have2fish
04-18-2010, 12:29 AM
Hey guys,
A tragic event on land took the life of a fellow fisherman last week in Santa Barbara. He worked on Urchin Boats and other fishing boats. We shared the same passion for being on and under the water.
http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash1/hs462.ash1/25387_398486701512_535401512_4413750_6558694_n.jpg
If you have spent any time in the SB Harbor, I'm sure that you crossed paths with Bobby-I.... and passionate he was! Colorful too... and he loved his dogs as much as I do mine....
I remembered that I wrote a story about running into him at a bar one night, in 2002. I dug it up and thought I would share it with you.....
http://www.facebook.com/marcofarrell?v=app_2347471856#!/note.php?note_id=119505841398556&id=535401512&ref=mf
Cousins and Bugz
Marco Farrell 2002
“Where the hell are you, man? It is 8:20, we are about to leave.” Yelled the angry captains voice into my phone.
Suddenly, it all started coming back to me, as the fog drifted from my eyes. The ride home, stop off at the corner bar for one last beer, my good friend Bobby-I and his dog, Sparky, had just been hit by a car that evening.
I had stayed with Bobby until the bar closed, lending a dog-lovers ear and heart to another's broken one.
“Get your ass here now, or we will leave without you!”
Throwing all my gear into my bag, I tried to figure out why my phone alarm had not awoken me an hour and a half ago, to prepare for this trip. Ah, ha, I had replaced the battery, and had not put the correct time in when restarting it. My alarm would be going off at 6:30 this evening. Damn.
Wetsuit, gloves, booties, fins, mask, weight belt…… I mentally ran down the list of what I needed as I ran about the house, cursing under my breath.
My head throbbed and screamed in pain from the many beers Bobby and I had cried and laughed into the night before. This was going to be a long morning. Hoping that I did not forget any vital piece of equipment, I sped towards the harbor.
When I reached the dock, running with all my dive gear, 20 minutes after the first call, to find an empty dock. DAMN! Ah, my head hurts, throbbing with pain. I fumble for my phone as three homeless men giggle at the sight of me.
“You looking for the boat, they just left.” One of them says.
“Nick, I am here, at the dock.” I look down the harbor to see him turning into the main channel “No, not in my car, at the dock. I am sorry!” I yell into the phone. The sight of him making a u-turn is a good one, the first of many to come that day.
I got an earful those next ten minutes, as I slowly put my gear into place.
The big swells that had been giving us head high and bigger surf for the past eleven days had backed off for a day, taking a rest before the next onslaught of swells, some of which were predicted to reach 10 feet or more this next week. The sun was making it’s way up the morning sky, the glassy water looked like oil, making beautiful swirls of color as the little swells moved below the boat. Hardly a whisper of wind danced on the waters surface, pelicans gracefully gliding down the gentle swells. The new Sea Sport raced comfortable at over 25 knots towards Santa Cruz Island.
“Hey look over there, dolphins!” Yelled Cesar.
A few dozen shapes splashed happily through the water, occasionally leaping far through the air.
“WOW, guys, those are Dall Porpoise!” I said, referring to the small black and white porpoise that closely resembled miniature Killer Whales. “They are very fast swimming, their dorsal fins streamlined for speed.
Their blowholes spraying water and air powerfully as they broke the surface sounded like pellet air guns firing. Platt! Platt! Platt Platt! They played for a few minutes under the bow of the boat before they lost interest in us and return to chasing the school of fish they were feeding on.
A half hour later, as we were tracking a few tankers crossing the channel on the radar, the little blip on the screen caught up to us and headed towards Santa Rosa Island. I strained to make out who it was, the “Calico Hunter” I think. Larry had a fast boat, and a gung-ho attitude that would put him mid-channel at this time. He had probably been fishing calico bass out front when the glassy waters called him to speed the 30 miles to Santa Rosa at almost 30 knots. I did notice how much more his boat bounced on the 2 to 3 foot swells that now gently rocked our boat. As we neared the island, the small boat suddenly turn 90 degrees, cut a mile in front of us and headed towards the middle of Santa Cruz Island.
