by EC NEWELLMAN » Mon Jul 26, 2010 10:59 pm
If you have ever been to a New Jersey shore bar, you pretty much know that it’s typically filled with a transient and spirited crowd that mixes well with each other during the warmer months of the year. But if it’s a shore side bar that just happens to sit right across from a number of commercial fishing and party boats, it’s always going to be filled with locals, especially during the off beach season periods during the year.
Everyday our bar was made up of three distinct groups, and notwithstanding the time of the year, various fishermen from the fish co-op, party and charter boat captains and mates along with the regular private boat fishermen from the area, would be hanging out and indulging in adult beverages starting sometime early in the afternoon. There was also a noticeable crowd of younger women, most coming from the local fishing families who grew up working and helping their dads and brothers on the boats. Finally there were the older ‘sea hags’ whose lives now centered around sweet talking the local fishermen into buying them drinks, or pestering the mostly male clientele by constantly asking throughout the night, ‘you got an extra smoke’?
It was an atmosphere generally no different from any bar that sat right next to that community’s traditional fishing fleet. If you removed the one sun baked sign that sat over the bar that stated ‘Welcome to the Jersey Shore’, our bar could have been set in Montauk, Gloucester, or for that matter Virginia Beach, as fishing boots gave way to fishermen wearing flip flops during the summer months.
My spider-like senses started tingling on this early November night when three very obvious ‘muscle heads’, made a boisterous entrance through the front door of our local watering hole. Instantly all drinking came to a halt as heads turned along the bar, and animated conversations immediately dropping to ’hushed’ tones as everyone stared at these three larger then life sized people taking up seats front and center in our bar. No doubt they did not pay any attention to the coated wire lobster and crab pots and big ketch anchor that sat right outside the entrance of the bar, and realize that this was a fishermen’s bar and not the type of bar shown on MTVs Jersey Shore.
Everyone slowly returned to their stories, but their was now a slight unease of watching and hearing these three muscle bound characters howl and hoot at the one large flat screen TV that just happened to be showing an old episode of the Deadliest Catch. Eventually it seemed as everyone’s wariness waned, and the conversational tone inside the bar was cranked up as the oft repeated fishing stories were being told for what seemed the hundredth time.
Now thinking back, I know it was my fault as the nights heavy drinking took its toll on me, as I became more demonstrative telling my favorite tuna fishing exploits. It did not help as my buddies egged me on as I faked holding a fishing rod in hand, rocking back and forth on till I made a movement of grabbing a gaff and sticking it into the large tuna, then stretching my arms out across my body while standing with one leg propped up on my chair which was supposed to represent the now dead tuna fish. Finally, I made a slitting gesture with my hand across my throat, showing that I now beat this powerful beast.
That last act seemed to be a little too much for the ‘d-bol’ fed group of three to endure. From the corner of my eye, I did see them continuously point the tip of their beer bottles at me, then for a moment leaning together like they were getting the next play from the quarterback in a football huddle, then in unison leaning back, turning and facing me now with long frowns on their faces.
Out of no where, one of them yelled out, ”Yea right, you reeled in a bunch of hundred pound tuna on your own boat…..you couldn’t even lift my gym bag”!
A bunch of laughs and giggles broke out, not only among their small group but a few of the other bar patrons.
If there are any rules for ‘local dive decorum’, they definitely broke the most important one since it was pretty rude when outsiders drinking in a local bar making such loud comments for everyone to hear. I ignored the three beefy jocks as I continued to tell another story, now being self conscious in telling it for only my group to hear.
One of the jocks unsatisfied that he did not get any reaction out of me, then yelled out, “I used to look like that guy……….. when I was eight years old”, causing a bigger roar of laughter and some finger pointing at me by a few of the fishermen in the bar.
It was at that moment that I became keenly aware of how thin I was. Sure I maybe weighted 175 pounds soaking wet at five foot ten, but little did these three know that I banged nails for a living since I was a teen here in the Point Pleasant shore community. Yes a body honed by hard manual labor for eight or more hours a day often working six days a week for most of the year, instead of pumping weights in a Richard Simmons ’spandex stretched’ gym shorts for maybe a hour at some air conditioned gym like these guys did.
