Close to the Bone in Exuma

 

Above the placid water, undersides lit by reflected turquoise, hung Caribbean  clouds of awesome beauty.  Inside a vast jewel of aquamarine light, our boat skimmed across the flats as lemon, nurse and bull sharks patrolled beneath us.  Our destination was a mangrove fringed cove Once there, we climbed over the sides to wade in the warm water.  After a few casts both of our reels were screaming with running bone fish.

But wait. That’s not where the story starts.  It began a year ago. 

Sadly, scuba diving a sport that had always been our primary focus during out island getaways was now out of the question thanks to a case skin bends my wife suffered at the Turneffe Island resort.  Bone fishing would have to take its place and a trip to a Bahamian out island seemed like a golden opportunity to try our hand at salt water fly fishing.  We booked a bargain vacation to San Salvador, the island made famous by an Italian explorer back in 1492.  Club Med provided our accommodations.  Its a seriously cheap all inclusive where we would eat second rate food, drink third rate booze and hopefully fish to our hearts’ content. 

 Prior to the trip my search for bone fishing guides on San Salvador came up blank.  Nevertheless I was convinced there was good bone fishing on San Salvador because 1) I read about it on the internet and 2) Club Med was built on Bonefish Bay.   The lack of bone fishing guides must just be one of those unexplained mysteries.  One thing was for sure though, we'd have to buy our own gear.  Consider the cost of two 8wt fly rods, reels, lines leader, tippets, and flies; So much for a bargain vacation.

As the plane landed in the sun washed tarmac, I was still bothered by the absence of fly fishing guides but my fears were allayed when I spotted another guy getting off the plane with a rod case.   Upon striking up a conversation I discovered he was and anesthesiologist named Steve from Massachusetts who also heard there was bonefish on the island.  He had no more idea than I did about the possibility of getting a guide.  Still, things were looking up. 

After a the obligatory queue in the tiny Bahamian customs building, the Club Med school bus met us for the short ride to the resort.  Having never been to a Club Med before was taken aback by a little Mexican guy, the resort’s resident comedian, in the yellow chicken suit waiting for us on the bus.  All the guests from the weekly charter from Ft Lauderdale herded into an outdoor amphitheater where we received our briefing from the village “Chief” about our all inclusive stay on San Salvador.  The Chief didn’t say a word about bone fishing.

 

The week long Club Med circus had begun complete with young bilingual staff that was encouraged to dine with the predominantly middle aged French speaking clientele each night. 

 

The center of activity each day was the swimming pool where staff member would lead vigorous exercises and dances accompanied by blaring club music and screaming children.  Each night after dinner the staff would don costumes to perform dances and skits in the amphitheater. 

 

 

 

Still, our week passed quickly punctuated by several fruitless attempts by Steve and my self to find bonefish including renting a beat up micro car and driving the pot hole strewn gravel roads to wade the salt creeks on the far side of the island.  Not only did we never see a bonefish, our last day we ran into a local biologist who revealed that there hadn’t been a bonefish in Bonefish Bay for ten years.  

 

 

 

So, shiny new rods and reels and no bone fish:  Now what?

 

Fast forward a year and it was time for another island vacation only this time to Exuma, an island inhabited by actual bone fish.  Maybe Andros has bigger fish but Exuma has more of them and there's less pressure.  A quick check of the tourism website confirmed there were plenty of bone fishing guides. 

 

Now don’t get the idea that Exuma is some secluded fishing lodge.  It’s a good size group of islands known primarily for is sheltered harbor at its principal city of Georgetown and the grotto scene from "Thunderball".  It's a Mecca for sailors from all over the Caribbean, particularly in April when the Family Regatta takes place.  During our visit in March 450 boats anchored in the harbor.  Their owners invariably complained about the high winds that had been blowing that year.  It had turned sailing into an exercise of tucking in somewhere such as Georgetown harbor, waiting out the wind and drinking yourself into oblivion at the Chat n' Chill bar.

 

 

Since I at least could still scuba dive, our first stop was Exuma Divers where I booked a couple of boat dives for the week.  After the diving paperwork was finished  I inquired about fishing and Tamara one of the owners referred me to JJ Dames and his associate Herman Bowes.

JJ was busy so we’d be going out with Herman, a lifelong resident of the island who used to have his own guide business until he lost his boat to a hurricane that snuck up from the south and inundated his home on Harry Cay.  Now he helped JJ Dames when things got busy.  At 8am sharp Herman picked us up at our cottage in his Chevy crew cab and we drove though Georgetown, which took all of about sixty seconds. WE continued down the queens highway to Old Airport Road, aptly named because soon the gravel road turned into the cracked and weed infested runway of an abandoned airport.  Along the way we passed two massive white radar domes that marked a high security surveillance station jointly funded by the US and Bahamian governments.  Herman told us it was no longer operational but the chain link fence surrounding it was still topped with shiny coils if razor wire.  He wasn't sure if it the facility was meant interdict drug traffickers or keep an eye on Cuba.