“That’s funny,” I thought, as we watched him race a mile one way, then make a few sharp turns, then head another few miles in another direction. “That can’t be Larry, it must be a weekend warrior with his new Christmas toy”
We were about 4 miles from the west end of Santa Cruz, when I looked down the island for our funny little friend. I saw the strangest sight. It looked like someone had skipped a huge stone, and little puffs of water were splashing randomly in a line. Had it been rough, I would have accepted it as the splashing of our little friends hull. I could not understand what I was seeing, that boat would have to be skipping fast and far to be making such splashes. The captain reaches for the binoculars.
“WHALES!” he yells excitedly as he takes the boat off auto-pilot and turns sharply. “Yeah, whales!” he continues. I grab my camera as I realize that it is the southern leg of the yearly Gray Whale migration.
All thoughts of the large lobsters we were dreaming of have now been replaced with the wonderment of being in such close proximity of our largest brethren. As breath hold free divers, we have all been jealous of the whales and dolphins that we see cavorting above and below the waters. The sights that they must see, to be able to hold our breath as long as they do, to dive as deep as they do. What are they thinking about? What do they think about us? These are all feelings that at one time or another, we as free divers have felt.
“WOW, look at them.” They were moving eastward, down the Santa Barbara Channel, swimming just feet from each other. They would rise up and blow big sprays of air and water, fifteen feet or more in the air. That mist created rainbows that hung for many seconds as it slowly fell. We repositioned the boat a few times as they would sound and resurface several hundred yards away. We would whoop and holler as they broke the surface. I wonder if they heard us, what did they think?
As they moved away, we all sat there for a moment and reflected on what we had just experienced.
Back to the task at hand. We motored around the famed “Potato Patch” an wild and rough patch of ocean where waves came from all directions. Open ocean swells and currents ripped through this area, slamming into the west end of the island, only to reflect and refract in all directions. Boats were known to suddenly rise six feet over one crest, only to drop a dozen as two swells converged to create a hole in the water. Many white-knuckle trips were made through this area, but not today. It was calm and smooth, like a monster gently sleeping. It would not take much to wake the monster, but he was resting for the big swells of the coming week.
We headed to a place I will call Dope-dealers, for all the crack(s) that were lining the volcanic rock. The water looked green and pretty dirty, different from the clean blue water that we crossed to get here. The first trip out, after a series of swells and storms is always fraught by anticipation of not knowing how the water conditions would be. It looked like we had a solid three to six feet of visibility as we motored to different spots along the shoreline.
“This is as good as I have seen.” I say as I head towards the anchor. “Lets hop in here.”
Last week the surge and swell would have made even getting here treacherous, if not nearly impossible, but today, only a three foot surge would rise every once in a while as the monster snored away.
I spent a few minutes looking in the green water under the kelp fronds. It will not be too long before the big sea bass will start hanging in the kelp, but today the focus is lobster. We leave our guns in a little crack, float lines trailing 75 feet in the current and begin to work the crags and cracks in the reef. I feel a little better once I am in the water, but as soon as I begin to get slammed around by the surge, hanging upside down trying to focus into deep and dark cracks, I am reminded of my overindulgence the night before. Head throbs, stomach churns.
We pick a lobster here and there, and an hour later, I have one legal and Nic has two, all a little over a pound. We motor a few hundred yards down the reef to another group of rocks.
We work in and out of the rocks, waiting between sets of waves to work the channels. We look under ledges, in holes, all around for the bright orange crustaceans that we so desire. All of a sudden, we are in them. Every few minutes, the little light I am holding will suddenly illuminate one, and I will rapidly jam my arm in, trying to pin it to the walls so I can get a good grip.
On one such thrust, I slam so hard, that my head hits an urchin on the top of the hole. A single spine has gone trough my hood, and lodged in my scalp. I can feel it as I rub the hood back and forth. Ouch, this one is gonna hurt.
A few dives later, I peek around a little hole, and see some big hairy legs of a pretty good sized lobster. This is all I see, and I don’t want to spook him, so I blindly slam my hand into the hold and grab him. A nice four pound lobster comes out of the hole, as I throw him into my bag.