They continued to smugly stare at me as they were now fist-bumping each other, on till I finally I could not contain my anger anymore and blurted out,
“YOU GUYS MAY HAVE THOSE GYM WORKOUT MUSCLES, BUT I DON’T SEE ONE STITCH OF FISH PULLING MUSCLES ON ANY OF YOU”!
Just like a scene from an old John Ford country western, the three of them sat up ram-rod stiff, and glared at me for what seemed a few minutes but in reality was barely a few seconds, with one of them now acting as the de-facto spokesman of the group stating in a lowered deep tone,
“What’s that supposed to mean”?
My local bar, my home away from home, felt strangely very small. I looked up at the walls which had yellowing pictures of all the local fishing legends that came from and out of Brielle, Belmar, Manasquan and Point Pleasant. It was almost as the fishermen in those very pictures were now looking at me to defend not only the honor of the bar, but of all the proud fishermen who made a living of catching fish and carrying customers from this area for the last hundred or so years.
With my brain now racing a mile a minute, I had to say something quickly…
“Well you guys don’t believe I could pull tuna weighting a hundred of pounds all day on a small fishing boat….instead of spending your time popping each other in the butt with a syringe filled with d-bol, why don’t you jump on my boat this weekend and see what I could do when it comes to reeling in big tuna…..oh and by the way, all you have to do is show up and come out, all expenses on me”.
What did I just say? Did I just sign and seal my death warrant in making this challenge to what were obviously now three drunk, steroid built gym rats?
The captains, mates and other bar patrons who have known me since I was a ’speck on the deck’ working on the party boats in the area, had their heads swiveling back and forth, first at the group of three, then at me.
Again in what seemed a practiced ritual, they huddled tightly together, now whispering back and forth to each other. I knew I had hooked all three of them when I mentioned syringes and guys butts in a bar that was partially filled with women.
Then they slowly leaned back with one of them yelling out, “you name the time and place and all three of us will be there….and we want your cell number too so you can’t get out of this”.
“Ok”, and then grabbing one of the soiled napkins, I quickly scratched out my cell number along with directions and description of my boat, which happened to be docked just right down the road.
“You guys be down at my boat by 5….no later….wear warm clothes and make sure you bring big lunches. We are going to be out all day”.
One of my buddies who was my mate, just looked at me and quietly said “all day”?
I now giggled to myself and told him “that’s why they bring a cooler full of food and beer. I bet you anything we go home with not only a bunch of tuna fish, but everything else they bring on my boat”.
There was now a near silence in the bar on till one of the muscle heads yelled out ‘what type of tuna are we going to be fishing for”?
Quickly and without thinking I blurted out, “NANTUCKET BIGEYES”!
At that very instant, every one of the local fishermen turned towards me with a blank look in their face, wondering to themselves what the hell a ‘Nantucket Bigeye’ was.
With the night now over, I headed home knowing that I had a number of things to do to get this trip off the dock at this time of year. The next morning, I made my phone call to my buddy at the local fish dock filling him in on the prior evening events at the bar, and he immediately abruptly interrupted me in saying, “your going out this weekend…didn’t you take a look at the weather”?
‘Price is going to be good for quality fish, right’?
He quickly came back with, “as high as you can get at this time of the year…. no one has brought anything in for the last few days….. a few hundred lbs of tuna right now and you could put a respectable down payment on a car”! I was juiced after I got off the phone, and made a beeline down to the boat to prep it for the trip. As I was fueling up, I turned on the vhf radio and heard something that would have made most fishermen going out in a 28 foot open center console, stop instantly in their tracks….
“SUSTAINED WIND SPEEDS OF 20 KNOTS WITH GUSTS TO 30 KNOTS, SEAS BUILDING FROM 4 TO 7 FEET SUBSIDING LATER IN THE DAY”.
I continued fueling, not daunted by the lousy forecast. As long as I could clear the inlet, the allure of a very lucrative pay day and laying out the three muscle heads would not stop me now.
It was 4 am the next day as I stopped in at the Dunkin Donuts located right across from where my boat was docked. The guy behind the counter did not look up at me as he made my usual big cup of coffee. The silence was not typical at this time of the morning as this place was always filled with chatty ‘rubber boot’ wearing fishermen standing in line waiting for a hot cup of Joe, especially on a cool damp morning.
