A Good Weekend Gone Bad

On Friday, July 22, 2011, my dad, brother, son and me set off for Calabash, North Carolina for a deep fishing trip. We were scheduled to leave the dock on Saturday morning at 7:30 a.m. We got a late start on Friday, and did not leave Monroe until 6:30 p.m.  The GPS said we would arrive in Calabash around 12:30 a.m. on Saturday morning which was no big deal to me because we were going to get at least 6-7 hours of sleep. So I thought.

Mistake number one. We did not book a hotel room and everything was sold out in Myrtle Beach, North Myrtle Beach, and Calabash. In fact, everything was sold out along the eastern seaboard all the way to Wilmington, NC.  We went to at least a dozen hotels begging for a place to stay.  Nothing. Nada. We finally decided to camp out at the parking lot of the marina and we were quick to notice that we were not the only ones that forgot to book a hotel room.

The parking lot was littered with people scrambling to find some comfortable place to call it a night. Around 3:00 a.m., I blew up my air mattress and camped out on the front porch of the marina’s restaurant. After I battled a few mosquitos and a couple of other insects that I could not identify, I drifted off to sleep around 4:00 a.m. only to be awakened around 6:00 a.m. by the sound of diesel engines screaming to life.

We boarded the boat around 7:00 a.m. and the to time pull away from the dock soon approached.  The time to pull away from the dock quickly passed and my brother and I were getting a little irritated as the captain refused to leave. The boat was crowded but it was manageable. 7:45 passed and we were getting very agitated when suddenly a big tour bus showed  up and unloaded about 45 people and they were all heading for our boat, the Super Voyager III. I looked at my brother, and I said to him, “I need a beer.”  Mistake number 2.

My brother and I manage to drink most of the beer on the 3 hour 30 minute ride out to the Gulf Stream in the Atlantic Ocean. Drinking most of the beer was mistake number 3 because it really pissed my dad off!  My brother and I got a big laugh at my son’s expense because he was getting very seasick as was most of the boat.  We hit 6 to 8 foot seas and the water spray was really getting the best of Blake.

Blake Wise Dreaming of Land

I will skip the first part where we didn’t catch any fish, and I’ll pass over the second part where we didn’t catch any fish either.  Towards the end of the day, we were at another fishing hole and we were still not catching any fish. After about 30 minutes, my brother and I started hollering up at the captain to move to another spot.  We did it a second time and still we did not get any response from the wheel house.

Furthermore, the captain was doing nothing to prevent the lines from tangling and we were drifting along at an amazing pace. I’d had enough! With a little liquid courage, I climbed up the ladder towards the wheel house, and I was going to find out exactly what this captain was thinking. I walked up to the wheel house, looked in and no one was in the wheel house. I turned to the guy standing next to the door and said where is the captain? To which he replied, “He’s in there!” I peeked through the glass and sure enough the captain was out cold, dead asleep in the wheel house.  I purposely banged on the glass window and when I did the captain jumped to life, terrified, and said, “What? What’s the matter?” I replied, “We need to move, we are not catching any fish.”

Now, I was fuming.  I turned towards the railing and hollered down to my brother, “Guess what Casey? Our idiot Captain was asleep!” I walked down the ladder and let the entire boat know that our wonderful captain who put us on so much fish was asleep at the wheel. Mistake number 4. The first mate hollered back at me and told me to shut up. He said the captain was entitled to a nap and it was his job to takeover when the captain was asleep. I told him that it was his job to wake the idiot captain and put us on some fish, not trash fish. We shared a few more pleasantries and then I held my peace.

What I learned from this experience is to never fish on any of the Voyager fishing boats out of Calabash, North Carolina. It’s a tourist trap, and most of the tourists are satisfied with a 12-hour boat ride and puking their brains out.  Secondly, many tourists are satisfied when they catch a few trash fish.  Out of 100+ people, there was maybe 4-5 game fish caught the entire day (2-small black grouper, 1-small red snapper, 1-small cobia). That’s it!

Never, ever under any circumstance fish on the Super Voyager III. It’s a waste of good money especially if you are a true sportsman. If you’re tourist looking for an expensive boat ride, Bon Voyage!