“Everything’s good in the engine room. Timmy has that under control. This boat is really comfortable. I’ll bet she’s a great sea boat,” Arch said as he squinted out the back window at the last of the colorful sky. I dove into the steak and Stove Top stuffing like it was the last meal I would see. It was all smothered in gravy. Nothing could have been more unhealthy and fattening. I never would have worried about that ten years ago either. But I didn’t complain, because I had appointed Archie to do the cooking. We hadn’t had to draw straws to see who was stuck with the chore of feeding the group. “I feel good. This feels right. You feel good?” Archie asked.
“Yes. This is great, Arch. I feel great,” I lied.
CHAPTER 3
Outward Bound
Ripe and one sliver shy of full, the cantaloupe moon shone a flashlight beam along our path as we steamed east through the Gulf of Maine. It was glassy calm, and running lights glowed dimly on the stabilizing birds at the ends of the booms, rounding their edges to appear like jet engines under wings, red on port and green on starboard. This breathless night allowed us to haul the birds out of the water and gain a full knot in speed, as they normally ride below the surface to retard the roll of the boat and they slow us down in the process. The steady drone of the diesel two decks below added a soothing hum to the slow, gentle rocking of mysterious origin. The last of the lime green landmass had crept from the edge of the radar screen as the faded umbrella of city lights closed over our wake. At sea—it’s more a feeling than it is a place.
It was this feeling, the state of being at sea, that I hadn’t experienced in ten years. This sensation is the result of living the total contradiction of burden and freedom. I am the captain, I thought. The freedom to make all decisions, unquestioned and without input, was something that I had missed during my sabbatical. To be held ultimately, although not solely, responsible for the lives and livelihoods of a loyal and capable crew was strangely exhilarating and empowering. But high hopes and expectations were weighty loads. It’s the willingness, and not the ability, to bear that burden that separates captains from their crew. Right here and right now, as the Seahawk plodded along, I was fondly embracing the burden of that responsibility. Just being on the boat made me feel good. I was confident. And confidence is a key to success.
I tweaked a knob on the autopilot to correct our course two degrees and remain on a perfect heading according to the numbers displayed on both GPS’s. As I eased myself back into the captain’s chair, Arch pulled himself up the narrow stairway and into the dark-paneled wheelhouse beside me. “Everything is secure below. Timmy is in the engine room doing a few things, Dave is reading a magazine at the galley table, and Machado is sleeping,” he reported. “I really like Machado. He’s so funny! I think he’ll more than make up for not being around to help at the dock. You got a great crew!”
“Thanks, Arch. I know I do.” I meant it. Confidence in my crew fed my personal confidence. I believed that this was the best crew I had ever sailed with. Certainly the most mature; we probably wouldn’t be plagued by the usual crew problems that stem from basic personality differences and lack of sleep. I wouldn’t have to break up any fistfights or garnish any wages as punishment for poor behavior. Small squabbles could be annoying, I knew. And nothing was more exasperating than trying to reason with real, solid, mutual hatred when both parties are virtually connected at the hip for an extended voyage. Liking one another was huge. As far as work ethics go, nothing beats the older, more experienced guys. It’s very much like the “young bull/old bull” thing. Four of the five of us owned and operated our own boats, so we already knew the basic moves that otherwise needed to be taught. Mike Machado was the only non-captain aboard, but he was also the only one other than me with any Grand Banks fishing experience. And between the two of us, I suspected that we had racked up more miles along the salty way than any pair I could think of. “Yes,” I said, “I think we have a winning team aboard. Just the right combination of talents and strengths.”
“Speaking of talents and strengths, here I am,” Tim said laughingly as he popped his head through the back door of the wheelhouse behind Archie. “The engine room is looking good. The water maker is cranking out, and the ice machine is making great ice—lots of it. I just shoveled. How’s the list?” he asked, referring to whether or not the boat was leaning. I looked directly at the bow to determine that we were indeed not listing to either side and gave a silent nod. I was happy to forgo the usual lecture on the importance of keeping the boat on an even keel and the dangers inherent in not doing so, which is why I’d asked Tim to compensate by moving ice or fuel.