As I tossed a buck into the tip jar, the counter person said “not going to be a good morning here….too windy…that might be my best tip today….you going fishing”?
“Yep” smiling as I walked out.
My mate who had shaped up an hour earlier at the boat, had the deck lights ablaze as both myself and the three muscle heads came down at the same time. All the tackle and bait was loaded onto the boat, and as I told and predicted to my buddy in the bar that night, two large coolers full of food along with three cases of beer came out of the big SUV and were being lugged across the dock.
“Where do you want us to put the food”?
Now I started to bark a few orders like Captain Quint in the movie Jaws, “just out of the way….keep the deck clear, because we are going to be fighting a number of fish today”.
Then I jokingly said, “only three cases of beer”?
That’s when the biggest of the three muscle heads said, “that’s one case for each one of us” now pointing to himself and his two other buddies…”maybe we will let you and your mate have one beer apiece if you catch us some fish at the end of the day”!
All of a sudden in unison they let out something that sounded like a loud Marine grunt, as they easily tossed around the coolers and cases of beer into my boat.
I said “hope you boys have saved some strength so you can easily pull in all the tuna we are going to catch today”. Surprisingly that did not bring a peep from any of them for the first time since the night I met them in the bar.
“Where are we going” one of them blurted out as we jogged slowly down the canal towards the inlet here at Point Pleasant.
The breeze quickly picked up as we left the protective area where my boat was docked, and the wires hanging along the shoreline were eerily sounding out a high pitched whistle. The smooth ride out of the canal now gave way to small rollers coming through the inlet, making my boat start to porpoise up and down.
“Monster Ledge, and grab a hold of something because we are coming up to the inlet”.
‘Monster Ledge’ was the last word I heard from them as I came up along the rocks leading to the inlet, I thought to myself that this was really happening and now I was in for a s#&*# and pissy ride in the dark. No running back now as both the muscle heads and myself were committed. It seemed like a verbal contract had been made and signed that night at the bar, with me guaranteeing big tuna fish, and the steroid built jocks, wanting to prove that they could reel in the biggest tuna without ever breaking a sweat. I knew I would take a beating, but the 3 super studs had called me out in my own watering hole, so off we went.
The rollers turned into frothy white breakers as spray gave way to buckets of water now hitting the canopy of my boat. I gave one last quick glance at them to make sure everyone was holding on, as we slowly rode up and over the large cresting rollers in the inlet. With my attention now fixated ahead, my boat raced down into the trough and then I quickly powered up repeating the process to get us free of some serious sized breakers that would not let up for the next few minutes on till I cleared the inlet.
The beat red color on their cheeks from the cool morning air immediately started to drain, and for a moment I started to see the sparkling colors of the rainbow across all three of their faces as we barely cleared the last set of breakers in the inlet…..there was no turning back now as we were in the open waters of the Atlantic.
Salt water and wind swept waves poured into my boat and quickly drained out the scuppers. The sound of my twin exhaust bellowed, ranging from a deep low hum to what sounded like a fog horn blast when my boat was launched out of the water. One of the muscle heads started to yell out “my sneakers are all soaked already”, causing me to look at the footwear these guys have brought along.
“For goodness sake, it’s November and all three of you are wearing sneakers on a offshore fishing trip in a open boat”?
Another then blurted out “these are 150 dollar leather sneakers”!
“So what” and I now realized that I had brought out three’ man-children’ who were already not prepared for what would lay ahead for them.
I was just a few miles off the beach as I lost the first muscleman as he slowly melted into the deck…. the next went down around Shark River reef, with the last one just clinging to life. A few minutes latter I thought I saw him making the sign of the cross as he began to crumple down between the cabin and helm consol but quickly rising up when his butt hit the wet deck. Finally dragging his way to the stern, he went down without a whimper, collapsing onto the other two, both who were making some grunting and burping noises but never looking up.
I’m now thinking about my mate and myself having to reel in anything if we get bit. Just terrific I thought, as I would be running back and forth from the wheel, jigging, then fighting the fish, and then worst of all, the cutting of the tuna before we hit the coop.
