June 25

The Old Man and I pulled into the small lot in Sandwich at almost exactly 4:30am. Dawn was just over the horizon and already the world was being illuminated. I had forgotten my headlamp and was worried I might struggle in the dark but clearly, that would not be an issue. We geared up the kayaks and launched just as Bruce arrived. He was on his own. We could already see a herd of boats sitting about a mile off shore and we were not waiting around for him to gear up. We began paddling towards the rising sun, witness to one of the finest mornings the Cape has seen this summer.

The water was flat and there was hardly a breeze. Unfortunately, there was a decent amount of weed in the water. I found myself frequently pulling in the line on both my fly and spin rods, which I had been trolling, to clear them of mung, grass and lettuce. Despite this, we made decent time and found ourselves cruising up to the boat herd within 15 minutes or so. Here we got our first blow to the day. It was easy to see that fish weren’t working the surface, even from a ways back. We were hoping that we could join up in some subsurface action with our best mackerel imitations.

The slog off shore proved futile though. We had hoped the boats were sitting over some stripers. Instead they were jigging for mackerel to take elsewhere. It was the second strike for the morning. The first being that neither of us (and Bruce we would later find out) had even a nibble on either fly or spin rods while trolling out. After a brief strategy session, it was decided that we’d cross the canal and try fishing the beach and breakwater.

In hindsight, that was a mistake. We should have hustled back to the truck and moved locations while we still had a dropping tide. The beach and breakwater offered nothing but a solitary tug on the Old Man’s fly rod. The fish never came back for seconds and we decided to scram. It was nearly slack tide on the bay side now and back in Buzzards Bay, the tide was already well into the flood. With no better ideas for a plan, we went back to Buttermilk Bay.

I really had no expectations. The small bay which, during the spring, offered days where more than 30 fish were caught and my first keepers of the year were taken, had calmed down. Because of that, I hadn’t fished it much as June carried on.  It felt like a pond when we launched. The water was almost glass calm and the sun was beating down at that point. My expectations were not high.

At first it seemed like I was right. The incoming tide was pushing loads of weed into the bay making trolling nearly impossible. As we paddled around, searching out the areas we knew as having structure our casts provided nothing. Feeling discouraged, I consoled myself that it could not be a nicer morning for paddle. Then I had fish on. I could immediately tell that it was a small fish, about ten inches once I boated it. But it broke the dry day and at least put one on the board. A few casts later and I was on another one, this time a little bigger.

By now the Old Man and I had paddled up towards the entrance of the bay and the incoming tide was providing a decently strong current. Despite the sudden bite, both of us had other obligations for the day and we decided to let the tide push us back into and across the bay. As we drifted over a submerged sandbar we continued to cast with more success. I think my largest of the day was about twenty inches and I finished the day with seven in total, all within the last half hour. The Old Man also boated seven for the day, and managed one about twenty two inches.

Despite the fish, we had to call it a day. In many ways the morning was a disappointment. The Old Man and I have been on a mission for big fish. As much as I want to get it on the fly rod, I’ll take it on the spin. So far we have been eluded. With the new moon tide, and the influx of mackerel in the bay, we thought our odds were good and at least one of us would see a fish over thirty five inches.  But, at least we weren’t completely skunked. The beautiful weather didn’t hurt either. I will never complain about a day spent on my kayak, next time I will remember to chart my journey via GPS so I can share it.

As always,

Tight Lines