North Andros Island Report

[Bulletin Board]

Posted by Glenn on 2009-12-17 15:30:30

After a crazy week of design workshops and conferencing Mona and I made the short drive north from Sunset Beach to LAX and soon we were soon off on our first, long awaited trip to the Bahamas to celebrate our 25th anniversary. After an uneventful “red eye” flight, we arrived in Fort Lauderdale around 6:00 AM, lying around the baggage carousel area waiting for Watermakers, our private charter airline, to open so that we could make the last leg of the journey to Kamalame, our home for the next eight days. After an hour in the air we were treated to a wonderful view of the NW end of the island. The color of the flats contrasting against the unmapped inland lakes, springs, and plant life was something we had never seen before.

Once safely through customs, we were greeted by our taxi and off we went. Upon our arrival, we were given a tour of the premises and presented with our golf cart for the week! Cool!

We eventually made it to our cottage and this what we saw. This was going to be hard to take :)!

Though not a long walk from our private cottage to the Great House, I would later find out how convenient the golf cart would be while traveling to and from the home flats. It got to where we would head out with binoculars every evening to enjoy the sunset while spotting tailers. I love this place!

With everything stowed, it was time to gear up with the right stuff!

With five days of guided fishing, we were in no hurry to hit the water but there was something about those home flats only a few feet away that kept calling us so we loaded up the golf cart and headed out!

It wasn’t long before we found some beautiful bones, sending them scurrying for places unknown. It had been two years since we fished bonefish so it was nice to get in some spotting and casting practice before our first real fishing day. The place on the right is discounted right now for $1.6M. Anyone wanna go halves? Ocean view (east) and Staniard Creek home flats view (west). Some folks just know how to live.

Checking the tide tables, the afternoon showed the water falling so with the wife sunning with her Kindle, I was back out there mid-afternoon waiting for them to drain off of the flats into the nearby channels. Wading through the silty sand, I set up on a grassy edge near some random mangroves and before long a steady parade of cruisers started to show. The best time seemed to be 1.5 - 2 hours before the low. Extremely skittish, they were nonetheless still feeding on occasion and after three refusals my first bone of the trip was ON! Satisfied, I headed back to a wonderful sauteed lobster dinner with missus.

Noting the color of the bottom, I deviated from the standard Gotcha-type patterns and went with a darker pattern called Mars Bay Special. Named after another great location on South Andros, it still had that all important bright orange accent. Part crab part shrimp, I didn’t have any of that rusty colored fur so I subbed natural rabbit and they LOVED it!

I landed 12 bones on that first fly until I lost it when a big bone ran into the mangroves a few days later. On the high tides the fish would usually run for the mangroves and there was little you could do to stop them as they averaged an honest 3-4 pounds. On our second day, I broke of three straight on 20# Seaguar fluorocarbon trying to stop them from heading into the heavy stuff.

The next morning dawned breezy and somewhat sunny and Mo’ decided to stay back and kick it while our guide and I headed out for the day.

Meeting our guide Solomon for the first time, I felt an instant connection with his warm smile and welcoming personality. He said, “We’re going to the Joulters Mon!” so I hopped into the Ford Ranger and we were off! The Joulters are a series of huge white sand flats interspersed with tiny palm tree and mangrove covered islands that extend over literally hundreds of wadeable square miles. Having only fished off pangas in Belize, I kept peering back through the back window at Solly’s beautiful light teal 16' Maverick Flats skiff. With its 90 horse four stroke Yammie, we would be fishing in style! I don’t know if any of you have ever fished one, but this boat is simply incredible. From it’s expansive casting deck to massive rod storage to its soft ride, this is the skiff I would own if we lived in that part of the world. What impressed me the most was the lack of hull “slap” even in the choppiest of weather. We swapped boat owner stories and I launched his boat whenever we trailered it. Cool!

With the weather building and the tide rising Solomon got us set up and soon we were out wading the Joulters. I much prefer wading over the boat but there are times when you simply can’t see them that way due to the conditions nor do you cover as much water.