As false dawn started graying up, my Furuno loran was counting down with about 3 miles left to go to the Ledge. As the sun popped up, I started pulling the throttles back which slowed the boat down even more from our 10 knot blistering pace I was barely keeping. I started to slide into the west side of the Hole and do some poking around, watching my old reliable Sitex-Koden bottom machine hoping to see some marks. All of a sudden, I happened to look up and see a cloud of birds in the distance.
Could it be….have the fishing Gods smiled on me and my sorry looking fishing crew? Off we steam into the deep, but the hole was not looking too pretty.
My three muscle heads now laying on each other in the stern of my boat, were now doing ‘junkie nods’ as the boat went up and down in the large swells. Then in what could be called a Discovery Channel scene, the sky kept filling with more gannets and gulls diving around a small whale.
“GET UP, GET UP AND GET READY. HERE THEY ARE”.
Now was the time for me to show my navigational skills, as I carefully started to circle around and come back on some of the readings I just ran past. My mate was running around like a man with his tail on fire as I finally got ahead of the fish readings. I pulled both engines to full stop and then in what looked like a person performing a Heimlich maneuver, I picked up the muscle head closest to me, pulling him out of my way as I grabbed my jigging stick that had a well worn 10 ounce Crippled Herring jig with a traditional short-shanked rusted tuna hook on it.
Down the jig went into the midnight blue depths, as it was now my mate and my self fishing, as the three others were watching from their wet seat on the deck. Barely three pumps and ‘bang’ as the jig got hit on the way down, and again yell to my half awake group to get up. The first muscle head gets up and I shove the rod into him by driving it right into his gut.
“START REELING”!
Since he was the last standing victim to go down, I figured that he was in the best shape to fight a fish. Who knew how many I would hook this day and I wanted to take best advantage while I was on a few fish. I then picked up one of the thick Fenwick trolling rods with a 9/0 on it, and tied another beat up Crippled Herring with a siwash hook on it. I proceed to drop this one down, lock the reel up and only a few lifts on it and get blasted....
“FISH ON!, EVERYONE GET UP”!
Now it’s total mayhem as I have two crazy tuna hooked on jigs in rolling seas and these guys can’t even stand up. I turn around to see how the first muscle head is doing with the fish and I see my mate is now holding the guy up. I knew that it was time to get back on the wheel, as I’m trying to steer the boat with one hand so that I can keep these fish at good angles, while holding the back of the other guys jacket with my other hand so he doesn’t go swimming with the my trolling rod. The pain, the pain….. not only in bringing these guys out, but in making sure I get all three of these guys back in.
The first fish pulls off with the muscle head asking ‘what happened’, but I could not care less about answering him as the second fish came right to the side of the boat quickly due to the 9/0 mounted on the trolling stick where my mate hit the fish in the head with the gaff. Turns out that this first fish dresses out at 87 pounds.
I was energized as I was not going home empty handed today and turned my boat back into to the sea and on top of the big bait readings which the fish were working on. By now all three of the muscle heads are standing, soaked to their shorts and looking deathly pail white. By this time, the sea conditions were not as bad as the current seemed to be letting off, but these guys could not stand up straight without holding on to something.
I pull the throttles of the boat back and point to everyone to grab a rod and drop a jig down on till I tell them to stop.
“STOP AND START JIGGING UP AND DOWN LIKE THIS” I tell them, and like a group of trained space monkeys, they do as they are told. As I was picking up my rod, one of the muscle heads gets bit, while at the same time my mate is into a nice fish which he is now walking up from the stern.
I yell out to the other two guys to first reel up, and then get out of the way, as the mates fish proceeds to head back towards the stern. The muscle head not knowing what to do was just continuing to turn the handle of the big 6/0 senator and the fish kept coming up. Finally the two fish showed color at the same time and we get both of them into the boat with my mates being dressed at 102 lbs and the muscle heads' fish at 74 pounds dressed.
This was looking pretty good considering that less then an hour ago these three were sloshing around on my deck. Now with almost 300 lbs of fish in the boat, I made my trip, plus expenses and could order my son a Xbox without my wife yelling at me about who is going to pay the credit card bill.
We had drifted a long distance from our original location and it was time to turn the boat into the sea and head to the spot. The three muscle heads were now complaining to me that they caught some fish and wanted to go home.
