Ship's Log August 1st-4th 2019
Wyatt Comes, Travis Goes
With the blown genset engine in mind I immediately (at sea) called my banker first. I needed a little reassurance and got that. Then I called my mechanic, Nate Hudson, who luck would have it was available. I remember hitting the dock in Winchester Bay and within a few hours the genset was tore apart, and the next day removed from the vessel. I brought the fresh one in from my shop and we did the job in 7 days total. The season was in full swing by the time we had re-supplied and ready to go.
My son Wyatt made the commitment to the 20 day trip, and Travis was still pretty up-beat about it, but had not earned any $$ yet, so was getting apprehensive.
We departed on 8-1 at 7:30pm into a semi rough sea. I steamed out to the tuna grounds before shutting down for bedtime about 3am. I started the next day at 6am with coffee and I set the gear. Travis remained in the bunk, and when the fish came on, I had Wyatt nearby to assist, so I left Travis to get up whenever he wanted. Wyatt and I pulled 94 fish, and Travis joined up for another 53 before nightfall which gave us 147 for the first day.
I was really excited to have Wyatt aboard. It is a struggle to be away from the family for so many days/weeks/months while fishing tuna in the summertime. My dream is for my 2 boys to be aboard the vessel fishing alongside me for years to come, but I am objectively realistic and do not want to force my issue on them. I do not want to blow them off the boat forever, so I am patient. Now Wyatt is on the boat, my youngest son, and I am VERY CONTENT! And he is having a good time
Day 2 Travis got up early and promptly caught a great Mahi Mahi. SURPRISE!! He threw it aboard and we got a couple good pics then put it aside for dinner. Wyatt was up too and the deck was a lot of fun pulling a decent number of fish til it got pretty ROUGH out! Wyatt and I met the challenge but Travis got back down into his bunk. Not too much longer he came out and broke the news that he did not want to continue this arrangement. Pretty upset, but the ocean in this condition is not for him. This vessel is a big round belly boat with no rolling chalks, no stabilizers, and only a couple hundred fish for ballast in its 19 ton hold. It snaps back hard and fast and the roll is extreme.
I was pretty pissed. Pretty surprised too. Something was not what I thought it was. I was missing the boat somewhere here with Travis, but what can I do. Force the issue and things get very dis harmonious very quickly so I just aimed for Winchester Bay, 40 miles is all it took. It was late and dark, the James T, a big dredge vessel was dredging the channel into the East Basin of Salmon Harbor. The tide was rushing in and when I tried to go between them and the green buoy, I grounded my boat! I could see the mud shooting out of the deckhose, and was very worried about my propeller, but I hit reverse, nothing happened. After for a minute or two then we began to back off the mud. We made it back to the channel. I just went to the West Basin and parked at the fuel dock. Travis helped tie up, then grabbed a bag and with plenty of expletives he bailed on us.
Fine. But now Wyatt has had a pretty fun 2 days, and he is wanting to bail as well. Again I cannot push that, try as I might with positive attitude, promises of riches, etc etc I cannot change his mind. Wyatt and I sleep it off, and wake up to fill the boat with the small amount of fuel we burned and then we motored over to my moorage position in Winchester Bay. I took Wyatt home, then back to the boat to scratch my head.
Boats were selling full loads of tuna. The dock was active with that. I got ahold of my friend Mark Kimball from the Steelblue Chameleon Lodge on the Elk River. He had mentioned that he wanted to do a tuna trip. I offered up the chance. He was not available for 4 more days from now. So at 3am the next morning I was too stir crazy to sleep and I headed out of Winchester Bay and crossed the Umpqua bar with Seanna. I was going for it alone. Lotsa guys do it. Bet I can...