 

Just beyond was reached the lee side of the island and JJ’s "harbor". which was was no more than a notch hewn out of the limestone just big enough for his two flats boats. Herman said that the stone was soft and easy to cut.  It didn’t look that easy to me but at least it explained how the wind and waves had sculpted the shoreline into fantastic shapes with hazardously sharp edges.

 

JJ’s were classic flats boats, with a poling platforms built above the massive Suzuki outboards.  While Herman readied our boat we strung up our rods and tied on the gotcha flies we had bought the year before from a Orvis shop located in landlocked Lombard Illinois..  I showed the flies to Herman, he approved, and with that we were off, skimming 40mph over the glass smooth turquoise water.

 

 

 

The flats could be an easy place to get lost.  It was hard to distinguish the main island from the multitude of small cays that stretched out to the east.  Herman of course knew it well and knew where the fish held.  Since JJ, who I imagine had first choice,  wasn’t guiding fishermen that day we had had full access to all his honey holes.   Honey holes meant proximity to the mangroves where the bonies could slip in to feed at high tide.  

 

The best time to fish was a low and rising tide.  That day the bonies were hungry and anxious to get into the Mangroves and Herman was anxious to start fishing ahead of the rising tide.  He had an intent expression as he nudged the throttle forward a notch.  “We got to catch this tide.” He said.

After twenty minutes he cut the throttle and we idled into a mangrove fringed cove.  Then he cut the engine entirely and unfastened the flats pole from its clips.   He climbed atop the platform and began polling slowly across the marl.  The hunt was on.

 

 

From my perch on the casting deck I made a few clumsy casts and strip retrieves in the direction Herman called out without actually seeing any fish.    “Keep the tip down.”  Herman reminded.  Then it happened.  I felt the pull from another world on the rod.  As the bonefish started his run as just as I felt the adrenaline rise in my blood, the line went limp.  The fish had broken off because I was standing on the line.  It wasn’t my fault I thought. The wind moving the bow had wedged the line under my feet.   Nevertheless I felt embarrassed as I tied on another precious gotcha, precious because the only flies we had were those we brought with us.  None were available on the island for love or money. 

 

Thankfully it wasn’t long before I hooked another and the fight was on.  In our home waters we never need to get the fish on the reel so I wondered how to transition to the reel here.  I needn’t have worried.   The bonies pull so hard that before you know it all the slack line has gone in the direction of Cuba and the reel is screaming.   Depending on the size of the fish the rum may be short or long.  This one was short.  I reeled in and had another short run before the bonie gave himself up.  We caught a few fish in that cove before it was on to another where Herman told us the fish will hit anything you throw at them.  He was right.  I tied on a crab and landed several as did my wife.  We were both out of the boat and wading, both fighting fish at the same time, careful to not let our lines tangle. Later I asked her how many fish she caught.  “I lost count,” was her reply.

 

 

Suddenly the bite was off.  The window of time when currents and tide make fish bite was closed.  Still we continued our tour until found a cove full of schooling bonefish.  They surrounded a lemon shark in a concentric ring.  As the lemon shark moved so did the ring.  I made several casts into the crowd to avail.  The bonies were done feeding.  Herman said we were watching mating behavior.  The only fish interested in my fly was the shark.  It followed my retrieve but luckily didn’t strike.  We were running low on flies.

 

At three o clock were back at the home made harbor.  Since Herman, like all the guides on the island didn’t accept credit cards so we stopped by an ATM on the way back to our cottage.  Over the ten days of our trip I gave this particular ATM a steady workout.  Turns out that was a costly was to do business.  After the local banks fee and my bank’s foreign transaction fees it was costing me almost 6% to get at my own scratch.  Note to self, bring a big wad of cash on the next visit to Exuma.

 

Herman wouldn’t be available the next day so we decided to try our hand at some DIY fishing.  Most of the DIY fishing on Exuma requires a boat or at least a Kayak. We had neither.  I did, however, find a blog that told us about one place where we could wade in and catch bonefish.  While that seemed optimistic to me I thought we’d give it a shot.  So next day we rented a micro car with tiny wheels the size of dinner plate and headed out from our cottage.  After a wrong turn on that took us into a labyrinth of jeep trails. It was clear we had the wrong vehicle for the situation.  Thorn bushes that extended into the road scratched our poor rental car’s paint like nails.   Eventually we found the road that took us to the flats.  We parked the car, geared up and began a thirty minute hike to what we hoped would be a Mangrove lined channel.  We could see Dove Cay far in the distance.  Because the sharp rocky shoreline it was easier to wade.   Crabs darted from beneath out feet as we walked in the turquoise water.   