It wasn’t long before we spotted some tailers on the first cast, SUCCESS! With a deep bend in the Loomis and the Galvan Torque 8 just purring away, I was in my happy place.

Unfortunately, the conditions quickly fell apart and we struggled to find fish as the strong NE pushed in cold water and the flats were promptly vacated. Nasty clouds rolled in and donned in rain wear we retreated for the mangroves to hide. We ended with a handful of beautiful bones and I was more than satisfied having visited a place seldom seen by westerners. We agreed to monitor the weather closely as so often in the Bahamas things can change in an instant....and they did.

Though windy the night before with palm fronds rattling against our thatched roof, our third day started with dead flat conditions and clear skies! YES! Solly greeted us at the dock and said he wanted to stay local today hitting nearby different creeks and flats, a change of scenery, giving the Joulters a chance to recover. After a 15 minute run north, he pulled back on the throttles bringing the boat to a stop 100 yards or so off the nearest piece of mangrove covered shore. It wasn’t long before we could see tailers in all directions, some heading our way, others set up in a nearby gap feeding into the rising tide. This was going to be good. I could feel it.

Climbing atop the bow of the Maverick, I got my line all stretched and piled neatly on the mat, leaving the fluoro tipped leader plus 10' of line clear of the tip, ready for action. It wasn’t long before Solly in his calm, relaxing style, said, “Okay Glenn 60' ten o’clock coming in. Point your rod, okay, see em?”

I responded, “GOT ‘EM!”.

With my heart jumping out of chest, I started to extend line, my stroke of course way to fast, and in his soothing way Solly instructed, “Okaaaaay, sloooooow ittttt doooooown ........theeeeeere youuuuuu goooooooo.......extend some more..... a little right.......drop the next one for me.” I did with the little fly landing about 4' in front of the nearest of three bonefish now becoming more visible in the morning light.

Guiding me further, “Okay, Glenn let it sink..... wait....... wait..... strip..... strip...... strip..... stop.... long strip.....got ‘em! I turned and exclaimed, “Solly, with instructions like that, heck, even Stevie Wonder could catch fish”, the comment almost causing him to fall off the poling platform laughing.

Smiling ear to ear, I handed the rod to Mo’ and said, “Your turn”. Nervous due to her own inexperience, and with light encouragement from our guide she reluctantly got up on the platform. Having caught bonefish, stripers, barracuda and calicos “blind casting” before, she had never attempted sight casting and was just a bit tentative to say the least. Again Solly in his unique way, spying a group of cruisers coming down the bank at 1:00 o’clock 60' feet away, said, “Mona? Show me a cast at three o’clock, okay?” Remembering her lessons, she released her grip on the bend of the hook, unleashed a nice little roll cast, and was soon extending line on every false cast...20'....25'....30'.....35'.....then 40' and with the bones closing the gap quickly, Solly said, “Mona? Can you drop the next one for me?” and she did now able to see the bones herself through her amber lensed Costa Del Mars. Solly continued, “I can work with that...... okay..... lets wait a bit... okay.... give me a short strip.... stop..... long strip.....GOT EM!”

After a great battle including some blazing runs and Mo’ managing to keep her knuckles clear of the handle, she had her first sight caught bone and it was beauty! Can you tell that she wasn’t happy at all? All she could say was, "I saw it eas tthe fly!" I’ve never been so proud. All of her practice had paid off nicely. Before handing the rod, she said, “Okay I’m done, one cast, one fish, I’m happy!”

On the technical side. we began the trip alternating between the 8 and 9 wt sticks during the trip based on wind and location but eventually settled on straight nine weights; with Native Run GLX and Cross Current GLX getting the job done. I actually prefer the somewhat lighter-in-the-hand Native Run even though it is promoted as more of a freshwater stick. I understand that it is the original GLX repackaged. The Galvan Torques never let us down staying buttery smooth the entire trip. With the exception of the fish I tried to stop from going into the mangroves, EVERY fish went well into the backing. Happy with their performance on our own local three B’s, I experimented with the Okuma Helios 8-9 and they too performed admirably though I did have some lack of backing scares! All of our lines were SA mastery bonefish lines and they did not fail us even though I may need to replace one after it was dragged way into the mangroves by a really mean bone.

