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- Should have seen this, wish you were here, Steve Lassley
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Aftco Presents: |
Should have seen this, wish you were here, Steve Lassley |
- By Steve Lassley
- Published 11/4/2008
- Fishing Reports
- Unrated
The Bisbees hadn't even started and we were watching the weather looking for a window to bring the CROW'S NEST home. The boat had done a great job pre-fishing and during the tournaments. I don't remember exactly what Anthony caught pre-fishing the week before the tournaments. Something like a Black about 575 lb, a couple 450 lb Blacks, a 300, and a couple small ones. He was flat coonin 'em. This is coupled with him looking at several areas. The conditions just turned to crap after Hurricane Norbert rolled through–that, and we were on the worst possible moon phase.
Anyway, where was I? To my complete dismay it looks like the weather is going to be flat calm 2 days after the tournament. We keep an eye on it, and sure enough, it's going to be beautiful, starting on the day I'm supposed to fly home. We finish getting our asses kicked in the tournament, then we wax and polish the Badger and get it prepared for??? Chad and Eliseo prepare CROWS NEST for the trip home. Clear papers, buy groceries and Eliseo's wife made us like 40 burritos and we were outta there.
The weather reports said less than 10 knots all the way home if we could make it in less than 60 hours. I also saw just a touch of rain or drizzle in the forecast. Mostly from the Finger Bank up to the bottom of the Ridge. No big deal–I hardly even paid attention.
We departed at 8pm, making about 11 knots. By about 10pm I am seeing a pretty amazing lightning show, all inland and above us, at least for the first hour or so. By midnight I'm not just seeing them off to my right but over on my left as well. These boats are all electronic. Electronic engines, shifters etc... needless to say, a strike could potentially leave us dead in the water. Completely. I had only seen a few off to the left and they appeared to be a long way off. The ones on my right side were every 15 or 20 seconds. For about 10 minutes I counted between bolts and never made it passed 22 seconds without seeing the next one. It was actually one of the coolest things I had ever seen. They were over there and I was here. Life was good. I was getting pretty tired so I got Chad up and got some sleep.
I got up around 5AM after a whoppin' 4 hours of sleep. I kept waking up wondering what we were driving into, figured what the hell, can't sleep anyway. I came up on the bridge and was like, "whoa"... lightning all around. There were like 20 of these super charged cells floating around at about 20-25 knots. We were going like 11 knots. They were small, most of them the size of a baseball stadium or so. Very little rain, but my God they were hot. I can't remember ever seeing that much lightning in such a short period of time. I tried to photograph some but only got this one grainy shot. Once again, that not so smart gene reared it's ugly head. So, I'm standing in the cockpit of this boat with an aluminum tower and outriggers in the middle of a lightening storm trying to get pics of this lightening hitting the water all around us. It was awe inspiring. Many had multiple veins going right into the water. I would see the bolt, click the button and right after the bolt was done I would hear the shutter click. Time after time–I need a new camera. There was some spectacular blasts. Every now and then one of these cells would be coming at you and it felt like you were moving but you went nowhere.
So we dodged these things until daylight and then we ran it up to 1750 rpm, or 30 knots. In the daylight we (I) were getting pretty cocky and running around the edges of the cells, you could clearly see where the edges of all the charged clouds were. There was a couple knots of wind and some rain in the hot spots, slick grease everywhere else. I got a little too close to a couple and I could feel the hair on my arms raise up before the strike. We were going 30 knots and the clouds were almost keeping up. It really was awesome, something to see. David Grimes was bringing the PEZ ESPADA home at the same time. He was fishing the Thetis and I see this cell heading right for him. He comes back on the radio and says the lightning is hitting all around him, never hits him though. Man I wouldn't want to be holding onto a graphite rod with wet line and reel in that condition! Talk about an afro. I think the only thing left would be some smoking boots and a pile of ashes on the deck.
Well....we made it home in 42 hours, slick calm almost the whole way. We fished for about 1/2 an hour total, lost 3 Marlin, 2 Wahoo and a Dorado. Figures. Turtle Bay by 5pm. Ensenada the next day at 1pm, we were at Customs in San Diego by 3pm. Sick. We needed to get home fast. I have never gone through that area without fishing before, weird.
Anyway, where was I? To my complete dismay it looks like the weather is going to be flat calm 2 days after the tournament. We keep an eye on it, and sure enough, it's going to be beautiful, starting on the day I'm supposed to fly home. We finish getting our asses kicked in the tournament, then we wax and polish the Badger and get it prepared for??? Chad and Eliseo prepare CROWS NEST for the trip home. Clear papers, buy groceries and Eliseo's wife made us like 40 burritos and we were outta there.
The weather reports said less than 10 knots all the way home if we could make it in less than 60 hours. I also saw just a touch of rain or drizzle in the forecast. Mostly from the Finger Bank up to the bottom of the Ridge. No big deal–I hardly even paid attention.
We departed at 8pm, making about 11 knots. By about 10pm I am seeing a pretty amazing lightning show, all inland and above us, at least for the first hour or so. By midnight I'm not just seeing them off to my right but over on my left as well. These boats are all electronic. Electronic engines, shifters etc... needless to say, a strike could potentially leave us dead in the water. Completely. I had only seen a few off to the left and they appeared to be a long way off. The ones on my right side were every 15 or 20 seconds. For about 10 minutes I counted between bolts and never made it passed 22 seconds without seeing the next one. It was actually one of the coolest things I had ever seen. They were over there and I was here. Life was good. I was getting pretty tired so I got Chad up and got some sleep.
I got up around 5AM after a whoppin' 4 hours of sleep. I kept waking up wondering what we were driving into, figured what the hell, can't sleep anyway. I came up on the bridge and was like, "whoa"... lightning all around. There were like 20 of these super charged cells floating around at about 20-25 knots. We were going like 11 knots. They were small, most of them the size of a baseball stadium or so. Very little rain, but my God they were hot. I can't remember ever seeing that much lightning in such a short period of time. I tried to photograph some but only got this one grainy shot. Once again, that not so smart gene reared it's ugly head. So, I'm standing in the cockpit of this boat with an aluminum tower and outriggers in the middle of a lightening storm trying to get pics of this lightening hitting the water all around us. It was awe inspiring. Many had multiple veins going right into the water. I would see the bolt, click the button and right after the bolt was done I would hear the shutter click. Time after time–I need a new camera. There was some spectacular blasts. Every now and then one of these cells would be coming at you and it felt like you were moving but you went nowhere.
So we dodged these things until daylight and then we ran it up to 1750 rpm, or 30 knots. In the daylight we (I) were getting pretty cocky and running around the edges of the cells, you could clearly see where the edges of all the charged clouds were. There was a couple knots of wind and some rain in the hot spots, slick grease everywhere else. I got a little too close to a couple and I could feel the hair on my arms raise up before the strike. We were going 30 knots and the clouds were almost keeping up. It really was awesome, something to see. David Grimes was bringing the PEZ ESPADA home at the same time. He was fishing the Thetis and I see this cell heading right for him. He comes back on the radio and says the lightning is hitting all around him, never hits him though. Man I wouldn't want to be holding onto a graphite rod with wet line and reel in that condition! Talk about an afro. I think the only thing left would be some smoking boots and a pile of ashes on the deck.
Well....we made it home in 42 hours, slick calm almost the whole way. We fished for about 1/2 an hour total, lost 3 Marlin, 2 Wahoo and a Dorado. Figures. Turtle Bay by 5pm. Ensenada the next day at 1pm, we were at Customs in San Diego by 3pm. Sick. We needed to get home fast. I have never gone through that area without fishing before, weird.
