A-fishing we will go - part one

One great memory I have of my dad is when we went fishing together.

My earliest fishing memory is going fishing with him when we were still in Monaco and we would go on the jetty of the port. I was probably 8 years old.

The fishing was never great in Monaco, but the time with my dad was priceless. I remember walking to the port with all our gears. We would make our own bait with old bread, stinky cheese and few other ingredients that I don't remember. I do remember that that stuff stunk to high heaven. By the time we were finished and had our few small fish after hours of throwing the line down, I usually would jump in the water and go swimming for a while.

When we came to the US, the tradition continued. From Metairie, a suburb of New Orleans, we would drive to deep south Louisiana in the jungle of bayous and swamps and rent a boat for the day. It was just a little flat bottom boat. As we went out, we would find our way through cattails in a spaghetti bowl of bayous. More than once, I thought we would never find our way back.

My father didn't have the greatest sense of direction while driving. As a matter of fact, he was lost on several occasions... in our neighborhood... a block away from the house... after living there for 20 years. But that's another story.

However easily my dad would get lost on the roads, he always found our way back to the docks without the least bit of trouble. I guess he was in his element on the water. I know he loved sailing and anything to do with water.

In the US, the fishing was much better. Once we caught a very large alligator gar and we weren't quite sure what to do with a fish that was almost as big as the boat we were in. So, we did what any "good" fisherman would do. We cut the line and let him go.

During another exploration, we were peacefully fishing when all the sudden the water started to recede. It was as if someone had pull the bottom plug of the bayou and let all the water out. I'm guessing it was the tide. All I know is that it wasn't very easy to get back to the boat rental place. We were continually hitting bottom, having to go around sand dunes, getting out of the boat and having to lift the boat off the bottom... remember, the alligator gar... well, we did. We were very cautious as we disembarked.

... a-fishing we will go - part two tomorrow...