With the sun shining brightly and nary a breeze, we stopped for lunch on sugary white sand point and reflected on the morning’s outstanding fishing. With (9) bones averaging 3-4 and a five and a six mixed in who could complain! Having guided for the last thirteen years Solly, “Mon, it doesn’t get much better. Let’s look for big ones later okay?”

With the tide dropping and the morning feeding session over, we continued to pole this wonderful bay seeing a few larger ones up to 8# according to Solly, but we were never able to get the fly to them as the “smaller” bones constantly beat them to it. What a problem to have! We ended the day with fifteen beautiful bones and I wondered how it could get much better.

After a great night’s rest, we took the following day off celebrating our anniversary walking the beaches, sunning ourselves in 78 degree water, and doing a little beachcombing and shell collecting. I presented her with a bonefish necklace handcarved by artist Louie the Fish. We won’t soon forget that day.

The next day we met again at the dock at 7:30 and headed back to the Joulters for a rematch. After the 45 minute drive north to Lowe Sound, we promptly launched the skiff and were off and running with the later high tide in our favor. Clear but with the breeze building we hit a few spots but never really got on them until around 10:30 when we came around the corner to an immense bonefish “mud” measuring 50 feet x half a football field long.

Schooled up in three foot of water, these fish were schooled up for safety as a dozen or so lemon sharks some up to a 100# zig-zagged through and around the school trying for an easy meal. It’s no wonder that bonefish fight the way they do with ospreys from above and barracuda and sharks below, only the really strong survive.

Having fished a mud before and understanding the sometimes less than challenging fishing not to mention quality, we stayed off the edges targeting only the larger fish though at times you could not keep the smaller two pound fish away! With the wind building throughout the day, we continued to work this large flat, with constant action on 3-4 pound average fish with maybe a couple larger and smaller. With every cast into the wind, we were more than pleased with our days catch of 25+ bones. Solly said it was closer to thirty! We never lost one to a lemon shark even though I did get one 80-90 pound lemon to eat the fly! Now that was a heck of run!

More than satiated, the next day was spent “local” again as the weather again turned with cloud cover making sight fishing very difficult. We chose to casually target larger fish with smaller bones allowed to swim by unmolested. I never thought that I would see the day when I would not cast to a bonefish regardless of size. We landed a handful and were more than happy just to be on the water

Our last day found us running to the west side of the island out of Red Bays, seeking trophy tarpon and permit.

Running full bore at 40 mph in glassy conditions was exhilarating, the scenery just spectacular.

After running 35 miles south dodging rain squalls we came into a wonderful expansive creek just full of life; the sound of exhaling of sea turtles, egrets strolling the banks, and the ever present sharks just everywhere now represented by black tips and bonnetheads. The falling tide allowed us to drift down with the current scanning back and forth across the expansive, yet depth varying bottom. After almost an hour our first guests showed up dressed up like 50-60 pound tarpon and I started to shake. I’ve got lots of 100-200 pound yellowfin tuna under my belt but there’s something much more intimidating about making having to make that perfect cast to a species you’ve never seen before less landed before. Without pictures and a real story to tell, let’s just say that the cast was there, the lead fish looked, but in the end she just gave me the FIN-ger! I can at least say that I got the beautiful little 15 pound permit to FOLLOW the fly almost into my rod tip before showing me her best view of her backside. I must say that this permit was a LOT easier to see with the black sickle tail gentling wobbling back and forth in the current as we poled after for over ten minutes taking multiple shots with a swimming crab pattern before finally giving chase to a #2 rubber legged Gotcha.

Kamalame and the people of Andros were absolutely wonderful. I have never met a more gracious, community conscious people in my life. This island reminded me a lot of my childhood summers with my grandma on Kauai where she never had to lock her doors until her passing in 1988. Without all of the crap we find so essential to life Androsians instead choose to focus on the more basic fundamental aspects of life; love, laughter and respect for one another. While others choose to wait for their heaven, we have found ours in Andros. I don’t when but we will be going back.

Glenn

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