the line is too much and the captain is again scared he might escape. And then an explosion right next to the boat as the marlin shows his muscles and soars out of the water. We are all in shock at the size of this ocean beast.

The fight has now been going on for over 1 hour, the fish is tiring and jack is pouring sweat from all parts of his body's. We just don't know who will tire first. It has become a tug of war between man and fish. Jack seems to have the edge, the fish is relenting and coming closer to the boat. We can see this monster of the sea just twenty feet away. He must of seen he is going crazy. Jack cant believe it. The fish runs another 50 yards out and makes another incredible leap.

Oh NO!! Jack says, has he holds the rod in his hands with it no longer doubled over and no resistance. We see the marlin jumping in glee behind the boat gloating if you will. He has escaped. Tears roll down the face of Jack he has battled to no avail. We all have this empty feeling in our belly and decide the only thing to do is crack open a cold corona get the lines back out and hope that we can do battle again with this magnificent creature again here in Manzanillo south of the border.

The marlin, the captain estimated was over 500 lbs and was a blue Marlin. We fished the rest of the day and landed a couple of Dorado or Maui Maui as some people call them. But, in the end we were just a couple of fisherman with a tall tell for the guys back home. Of course the big one got away.