 

Eventually the distance to the Dove Cay narrowed to a Mangrove line channel and, as luck would have it, we timed it right.  The tide was rising.  The blog led me to believe you could wade over to Dove Cay but the tide had already too high for that so we stayed by the Exuma shoreline and began working likely spots where the bonies could gain access to the Mangroves.  Before long we heard voices and looked uo to see a flats boat with two fishermen aboard poling up the other side of the channel.  Just then I caught a flash in the water not far front of me and let loose a cast.  I lost sight of the fish but it hadn’t lost sight of my fly.  After a few strips it hit it hard.  The fish was quickly on the reel and taking most of my fly line out of the spool.   The fish stopped running and I recover line.  He made another run, not so strong this time, and then I landed him.   I extracted the fly from his jaw and with great pleasure watched him swim away.   If the men in the boat saw me catch the fish they didn’t acknowledge it.   I started to feel a little guilty for catching a fish without spending 400 dollars for a guide, but soon got over it. 

 

I didn’t spot any more bonefish and after a while frustration and boredomst in.  so much so that I made a blind cast and to my surprise I felt a strong tug on the line.   Having not seen the fish I had no idea what was on the other end of my line.  My wife asked if it was a bonefish and I replied, “I hope so”.  Thankfully it was. 

 

 

My wife had no luck on our DIY day.  All she hooked was a small barracuda that immediately bit though the tippet.  Another fly lost.

We reeled in and began the long slog back the car, wading in the uneven flats.  Once we reached the car we were hot, exhausted and looking forward to a cold Kalik beer and conch salad at Big D’s.  That day we would have neither.   The tiny wheels on the rental car which somehow held up on the jeep tracks were no match for a many potholes that infiltrated the main highway from the crumbling shoulder.  After I ruined a wheel on the first pothole I put on the compact spare.  It was only a matter of a few miles before we hit a deeper pothole that almost bent the wheel in half.  Left us no other choice we abandoned the car on the side of the road and hitchhiked back to the cottage.  Words to the wise on Exuma; Rent a jeep with big wheels.  The edge the main highway is lined with ravenous potholes and hugging the centerline on the narrow road is in the face of oncoming traffic to avoid them was like playing an unending game of chicken.

 

A few days later we were back on the water with Herman.  After launching from the same makeshift harbor I could sense conditions were different.  The tide was high and falling.  Although he didn’t say it, Herman knew we wouldn’t catch as many fish today bit he also knew that these conditions could lead to larger fish.  An hour later, Herman was poling us along a channel where a river of tide was flowing out of the mangroves.  In accordance with his instructions I made a  cast to the two o clock position and began stripping.  Almost immediately I felt the familiar tug.  Then the carnival ride began.  The previous bonefish would give a good run, taking forty yards of line, but this one must have been shot out a cannon. It was all I could do was hold on as all the line disappeared from my reel and 60 yards of the florescent backing stretched out in front of me.  What a run!   Then I began to recover line, reeling in the backing some of the fly line appeared on the reel.  That was the cue for the fish to run again, no so far, not so hard but still a powerful surge.   As the fish got close to the boat, he spooked. Too tired for another run he resorted to dodging and weaving under the boat, leaving me the challenge of keeping the line clear of the outboard motor.  Finally I was able to get him along side where Herman reached him out of the water.  After a quick photo the fish was gently set free to terrorize the shrimp and crabs of Exuma. 

 

Soon I hooked another.  I felt the same powerful pull and saw the same long line of orange backing heading in the direction of Cuba. Sadly just as I began to reel in the line went limp.  The fish had broken off where I had added tippet with a double surgeons knot.  Apparently it should have been a triple.  Nonetheless a lost fish and fly were a small price to get into a fight with a good bonefish.  Neither of us hooked any more fish for the rest of the day but the time spent gliding along the mangrove fringed cays under the aquamarine clouds of Exuma remains one of a favorite experiences on the island. 

 

Rest assured that before leaving Exuma we rented a substantial SUV and finally made it to Big D’s.  It was the best conch salad on the island.

 

 

 

 

 

When we had the rental car we picked up all the hitchhikers we could.  This is common practice on the Exuma.  As we got to know them we fell deeper under the island's spell.  As disappointing as our trip to San Salvador was with its programmed resort, the trip to Exuma was one an all time favorite.   When we returned home I carefully rinsed the salt from the rods and reels before I stored them so they'll be ready for our next Exuma expedition.