“Why didn’t you tell me? I would have helped you shovel,” said Archie.
“You take care of the galley, and the rest of us will handle the shoveling. Thanks for dinner, by the way. It was great,” Tim said. I was relieved that Timmy had understood without having to be told that Archie was valuable in many ways and that none of his assets were in evidence on the end of a shovel. At his age and with the range of experience and breadth of knowledge that Archie had concerning just about anything, I didn’t want to waste him in the fish hold. Again, I was appreciating the maturity level of my shipmates. I knew that Archie and Tim had a mutual liking and respect for each other, reminding me of father and son.
“I’m gonna call Marge tomorrow and get a recipe for chicken,” Arch said. “Do you mind if I hook up the satellite phone in this corner? It’s the only place the antenna wire reaches. Everyone can use it to make calls.” He was twisting the small coupling at the end of the rubber-coated wire that came through a hole in the aft bulkhead and terminated in the corner he’d mentioned. The five of us had a lot in common, I realized. Our similarities went beyond the fishing gene. Food was of utmost importance, as was family. So a call home for a chicken recipe was a no-brainer. “I’m gonna fix that computer on my watch tonight. Did you find the manual for the weather fax? I know I can get that going. I bungeed the hell out of our stateroom. These things are coming in really handy so far,” he said as he pulled a short loop of bungee cord out of a hip pocket. “These and the two-part epoxy … I can keep us going with this stuff.” I had always known Archie as a guy with a short attention span. I guess you’d call it adult ADD.
“All I want to do is catch fish!” Hiltz had entered from the stairs and delivered what had already become his mantra. “Are we there yet, Skip?”
“Almost,” I said, taking a closer look at our ETA below the track plotted on the only functioning computer monitor. “One thousand miles at seven point three knots—you can do the math,” I told him as I slid out of the chair and leaned over the navigational chart built in on the after bulkhead. I’ve always preferred paper to electronics. I circled our present position in pencil and inscribed it with date and time.
“Where’s Scotty?” That was Dave’s other obsession. All he wanted to do was catch fish and know where Scotty was at all times. I understood his interest in the whereabouts of the Eagle Eye II as we went farther from shore than Dave had ever been—a lot farther—as a way to seek peace of mind through safety in numbers. As long as Scotty was in our vicinity, however wide or vague that might be, Dave seemed to relax.
I was more interested in the whereabouts of the Bigeye. Her captain, Chris Hanson—or “Chompers,” as he’s commonly known—is reputed to be one of the more disliked fishermen on the eastern seaboard. Although I had never encountered him, I had heard that Chompers had a history of doing whatever he had to do, regardless of fishing etiquette or safety, to pay his bills. From the radio chatter I gathered that the Bigeye’s captain was in Newfoundland outfitting for his Grand Banks debut.
I explained to Dave that Scotty couldn’t be very far ahead of us, as I had caught a glimpse of the boat before the sun went down. We would be tracking slightly south of Scotty’s course, since he had to steam to Newfoundland to pick up two crew members. His extra miles would gobble up what Scotty would otherwise have gained in a tiny speed advantage, so we woul
d reach the grounds and make our first sets on the same evening. I suspected that the Eagle Eye II was capable of making better speed, but the price of fuel had bolstered her captain’s innate patience, and he had pulled the throttle back. Satisfied that Scotty would not be out of radio range for the next sixty days, Dave eased into a story about the scars that ran the length of his arm, acquired while tub-trawling for halibut.
The four of us started trying to beat one another with tales of personal injuries inflicted at and by the sea. I joined in after Dave’s second round, which ended in an episode of near amputation, and regaled the men with a litany of broken bones suffered, including a badly fractured ankle that snapped when I was suddenly buried in a pile of oversize offshore lobster traps. My crew literally dug me out of the mountain of gear that had given in to one hellacious wave, surprised to find me alive. I hobbled around on the ankle to finish the trip—two weeks—until it had healed out of kilter and had to be rebroken in a surgical procedure. Tonight, before the end of the third round, I had totally extolled my own bravery and pain threshold with the telling of my left hand’s battle with a half hitch of thousand-pound-test monofilament. Although my hand won by parting the fishing line before being torn from my wrist, it was so badly swollen that it could not be put in a cast. So I did what any self-respecting fisherman would do and went back to sea with an Ace bandage and a bottle of aspirin. None of the episodes we chose to share proved much in the way of possessing brain cells. When the tales wound down to nicks and cuts and scars “that used to be right there,” I decided to begin the night watches.
