Fishing From A Kayak: I decimate stocks of Rock Cod and terrorize survivors

09/06/2011

I developed an interest in kayaking recently and have enjoyed several hours paddling around the very calm, brackish, inland waters of the San Francisco Bay area: Napa River, Suisuin Slough, The Delta. While investigating kayaking opportunities, I read some articles online and watched some videos of fishing from a kayak.

"Something I have to try soon," I thought.

I googled "kayak fishing" (I first wrote "I searched online", but having accepted google as a verb and participle, I feel good about the greater word economy, don't you?), and within two or three links, found Allen Bushnell, owner/operator/guide of Santa Cruz Kayak Fishing. After a couple of message exchanges, we settled upon a private guided trip on Labor Day. Allen checks weather and sea conditions and fish reports constantly and felt confident that all indications pointed to a good day.

ImageAnticipating a memorable experience with an expert guide, my wife and I loaded up the car, drove down to Carmel and then back up to Scotts Valley for the night. Up at 5:30 a.m. next morning, we drove down to the harbor to meet Allen. The affable guy unloading two kayaks and gear from his van as we pulled up was indeed our man. He had my wetsuit ready and told me to change in his van. We went through some basics about launching, the pole rigging he thought would be optimal, and most important: balance, a low center of gravity, hypothermia, and other safety items about kayaking before we wheeled the kayaks, poles, other gear, etc. down to the launching dock.

At the dock, Allen told me in detail what to expect from this day and reviewed some of the safety issues.

"Never reach across your body to get something from behind you, as you would if you were in the front seat of your car. That changes your center of gravity and you will tip that kayak in a nanosecond. If what you need is behind you and to your right, keeping your head centered in the middle of the kayak, reach behind you with your right hand and feel for it. Same thing on the left side. Okay?" "Okay," I responded nodding affirmatively.

He handed me the high-tech, waterproof walkie talkie that I would carry and explained what channel we would be on and what the emergency channel would be and how to call for help in the event that we needed it.

We paddled away from the dock, Allen staying close enough to me to talk me through how he wanted to navigate out past the breakers, which I would call sizable, into the open water. He cautioned me to stay close, of course, and we would track on the right close to the boat slips, staying alert for incoming and outgoing boats. We stopped at the spot he always stops at to time the swell, waited for the bigger clean-out wave, and then paddled hard across the mouth of the harbor and rested when we cleared it. Allen is the kind of guide in whom you have confidence immediately. Everything he does is purposeful and economical of movement. You can see that he scans his universe, and is aware and alert: the swells, the changing weather and wind, wildlife, kelp, surface conditions, his client, traffic, anything that might affect his mission.

Now, past the breakers, after a brief rest, we paddled smoothly and easily to Allen's first fishing spot. Onboard his kayak, he has sophisticated depth finders, fish finders, GPS devices, walkie talkie; and they all seem to have redundant systems. He had four or five fishing poles already rigged standing upright in PVC tubes and molded holes in the top of his kayak, and tackle boxes lashed securely behind him. Just the sight of all that gear in and on his 15-foot Ocean "Prowler" Kayak tells you that he is serious and knowledgeable about this business and that I should just follow his lead, and all will be well. We chatted while we paddled and he explained his strategy, the kind of fish inhabiting the area, the bottom structure and its condition after the kind of swells we had been experiencing here, the behavior of the different targeted fish species. Clearly, he had a reason for everything he did and everything he asked me to do.

After a brief paddle, we stopped, I think partly so that Allen could observe me and assess my condition. Apparently satisfied that I showed no signs of stress, he reminded me of a few things as we paused:

"When we stop to drop our lines, or do anything really, you will be more stable if you let your feet dangle off the sides of the kayak; that keeps you balanced and lowers your center of gravity."

I acknowledged that I understood his instruction by carefully dangling my feet over the sides. "Life this?" "Perfect."

We fished the bottom with frozen squid for a while, and I got a few nibbles probably from small Kingfish, which we did not want. Allen said we'd give it a few more minutes and if we had no action, we'd move to his next spot.

We tried this spot for about another 5 minutes and prepared to paddle on. With my feet inside the kayak on their footrests, I reached across my body with my right arm to put the pole in the left-side holder, turned my head to the left off the centerline, leaned the way my head was now positioned, and in a nanosecond, the left rail rose off the surface and no correction was possible. Oh, shit!"Going in," I shouted the obvious.

I realized the pole and reel were already in the water and lost before I was, myself, completely submerged. Of course, my personal flotation device (PFD we old salts like to call them) bobbed me back up to the surface. Calm but regretful and embarrassed, I floated on my back staying near the upside down kayak and said nothing. Allen said nothing. I saw him out of the corner of my eye, his head down, working on some tackle. Still with his head down, tending to a hook and sinker he was putting together

"Straighten your legs out; get them perpendicular to the surface. With your left hand, grab the first scupper hole you feel. Now, with your right hand reach over to the scupper hole on the opposite side, hoist yourself a bit and grab hold. I'll paddle over in a minute," he shouted.

I wonder now if Allen wanted to give me a bit of time in the water to think it all over, y'know, or perhaps let his client calm down a bit after the event before saying anything. Since I was with Allen, it was easy to remain calm. Otherwise, I can force calm when I have to. I've had some experience with that, and this was not going to be the worst. I was accepting of the embarrassment and the regret about losing the gear, and the wetsuit was doing its job and the PFD was doing its job and Allen was doing his job. Really, I was thinking about the moment I was having, and it occurred to me that it was interesting to be in this event that is talked about but not really experienced by that many people. "I hope we catch some fish," I thought as Allen approached methodically with instructions about how to right the kayak.

Once upright, and after a brief pause, Allen said, "Nick, my man, let's review, shall we?"

He handed me another pole and rigging and we paddled about one-quarter mile until his fish finder displayed fish about two feet from the bottom.

"Here we go, Nick. Drop your line here and give the reel about two cranks up," he said.

"With my feet in the water, keeping my head facing forward along the centerline of the kayak, carefully reaching for the pole on the left with my left hand and releasing it from its hook, I shall drop my line here," I said.

Allen laughed. I laughed. I repeated that little joke about four or five times to Allen's amusement.

"No one will learn that lesson better than you. It may be the most valuable experience you can have kayaking," he had said once we uprighted the kayak. "I have taken hundreds of people out who only know this cerebrally, you actually experienced it. You are way ahead of everyone else, and you are the guy I would least expect to roll over a kayak in the future."

We went as far as the one-mile buoy, fished several spots that Allen had previously marked on his fish finder, saw sea lion pups and dolphins breaking the surface, watched the biggest flocks of sea birds I had ever seen skim the surface, paddled over a lot of kelp. We experienced changes in wind, current, surface chop, and swell; all of which Allen pointed out to me before I could have observed it.

We caught our limits of Rockfish. We commented on how serene, peaceful, and pleasurable this day was several times during the paddle out and back. We laughed, learned a little about each other, and at the end of the adventure, on shore by his vehicle, we shook hands and did one of those manly hug things with the shoulder clap and all. Allen said that his season runs through the middle of October. I am going to engage him again before he shuts it down for the year. On that day, with my feet in the water, keeping my head facing forward along the centerline of the kayak . . ..