Stripers in the Fog

I remember the excitement of being asked to go fishing, at night, with my dad.  In the steamy days of late August, Striped Bass haunt the rip-rapped breachways of southern Rhode Island.  Sometimes they are itinerants, moving their way ahead of the fall migration to winter homes in the Hudson, Delaware or Chesapeake.  Some have been there since early spring and have found the routine of predictably changing tides moving through a narrow channel to their benefit in feeding. 

My father had heard they were there and we had heard stories of him catching a big one in Newport long ago.  We were within a mile of the breachway on the edge of Ninigret Salt Pond in our small month-long rental.

I was twelve.  He was then and has always been a giant in my eyes.  A picture on my refrigerator now shows me at 2 looking up in awe at his young, weathered face as we sit before a massive pile of split wood.  When he asked if I wanted to go with him at 2 in the morning to the breachway by boat to fish for stripers I leapt at the opportunity. 

I remember a small dock and the beach next to it that we laid the boat on.  The boat was the classic 12 foot “tinboat”.  We had two gray wooden oars and a small outboard that pushed us across the glassy pond in the pitch dark.  A long, serpentine channel lead to the breach. I held a flashlight over the bow as we traveled and I imagine he told me at some point to turn it off to conserve the battery.  Looking into water like that at night with a light has always fascinated me.  The water was rich with life and mystery.   Our pullout was a sandy recess on the West side of the channel, across from the state parking area.  We could hear the crashing of the surf in Block Island sound, only 200 yards over the barrier dune from our landing.  As he fished, I continued to peer into the water. I remember great schools of Silversides and many green crabs roaming the openings between the breachway’s slippery rocks.  I remember Striped Killifish mating at the very edge of the water at the top of the moon tide.   I’m sure that he was a bit disappointed that I was more interested in looking in the water than I was casting the Rebel plugs into the middle on the incoming tide.  I can’t remember much about the fishing except that we didn’t catch any Stripers and that the trip was cut short by an envelope of fog as the dawn approached. 

We packed out our gear with some urgency and raced (as best the small engine could) through the turns of the channel to the pond.  Once in the pond the fog settled completely on us and we were lost.  A thick fog makes a mockery of sense of direction.  The mind’s imaginings become confusing.  Navigating is like walking through your house with your eyes closed. 

He seemed more concerned about me and how I felt.  He told me that the best thing to do in fog was to set the anchor and “hunker down” until the fog lifted, which it surely would.  Once we’d navigated back out into what we thought was well out into the open pond, we set anchor.  For three hours we tried to get sleep on the hard, damp aluminum hull with little success.  I spent some of the time peering through the water, with and without the now useless light as the foggy darkness led to foggy light. 

As the fog began to lift and we recognized where we were, we laughed together.  100 yards to our north was our dock and beach.  We had been within 300 yards of our beds the whole time.  I remember sleeping well and him telling me that he didn’t mind being stuck in the fog with me, or something to that effect. 

Looking back, like all sons of good fathers I suppose, I would love to be lost out there, alone with him for another three hours.  Its not that bad being lost with your dad in a boat.  It sure as hell beats being lost by yourself. 

We haven’t fished for a while lately.  Now, more often than not, I’m the one carting sons out for adventure.  He had Lyme so bad last year we thought we were going to lose him.  He’s feeling better now and I’m hoping to get out a few more times with him on any water, with or without fish or fog.