How to Catch Fish and Trap Crabs – Part 4
Wednesday, June 13th – Jane, The First Mate’s childhood friend, arrives from Australia and has brought us both sun and good luck. On the afternoon of our first day of sailing, there’s a pull on the line we are trolling behind Avante. Just a pull, nothing more. The Captain proclaims it another hunk of seaweed. We are adept at catching those. He reels it in. There’s no fight, just steady drag. We are dismayed. As the lure nears the surface, there to our amazement, is a fish. “A fish!” he exclaims with surprise and delight. “A fish?” The First Mate thinks with dismay and foreboding. It didn’t fight. It’s got to be sick. Our first fish, a nice legal Chinook salmon, and it’s a sick one, she is sure. Just too sick to fight at all, and if it is sick, dare we eat it?
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She does not want to say anything in front of Jane for fear of alarming her, but how can we eat a sick fish? Jane gleefully takes out her camera for the commemorative fish photo. The First Mate goes along, smiling, but secretly is harboring dread over this sick fish.
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“We can’t eat a sick fish,” she continues to worry. She wants to ask The Captain, but he has already gone below to change into old clothes before cleaning our fish.
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Finally, she gets a chance to take The Captain aside to query him about this sick fish, and he assures her that any fish that went after a lure trolling behind a boat going 8 knots is a very active, aggressive and healthy fish. She is still in doubt, but, when the fish is all cut up, looking just like salmon fillets should, she feels much better about the fish.
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That night we sit down to a superb dinner: Sautéed Chinook Salmon Fillets,
Wild Rice, and Asparagus with Homemade Hollandaise Sauce. Dessert is Strawberries with Powdered Sugar. Jane declares it her very favorite dinner, and we all contentedly concur.
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The next day, The Captain tries jigging for Halibut. He rigs the line and sits on the end of the boat bobbing the line up and down in an attempt to imitate some kind of smaller fish for a bottom swimming Halibut to bite. Of course, like Tom Sawyer, he has intrigued his crew, and, the next thing you know, he is showing both ladies just how to jig for Halibut.
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With enthusiasm we take turns jigging for Halibut until our arms tire while The Captain retreats below with a Scotch to continue his reading of Michener’s “Alaska”. Our attempts at jigging do not tempt any Halibut.
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We continue to crab, dropping the trap almost every night when we anchor, but we have no success. We fish when we are underway, trolling at 7 or so knots as we head on our way. We have learned that our speed is really too fast, but we remain hopeful of another “sick” fish. We try different hooks, spoons, flashers, weights. With the crab trap, we carefully analyze locations for dropping the trap. We discuss and use various bait from perfectly fresh to rather ripe. Nothing is working.
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We are despondent with our dismal failures until, Tuesday, June 19th, our last morning in Misty Fiords, we trap 2 large male Dungeness Crabs.
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We sail to the next anchorage with our crabs chattering around in an orange bucket of seawater. Success at last, and it does breed enthusiasm. The Captain, who has now gotten into the sport (if sport it be), is as excited and delighted as are The First Mate and Jane.
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Now we have the pleasant task of cooking and eating our crab. The cooking and eating of our first smaller crabs had proved to be a messy affair. There’s that whole body of the cooked crab on one’s plate. Most of it offers nothing edible, yet it drips liquid and goo all over one’s plate. There has to be a more appetizing and less messy way of going about this thing.
“How to Catch Crabs” suggests an alternative that the author claims all the crabbers use. One kills the crab before cooking and then slices it down the middle. He suggests a shovel for this operation, but as that is not something we carry on the boat, The Captain uses a chef’s knife and a rubber hammer to split the crab. After the crab is sliced in half, the body shells and cavity gunk are removed. The legs are gently pulled from the body with the good body meat attached. The legs and attached meat are cooked. This method allows far more crab to be cooked in one pot.
Our success rate so far indicates that overloading the pot does not appear to be a concern we need to worry about, but the main benefit to this method of preparing crabs for cooking is that it creates a less messy eating experience. The body meat is easily extracted to eat, and there’s no body cavity liquid and goo all over one’s plate. How great to have found a far neater and easier way to tackle the eating of crab! We try it and are delighted. The Captain declares that the book has now paid for itself, even though all the other claptrap she has bought for this fishing has not!
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Dinner is divine. The crab is tender and succulent ….the best any of us had ever had. Jane declares this her second favorite meal, and, once again, we contentedly concur.
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Sea Life Tally to date:
3 Dungeness Crabs
1 Rock Crab
1 Chinook salmon
Obviously, marine life need not quake at our approach. We are not breaking any records, but we are having fun. The Captain may have other ideas, but The First Mate, for one, intends to fish and crab our way around the world aboard the sailing vessel Avante. And, if he’ll ever let her buy a shrimp trap, She will go after those shrimp, too!
The End and enough of “How to Catch Fish and Trap Crabs”. Further updates, if any become available, will be included in the body of the blog.
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Comments transferred over from a previous blog site:
Anonymous said: Dear Sue and Bill, We continue to delight in, and envy, every story and photo of your adventure on Avante. Thanks so much for sharing with us. Shirley and JohnJuly 2, 2007 at 5:47 PM
Purebliss said: WOW! It can’t get any better! I am finding so much pleasure reading your wonderful stories and seeing your pictures. Thanks for entertaining me thus far!July 6, 2007 at 10:47 PM