Arch was to stand watch first for two hours, waking Dave to do his two-hour stint. Tim was on the list at number three, and Machado was last and would wake me at 4:30 A.M. The watches would rotate, last man first up the next night, so that no one would be permanently saddled with the dreaded middle watches. Although the British navy would bristle at it, I had always referred to these as the “dog watches.” We didn’t sound bells every thirty minutes either. Night watches aboard a commercial fishing vessel require … well, watching. The men would watch the radar for traffic or other obstructions; the horizon for lights indicating traffic; the engine room for leaks, fires, and other problems; the ice machine for production; the GPS for our progress toward the fishing grounds; and the compass as a check on navigational electronics. Basically, the watch standers were responsible for keeping the boat on course and safe while the captain got some sleep.
I had many nightmarish stories of bad watch-standing practices to share. I spared my crew all the minute details, but the gist of the bedtime story I now chose to tell them was not aimed at putting them to sleep. There were many episodes of falling asleep and narrowly missing a fatal collision with another vessel or a landmass, but what appalled me even more were times when the watch stander was wide awake and making decisions in the wellintentioned interest of allowing the captain more sleep. In one case the man in charge had a bout of “get-home-itis.” He looked at the chart and decided that a straight line was indeed the shortest distance between our present position and the dock that he so yearned to step onto. He changed course to shorten our steam, saving fuel, and manipulated our ETA to better suit the making of happy hour at the local watering hole. To this day I don’t know how we made it through the dangerous shoals that his new course took us over. When I looked at our track line on the plotter that evening, I knew I’d seen a miracle. With the weather and sea conditions as they were, we should have been dead—all five of us.
I usually told a new crew about the time that a man fell asleep on watch and nearly ran us between a tug and its tow. And how I slapped him across the face to wake him. And how I fired him on the spot. But I didn’t feel that was necessary tonight. Relying on luck to keep us alive did little to instill confidence. Relying on ability did. All of my men were savvy navigators and conscientious guys in general. So I should have no trouble sleeping away my eight-hour time off the wheel.
“Sleep tight, Linny,” Arch said softly as I relinquished the chair to him. I wasn’t accustomed to crew members calling me by such a familiar nickname. But Arch was an old and trusted friend who was more like family. And I preferred this nickname to “Ma,” which is what Ringo and company had teasingly (and I chose to believe lovingly) called me. “We’ve got a lot to be proud of,” Arch said as he took the chair. I knew that he was speaking to us as a group, so I hung around to acknowledge him. “This old girl is gonna be fine,” he said as he patted the arm of the chair affectionately. “We brought her back to life from close to the grave. Think of what we’ve accomplished. And we haven’t even caught a fish yet.” Archie’s voice cracked a bit. I sensed that he was very emotional, so I said good night. We were way beyond captain and crew aboard the Seahawk. We were a group of friends. It was cool.
“Thanks for bringing me fishing with you, Linny,” said Hiltzie.
“You’re welcome. Thank you for agreeing to make the trip.” I hurried down the stairs into the stateroom I was to share with Archie and climbed into the top bunk. I’d never had a roommate on a fishing trip before and would have preferred my own space. But as long as I had to share, I was sure glad that it was with Archie. I hoped that Dave would still be thanking me at the end of the trip. This should really be a great experience for him, I thought as I pulled my sleeping bag up under my chin. And I was certainly feeling good about affording Dave this unique opportunity. If we could “hatch” the boat (fill the hold with fish) twice and hit the market at the right times, we’d all be happy about more than just a good experience. I wouldn’t miss lobstering at all. I knew that Hiltzie wouldn’t either.
