About 25 years ago, I spent 2 rough months up in Alaska being a deck hand on a long line fishing boat. It was an opportunity to make 'good' money... but I thankfully didn't.
The days were really long. My friend got me the job and we worked about 20 hours each day. We would spend a few days in port baiting garbage can sized tubs. These tubs would be tied together when setting the gear and ten tubs would be used to make one set. One set was 3 miles long. The hooks were 15 ft apart... so lots of baiting.
When setting the gear, we would travel pretty quickly. The hooks and line would rattle against a metal chute that each tub would be slid into when setting the gear. One time, while we were making a set, it got real quiet. I was in the back with 'Alvin.' He was the experienced guy and I was the green horn. We were talking, when we suddenly realized that something was wrong. We both turned and saw the 3/8th inch line stretching more and more tautly. A hook had inexplicably gotten hung up on the side of the chute. There were knifes everywhere, so I quickly reached up and snatched a knife that was stuck in the ceiling and reached out to cut the leader. 'Alvin' didn't have time to warn me... and he would have! I barely touched the leader, but when I did, the tub erupted! Like a volcano, hooks and line violently shot vertically up out of the tub, slamming into the ceiling and then horizontally yanked out the back. I was literally inches from the eruption of hooks and line. 'Alvin' grabbed me from behind and pulled me backwards. He then spun me around to face him and with a grim face told me to, "Never do that again." Long line fishing is very dangerous. Getting hooked and drug overboard was just one of the many popular ways to die.
When we would go out fishing, I would be very sea sick for the first two days. The problem was I would still need to work long dangerous hours while I was very sick... it was HARD. I remember barfing over the side and right after I barfed getting totally smacked in the upper half of my body and face by a big wave washing over the side of the boat. What a rush! You just had to stay alert. The third day out was always glorious. I would wake up hungry... the sea sickness would be gone.
There were 6 of us on the boat. My friend and I were the inexperienced ones. However, two people got hurt badly and it wasn't my friend or me. When you get a hook into you, you have several options. Option #1, pull out the hook. Option #2, cut the leader. Option #3, get pulled overboard to become bait. Option #4, grab onto something that isn't going anywhere and hang on until the hook comes out of your body. Twice, two of my coworkers chose Option #4. The sound of a grown man screaming as a hook goes sideways through his hand is pretty hard to listen to and even harder to watch.
I remember once we got into fish so heavily that they were knee deep on the deck. Another deck hand 'John' and I spent the next 6 to 7 hours cutting the heads off of fish. At one point we got into several wolf eels. I looked around and all of the sudden there were 4 to 5 huge eels snaking around on the top of all the fish. I couldn't move... it was creepy... I would simply keep cutting heads off of the cod fish we were catching and would wait for an eel to get close. Whenever one did, I would reach over and slice off its head. We had wolf eel for dinner that night and it was good... it tasted a lot like greasy chicken.
One night, I was up in the wheel house on watch. It was really stormy. We had to stay out in the bad weather overnight because we still had to pull in a set of gear the next day. It was about 2 AM. There were whitecaps on the top of all the big waves. Then in the distance, I noticed one long continuous white cap. I was getting closer and closer. I didn't know where the skipper slept. I didn't know what to do, but the wave was HUGE. It got closer and closer and then it hit. The boat we were in was a 65 ft long boat and the wheel house was maybe 15 ft up in the air. The stacks that went up out of the roof of the wheel house were at least 25 ft from sea level. The boat violently lurched to one side and then the next and water came crashing down through the stacks. Within moments the skipper came scrambling into the wheel house and gravely asked me what happened. I told him about the huge wave and that I didn't know where he slept. He told me to get to bed and I gratefully did.
The next morning, though, that is when I earned the nick-name 'Rancher.' It was still very stormy. We had to haul in that last set of gear. We were taking green water over the deck. Green water is deep water... not spray. I was up on the front deck heading cod fish. When a big wave would crash over the side, you would just hang onto whatever you had near you that wasn't going anywhere. Most of the time the water was about 2-3 ft deep! The skipper was up in the wheel house and it was all hands on deck. We were trying to get in the last set of gear and get the fish headed and stowed down below. It was nasty. I looked up at the skipper and he looked back down at me. I gave him a big stupid smile and a thumbs up. I was thinking, "This is rugged manly fishing!" I was not scared at all. He just looked down at me with a serious face and slowly shook his head from side to side. I suddenly realized that all may not be well. I looked over to my coworker 'John' and asked, "Have you ever been out in this kind of weather before?" He flatly stated, "I am crapping my pants right now." I couldn't believe it. This manly experienced fisherman was scared. I turned and looked, again, back up at my skipper... but this time I had fear in my eyes. He returned my gaze with a wry smile and a knowing nod of his head. I suddenly felt very small and helpless.
From then on my skipper called me 'Rancher.' One day I finally asked him why. He explained it like this, 'Well... the farthest thing from ranching is long line fishing.' In other words, I was so inexperienced, I wasn't scared when I should have been. I often call my students 'Ranchers' when they give me a ridiculous answer or do a lousy job of following directions.
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I like this story. I have a lot of friends that did this sort of work for a summer to earn a lot of money. Some summers they did and some summers they worked those long, hard hours and earned hardly anything.
ReplyDeleteI feel like a "Rancher" as I raise my kids....:-) Thanks for sharing.