A tragic event on land took the life of a fellow fisherman last week in Santa Barbara. He worked on Urchin Boats and other fishing boats. We shared the same passion for being on and under the water.
http://sphotos.ak.fbcdn.net/hphotos-ak-ash1/hs462.ash1/25387_398486701512_535401512_4413750_6558694_n.jpg
If you have spent any time in the SB Harbor, I'm sure that you crossed paths with Bobby-I.... and passionate he was! Colorful too... and he loved his dogs as much as I do mine....
I remembered that I wrote a story about running into him at a bar one night, in 2002. I dug it up and thought I would share it with you.....
http://www.facebook.com/marcofarrell?v=app_2347471856#!/note.php?note_id=119505841398556&id=535401512&ref=mf
Cousins and Bugz
Marco Farrell 2002
“Where the hell are you, man? It is 8:20, we are about to leave.” Yelled the angry captains voice into my phone.
Suddenly, it all started coming back to me, as the fog drifted from my eyes. The ride home, stop off at the corner bar for one last beer, my good friend Bobby-I and his dog, Sparky, had just been hit by a car that evening.
I had stayed with Bobby until the bar closed, lending a dog-lovers ear and heart to another's broken one.
“Get your ass here now, or we will leave without you!”
Throwing all my gear into my bag, I tried to figure out why my phone alarm had not awoken me an hour and a half ago, to prepare for this trip. Ah, ha, I had replaced the battery, and had not put the correct time in when restarting it. My alarm would be going off at 6:30 this evening. Damn.
Wetsuit, gloves, booties, fins, mask, weight belt…… I mentally ran down the list of what I needed as I ran about the house, cursing under my breath.
My head throbbed and screamed in pain from the many beers Bobby and I had cried and laughed into the night before. This was going to be a long morning. Hoping that I did not forget any vital piece of equipment, I sped towards the harbor.
When I reached the dock, running with all my dive gear, 20 minutes after the first call, to find an empty dock. DAMN! Ah, my head hurts, throbbing with pain. I fumble for my phone as three homeless men giggle at the sight of me.
“You looking for the boat, they just left.” One of them says.
“Nick, I am here, at the dock.” I look down the harbor to see him turning into the main channel “No, not in my car, at the dock. I am sorry!” I yell into the phone. The sight of him making a u-turn is a good one, the first of many to come that day.
I got an earful those next ten minutes, as I slowly put my gear into place.
The big swells that had been giving us head high and bigger surf for the past eleven days had backed off for a day, taking a rest before the next onslaught of swells, some of which were predicted to reach 10 feet or more this next week. The sun was making it’s way up the morning sky, the glassy water looked like oil, making beautiful swirls of color as the little swells moved below the boat. Hardly a whisper of wind danced on the waters surface, pelicans gracefully gliding down the gentle swells. The new Sea Sport raced comfortable at over 25 knots towards Santa Cruz Island.
“Hey look over there, dolphins!” Yelled Cesar.
A few dozen shapes splashed happily through the water, occasionally leaping far through the air.
“WOW, guys, those are Dall Porpoise!” I said, referring to the small black and white porpoise that closely resembled miniature Killer Whales. “They are very fast swimming, their dorsal fins streamlined for speed.
Their blowholes spraying water and air powerfully as they broke the surface sounded like pellet air guns firing. Platt! Platt! Platt Platt! They played for a few minutes under the bow of the boat before they lost interest in us and return to chasing the school of fish they were feeding on.
A half hour later, as we were tracking a few tankers crossing the channel on the radar, the little blip on the screen caught up to us and headed towards Santa Rosa Island. I strained to make out who it was, the “Calico Hunter” I think. Larry had a fast boat, and a gung-ho attitude that would put him mid-channel at this time. He had probably been fishing calico bass out front when the glassy waters called him to speed the 30 miles to Santa Rosa at almost 30 knots. I did notice how much more his boat bounced on the 2 to 3 foot swells that now gently rocked our boat. As we neared the island, the small boat suddenly turn 90 degrees, cut a mile in front of us and headed towards the middle of Santa Cruz Island.