I really despise sleeping bags. They make me feel all cooped up, like a bug in a cocoon, but not remotely cozy. I would have unzipped the bag, freeing my claustrophobic feet from the skinny, dead end if I could have sat up. This had to be the smallest bunk I’d ever been crammed into. There wasn’t an inch of extra room in it—even turning over would be prohibited by hips and shoulders. Good thing I could sleep on my back. Well, I couldn’t expect to return to swordfishing after being away so long and step right aboard the best boat. Archie was right—the Seahawk was fine. Besides, it had taken me many years to work my way up to the Hannah Boden. And the Seahawk had plenty of character. Small bunks but big personality. Plus, there really weren’t many boats left in the industry to choose from, even if I’d been given the option of running another, I realized as I started a mental count.
The position of skipper aboard a U.S. Grand Banks longline vessel is the absolute pinnacle of the commercial fishing world. I had always felt I was one of the few who remained of a dying breed of blue-water fishermen. And now that the number of Grand Bankers that sailed from the United States to catch swordfish was down to half a dozen boats or so, being one of their captains really placed me on an endangered-species list. I had always taken great pride in introducing myself as a commercial fisherman, in spite of the public’s misconceptions. We had long gotten a bad (and sometimes deservedly so) rap for pillaging our way through precious natural resources and promoting the eating of unhealthy fish, but the tide had turned. The latest government research had proved that the North Atlantic swordfish stock was totally rebuilt. And my understanding was that science was saying the presence of selenium negated any adverse effect or danger of mercury from consuming swordfish. I was proud to be heading out in more of a politically correct and environmentally healthy atmosphere than the one I had left. Yes, there is a certain snob appeal in being a member of such an elite group of men who risk all in pursuit of fish. And I had always felt that commercial fishing is a noble profession. We feed the world. But I had better get to sleep soon, I told myself. There wasn’t a lot of room in this bunk for a swollen head.
Apparently all my happy thoughts produced great sleep. “Time to get up, Skipper. Six o’clock,” Machado said, loudly enough to wake me but softly enough to not bother Archie, who was snoring in the bunk below. Had I really passed out for nine and a half hours? The stretc
h down from my bunk was a long one for short legs, and I had to place my foot carefully on the edge of the lower bunk to avoid stepping on my roommate. I hustled into my boots and scurried to the wheelhouse. “Good morning, Linda.” Machado greeted me with a huge infectious smile. “There’s fresh coffee on in the galley. Want a cup?”
“Thanks. I’ll help myself in a few minutes. And thanks for the extra rack time.” I looked at the electronics and was pleased with our progress and delighted that the crew had indeed kept us on course through the night. Archie had somehow managed to get the second computer of three up and running. So now I had a backup. I was glad that Arch had tackled the computer, as I had almost no ability and even less patience. None of the multiple fish-finding software or weather-forecasting programs I’d been promised by Jim Budi worked, but the feed from the GPS seemed to function. So I had another fine track plotter that was driven by a system with which I was just becoming familiar, Nobeltec.
The rising sun in the windows made me squint, but I could never bring myself to wear sunglasses. There is something special about steaming directly into the sun and losing clear perception in its blaze on the ocean.
I thought about the Grand Banks and how aptly named the area is. Grand indeed; these fishing grounds have quite an imposing legacy. Two of the most renowned maritime catastrophes in history occurred there—the Titanic and the Andrea Gail—creating an aura to match that of the Bermuda Triangle among seamen who work or traverse the massive banks and the surrounding expanse deemed so grand. But it’s not all about disaster. Not only do the Grand Banks produce some of the god-awfulest weather for mariners to contend with, but they also house some of the greatest fishing on the planet. Lifelong commercial fishermen who have never fished the Grand Banks are somewhat incomplete in their experience. To quote a late friend, “If you ain’t been to the Grand Banks, you ain’t been there.” In my own career the Grand Banks is where I have fished among icebergs and killer whales. Now I felt the heat of the sun through the window on my face and chest and knew that soon I would be shivering and that this warmth would be a memory.
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