Boat Captain pt 2

You come in after a charter, You still have to clean up the boat after every one else goes home, not just dried blood. I've had people go below and lay down in my bed and lift the covers and throw up in my blankets. Some hours later when I had finished cleaning, was very tired and needed to go to sleep, because I had an early charter the next day, I got in bed and found the " little present " they left me.

Now I still have to go to the laundry.

You need to be a good mechanic, in the summer it takes weeks to get into a boat shop. If you can't fix it yourself, you will lose 1000's of dollars!

You need to be good with children, people bring their children and you have to bait their hook, cast their rod, hook the fish, help them reel it in, take the fish of the hook, re-bait etc. Some people have three kids, who needs a gym? But, know what? I LOVE IT!! Kids are so cool, and they are the future of sport fishing!

You need to be the school nurse, I've never had a serious problem aboard my boat other than a few hooks stuck in fingers, but you need to know how to take care of medical emergencies just in case one happens.

You need to be an entertainer, fish don't bite all day, and during the slow times you need a vast joke library to keep people laughing.

I could go on and on, but I'll give you a break and end this here.
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Boat Captain pt 1

Lots of people tell me they would love to be a charter captain, "BOY, you have the greatest job in the world!" Getting paid for taking people fishing!! That's like saying the president gets paid for signing a few bills. They don't see the other 18 hrs a day he spends running the good ole USA.

My job entails being the guide and finding fish for you. Fish don't stay in the same place all the time, anytime there is a place where the fish hang out in the same place, fishermen quickly find out about it and quickly fish it out. I have some secret spots, but the other charter guys know my boat, and when they see me in a spot for more than a few minutes,they will wait for me to leave, then move over it to check it out with their electronics. Later they will come back and fish it, now it's not secret anymore.

For the past 25 yrs I have been insisting that my customers release all bass over 5 lbs. These are special fish, it takes 8 to 12 yrs to grow to this size. I have caught the same fish many times in a season, ( I mark them with a tag, then I can keep track of that fish, sometimes for years. )

People don't realize how hard it is to keep a boat in shape for chartering, You usually drive them for two days and work on them for three days. My wife thinks its just an excuse to get out of the house. The salt air is constantly eating up your wiring and generally causing havoc with anything metal ( your motor ). During the charter season the boat is kept in a slip in Marina del Rey, the rest of the year the boat is kept on the trailer in dry storage. Salt water is hell on a boat!!
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A Shark Story the Conclusion

We worked feverishly with the buckets to empty the water from the boat.

After about 45 min. most of the water was gone, and I could see no new water coming in. I looked over the side of the boat and noticed since we had stopped chumming most of the sharks had left. Now how were we going to start the motors with 2 dead batteries? I went to the medicine chest and got the bottle of aspirin, then I dropped 1 in each battery cell. The acid in the aspirin would give me one quick burst of power. I waited about 15 min for the aspirin to work, then used my jumper cables to hook both batteries to the engine that started the quickest. Crossing my fingers and holding my breath I turned the key...

The engine turned slowly, rrrrrr, rrrrrr, rrrrrr, varoom!! What a sweet sound. I let the engine run for about 10 minutes to charge the batteries up then started the other engine, when both engines were running smoothly I went back to the engine compartment to see if I could discover where the water was coming from. I immediately saw water coming from the rubber hose that connects the riser to the exaust system, it had split and a good amount of water was flowing out into the bildge. I shut the motor down and tightly wrapped duct tape around the hose, that quick repair would get me home, the hose could be replaced tomorrow.

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I have been chartering in Southern California for thirty years, I have learned many tricks on making emergency repairs to get the boat back to port, ( no service stations out here, you are on your own! ) These also work on you car or motorhome when you find yourself far from services. In my stories I will give some helpful hints on how to make it back when you are stuck.

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