“Oh no girls, we got some more fishing to do…..go drink a protein shake and get ready for the next drift”.
More inaudible grumbling as I stopped the boat and picked up my pole and started to jig. The current had pretty much let up and the fishing had definitely slowed up as I was pumping my jig up and down. ‘BANG’ as my drag let out a squeal with another fish hooked, one which was noticeably bigger then anything we had yet boated.
I was now in my barking orders mode, ordering these muscle heads who were literally double the size of me to get out of the way as this fish felt like a small car hooked to my pole. Up and around I raced on my boat as everyone watched the ‘little guy’ finally beat up on a fish that dressed out at 144 pounds.
The seas had settled to a relatively mild state with slow rollers easily going by. We tried for another hour without a bite, and again the muscle heads started to complain about the time of day, except it was barely 10 in the morning.
“Alright, but if we see anything come up, were stopping” I let them know before I turned the boat to the west. It was barely a few minutes ride when I thought I saw two things, one good and one not so good. Right ahead of me was a whale and right to the south of me it looked like the silhouette of a large Coast Guard cutter, something we did not see earlier in the morning.
After getting some large readings I had to make one last drop of a jig in this area right along the bank of the hole.
“ONE LAST TIME”, as everyone dropped their jigs down to the bottom. We jigged for 15 minutes and then one of the muscle heads lets out a Indian yell as he hooks into a fish.
“KEEP HIS HEAD UP” both my mate and myself cheer him along as we were very conscious that the silhouette in the background had noticeably grown larger.
“LOCK IT UP OR LOSE HIM” as my mate turned the star drag on the senator clockwise locking down the drag. Instantly this last fish came up as the muscle head using a spastic like cranking action, got the fish right up to the boat. This was the smallest of all the fish we caught at 66 pounds dressed, but it made for everyone having caught at least one fish for the trip.
Not letting on about the big Coast Guard cutter looming just to the south, I let out,
“Alright you bitches, cut your crying since your going home to mommy….and give me a beer for the ride home too”.
Dutifully one of the muscle heads breaks out two nice cold ones for me and my mate to enjoy as I put the hammers down as I had the sea behind us. I was now in the jokester mode, telling the three who were again slumped down on the deck, “go ahead have a beer….on me”.
The trip back was uneventful as I put good distance between us, the Ledge and the big Coast Guard cutter. The muscle heads were long into a semi-like coma, not bothered by all the blood on their clothes from the gutted fish we now had secured in my fish box. It was time to make the call to my buddy the fish buyer who was on one of the secret vhf channels.
“You on this one”, I kept calling on the radio. Finally I heard “what you got”?
Smiling, “5 hot lunches coming in”.
“FIVE”!
The sound of his voice gave me some concern, as he said “be careful coming through”.
“SEE YA” I left off, which meant I was under a half an hour out. Everything was stowed away, and as I approached the inlet, my pucker factor increased as I didn’t want to ‘screw the pooch’ so close to home coming in with 473 lbs of Nantucket Bigeyes on board..
My mate knew the routine as all skins came off and all rods hidden in the cabin. As we came through the inlet I made the three muscle heads get up and clean themselves off. Like a finely scripted play, as I approached the fish dock boxes were rolled out and the first fish tossed up like a shot put by one of the muscle heads. The lines weren’t even secured and all five fish were off the boat.
As the last fish went up one of the muscle heads says “How do you like these Nantucket Bigeyes”? No one on the dock said a word, and continued moving at break neck speed to get the fish quickly out of sight.
We pulled away and slowly made our five minute trip down to my dock. The muscle heads were acting like bulls in a China shop, finally eating the first of their heroes along with a beer. I was only half right as they left all the food and a case of beer with us, but with a changed attitude about the little guy now being tough enough to run a boat and get onto some pretty decent tuna fishing.
It wasn’t on till the lines were finally secured that it finally hit me on the day we just had. Of course it would be another story in the bar across the street later this afternoon as I would be gloating with my buddies about having five Nantucket Bigeyes dressing out at just under 500 lbs, along with laying out three super studs on the deck of my boat.
Keep them coming Steve great story,you got a job when you retire Steve...
