Fusco 1, Mother Nature 0 or My Hemingway Moment

After days of easy living, meals composed of super fresh and tasty seafood, beach walks, swimming for hours in the pool, and a re-introduction to the luxury of proper showers and flush toilets, Richard suggested we charter a boat and go fishing for the day on the Indian Ocean. As many of you know, my love for the outdoors knows no bounds and fishing has been a lifelong hobby with well over 7 hours (if you include time spent watching "The Deadliest Catch") of my life dedicated to its pursuit.


So, there we were, up at the crack of dawn and powering out to sea with Callum, our captain and 2 crew. If this is fishing, I'm in. Rich, his dog Foxy, and I were able to lounge comfortably as Callum steered us up the coast and out past the reef and into a rolling Indian Ocean. The veteran sea-goers were initially concerned that I might fall to sea sickness, but fortunately for all, I adapted to life on the rolling sea much like a super intelligent dolphin with a strong digestive tract and no inner ear issues.


Our steadfast crew went to work putting lures on lines and almost immediately started catching 12-18" long live bait fish and putting them out on their lines and moments later, reels started spinning as these bait fish were hit. Presumably much larger fish were on the hunt and our little bait fish had a rough go of it as a number of them were cut in half by hits.


This process of catching live bait and sending it out continued as did a number of false alarm hits until late morning when the the reels let out a high-pitched whirl and the crew got very excited. They shouted for me to take the rod and reel and along with Richard and Callum coached me through a 30 minute fight with nature. During the fight, the marlin jumped many times as he didn't seem to like the idea of joining us on board.



Towards the end of the fight, my arms started to feel like overcooked asparagus but I refused to yield to the mighty fish the size of my good friend KA. The battle continued until the mighty blue marlin learned the name Fusco and ultimately surrendered like a French soldier.


Unfortunately, the mighty sea beast had swallowed the hook and releasing it was not an option. After some photos, it was strapped to the back of the boat - the stern for all you nauticalistas out there - for transport.


Richard, Callum, and the crew all congratulated me on my haul and indicated that I was most fortunate as some have fished for years and never landed one. Our good luck continued as Rich was able to land two yellow fin tuna of about 30 kgs each and I was fortunate to fight and successfully land another tuna of similar size. My arms were finished by the end of that fight.


As the afternoon rolled along, the fishing action died down enough to look around and take in the wonders of the Indian Ocean. We saw schools of dolphins, sailfish, and various sea birds. The reels whirled from time to time, but fish were lost and nothing compared to our earlier triumphs.


We headed for the safe moorage in front of the Ocean Sports Resort and unloaded our catch and ourselves to a skip to get us ashore. There, they gathered to see our haul. They, in this case, meant local fish buyers and punters at the resort's bar. Coming home to such an audience with a big catch was a huge ego stroke, but fortunately for me, we picked the right bar to land at as tradition at another one dictates that the catcher of a marlin must buy the drinks for the entire bar.


I must admit that my fishing adventure was a complete rush and made me reconsider the merits of the pursuit, but the skeptic in me suspects that my success was all somehow an elaborate rouse set up by the fishing establishment to get me to stop verbally disparaging them.