So you think you want to be a charter captain

[5th Tuition]

Did you ever have a bad day? How about a bad week?

This is what happened to Captain John the last seven days Last Wed. we had a group of friends onboard for a fun fishing trip. It was supposed to be winds East 5-10 and an easy day. We left Deale and headed to Herring Bay to pick up some spot for livelinning. The winds were really blowing and our drift was much too fast to drift for bait. We thought about anchoring, but decided to go across the bay, get out of the wind, get our spot over by Tilghman and catch our fish at "the hook".

I knew of a place were I caught bait last year off Black Walnut Point. We tried a few drifts, but weren't having much success. No problem. I have a good friend (Charlie Schneider) who mates on a Tilghman boat (Big Will) and he could tell me were they were catching bait. I called Charlie and he was directing me to an area where they catch their bait, and I asked him if he wanted to "jump on" for a fun day of rockfishing. Charlie loves to fish, so he said sure. We ran to his home marina and picked him up at the dock. I pushed the bow away from the dock and Captain John hit reverse to back away from the pier. Charlie says, "You can't go back there", and John backs up just a little further. "Clunk, Clunk, Clunk", as the prop hits some submerged concrete We were barely moving, so some damage to the prop, but not tooooooo baddddd. We navigated the "Knapps Narrows" fine, but when we opened it up and put the hammer down, you could feel a slight vibration in the boat.

We dropped anchor, caught all our fish, dropped Charlie back at his pier, and headed back across the bay. The winds had layed down and it had turned into a beautiful day.

Captain John still had some bloodworms left, and because we had caught our rock so quickly, he headed back to Herring Bay to catch some perch for a friend of his who loves a perch dinner.

We drifted in the calm winds and caught plenty of big perch. "Patent Pending" has a full keel and we have drifted over many, many crab pots without incident. When a pot comes alongside, I usually tell the angler on the other side to beware. I don't want his fishing line to get caught in a pot coming under the boat. The float always goes under the boat and pops out the other side unmolested. Not this day. I watched the pot go under, but never came out When we got ready to move, I reminded John the pot was under the boat. He said he was going to just bump it forward and "kick" the float away. Thump, Thump, Thump; was what we heard. Not good. John decided to kick it in reverse just a tad. Thump, Thump, Thump; again.

One of our crew was an experienced sailor who had cleared pots from his boat before, so he volunteered to go over and take the boat hook and try to clear the pot. He was unsuccessful Once back onboard, we figured our only hope was to try to cut the float line with the prop to get clear. We hesitated to do this, knowing that it would mean the loss of a pot to the commercial crabber, and there was a danger we would wrap the line tightly around our prop. John throttled up the engine and we heard the worst sound possible. We had winched the pot up and INTO the prop. It's not a sound I want to hear again.

We were dead in the water. We contacted Captain Charlie Sisson on the "Backdraft", and he agreed to tow us in. (see photo) We contacted the marina and they were standing by to haul us out and cut the pot free. (see photo) They blocked the boat, removed the prop, had it serviced, and dropped us back in the water in just a few days. As much as I hated to pick up a pot, I think it was good to have the prop pulled and repaired before we did damage to bearings or seals on the boat.

End of first mishap; photos below; next mishap to be another post in this thread.
5th (Marty)