“That’s funny,” I thought, as we watched him race a mile one way, then make a few sharp turns, then head another few miles in another direction. “That can’t be Larry, it must be a weekend warrior with his new Christmas toy”
We were about 4 miles from the west end of Santa Cruz, when I looked down the island for our funny little friend. I saw the strangest sight. It looked like someone had skipped a huge stone, and little puffs of water were splashing randomly in a line. Had it been rough, I would have accepted it as the splashing of our little friends hull. I could not understand what I was seeing, that boat would have to be skipping fast and far to be making such splashes. The captain reaches for the binoculars.
“WHALES!” he yells excitedly as he takes the boat off auto-pilot and turns sharply. “Yeah, whales!” he continues. I grab my camera as I realize that it is the southern leg of the yearly Gray Whale migration.
All thoughts of the large lobsters we were dreaming of have now been replaced with the wonderment of being in such close proximity of our largest brethren. As breath hold free divers, we have all been jealous of the whales and dolphins that we see cavorting above and below the waters. The sights that they must see, to be able to hold our breath as long as they do, to dive as deep as they do. What are they thinking about? What do they think about us? These are all feelings that at one time or another, we as free divers have felt.
“WOW, look at them.” They were moving eastward, down the Santa Barbara Channel, swimming just feet from each other. They would rise up and blow big sprays of air and water, fifteen feet or more in the air. That mist created rainbows that hung for many seconds as it slowly fell. We repositioned the boat a few times as they would sound and resurface several hundred yards away. We would whoop and holler as they broke the surface. I wonder if they heard us, what did they think?
As they moved away, we all sat there for a moment and reflected on what we had just experienced.
Back to the task at hand. We motored around the famed “Potato Patch” an wild and rough patch of ocean where waves came from all directions. Open ocean swells and currents ripped through this area, slamming into the west end of the island, only to reflect and refract in all directions. Boats were known to suddenly rise six feet over one crest, only to drop a dozen as two swells converged to create a hole in the water. Many white-knuckle trips were made through this area, but not today. It was calm and smooth, like a monster gently sleeping. It would not take much to wake the monster, but he was resting for the big swells of the coming week.
We headed to a place I will call Dope-dealers, for all the crack(s) that were lining the volcanic rock. The water looked green and pretty dirty, different from the clean blue water that we crossed to get here. The first trip out, after a series of swells and storms is always fraught by anticipation of not knowing how the water conditions would be. It looked like we had a solid three to six feet of visibility as we motored to different spots along the shoreline.
“This is as good as I have seen.” I say as I head towards the anchor. “Lets hop in here.”
Last week the surge and swell would have made even getting here treacherous, if not nearly impossible, but today, only a three foot surge would rise every once in a while as the monster snored away.
I spent a few minutes looking in the green water under the kelp fronds. It will not be too long before the big sea bass will start hanging in the kelp, but today the focus is lobster. We leave our guns in a little crack, float lines trailing 75 feet in the current and begin to work the crags and cracks in the reef. I feel a little better once I am in the water, but as soon as I begin to get slammed around by the surge, hanging upside down trying to focus into deep and dark cracks, I am reminded of my overindulgence the night before. Head throbs, stomach churns.
We pick a lobster here and there, and an hour later, I have one legal and Nic has two, all a little over a pound. We motor a few hundred yards down the reef to another group of rocks.
We work in and out of the rocks, waiting between sets of waves to work the channels. We look under ledges, in holes, all around for the bright orange crustaceans that we so desire. All of a sudden, we are in them. Every few minutes, the little light I am holding will suddenly illuminate one, and I will rapidly jam my arm in, trying to pin it to the walls so I can get a good grip.
On one such thrust, I slam so hard, that my head hits an urchin on the top of the hole. A single spine has gone trough my hood, and lodged in my scalp. I can feel it as I rub the hood back and forth. Ouch, this one is gonna hurt.
A few dives later, I peek around a little hole, and see some big hairy legs of a pretty good sized lobster. This is all I see, and I don’t want to spook him, so I blindly slam my hand into the hold and grab him. A nice four pound lobster comes out of the hole, as I throw him into my bag.