Jamaica Bay, by Alexi

jamaica bay kayak fishing classic

new skyline

Steve and I went up to Jamaica Bay for the kayak fishing tournament.  It was three days of competition (with one pre-tournament prep day) and we fished all four days.  We camped out on the old Floyd Bennet air field strip.  It was strange being on a fishing trip in such a populated area, but the fishing was good. I believe that some of our east coast waterways are possibly healthier than they've been in eighty to a hundred years.  The industrial revolution really screwed things up, (in terms of water pollution) and recovery has been a slow and bumpy road. Recovery continues, but the sheer amount of fish at Jamaica Bay makes me hopeful.   I mean, here we are in N.Y.C. on a giant slab of concrete with 250 or so other guys that like to go out in floaty plastic boats and catch fish.  What a scene.
    I had a plan (as usual).  Catch fish using a new lure which as of yet has not worked for me... the tube-n-worm.  I wasn't so interested in winning because as I found out shortly before the tournament there were no prizes. At first this struck me as strange, what's a tournament without prizes?  But I grew to appreciate this aspect of the tournament.  If it were too competitive people might be inclined not to share information.  As it was I found little time for chatting with other kayakers either on the water or at the launch pad. We were there to catch fish and we did that when we weren't busy eating fish and drinking beer.

tube-n-worm-n-fish

    As per my plan, I found it worked well on the first day.  I didn't use the tube-n-worm exclusively because it's a trolling lure best used in weed free areas, and that's just not always available.  I used a gulp/ bucktail combo for a bit, and tried a kastmaster (my favorite for bluefish) too, but kept wanting to return to the tube-n-worm mostly for learning purposes.  I think that by Sunday I started to feel like I had worked out a bunch of kinks in regards to that lure.

home

Blue Fish

        The four days were a bit of a roller coaster ride, one day was good for me and bad for Steve, the next day the opposite.  But we each keyed in on certain techniques that worked best for us.  When we weren't fishing we were discussing fishing tactics.  This lends itself to a certain kind of debate.  We tend to discuss tactics almost endlessly, and sometimes act upon those discussions.   Other times the conditions (wind, current, depth, weeds) dictate what we do.   Steve had more success tossing soft plastics.  While it's true that I had my only bass that way, I was still more interested in trolling.  And we discussed this difference.
  At one point Steve had snagged a bunker and managed to drag it around for several hours with not even bump.  

Steve has a bent rod

     The fishing was good and exciting, and it proved difficult landing a 30 inch bluefish in the kayak and trying to successfully take a picture (while measuring it) and releasing it safely.  I found myself spending quite some time reviving a large bluefish, something I never imagined I would be doing.
     What exactly was the most interesting thing about this trip?  It wasn't the fishing.  It was the place.  The trash.  The neighbor with the generator that went on whenever.  The other neighbor, Dan who had the most camping gear I've ever seen, and in some ways, it was just right.  (He had been there all 9 years in the fly fishing division...kudos...) The old guy with the new Hobie he couldn't get on his truck by himself.   The people with their kids coming to walk along the most desolate wasteland of a shoreline.  The strange animal that ate our chips at night.  The way the sun rises and I try to remember a simple yoga routine I had just learned to give us the limberness required to turn around in a kayak after sitting in it for 14 hours straight.  All of this was quite amazing and wonderful.

When we left I was so beat I was actually dizzy.  Steve had won a new paddle as a raffle prize. Something he swore he never did.  I couldn't even wait until the end of the raffle.  We left before everyone.  I was out of gas, Steve was out of cigarettes and we needed to get the hell out of Jamaica Bay.  We may have left the tournament with a sour taste, like it was a waste of our time and energy, but a month from now we'll probably be talking about what we'll do for it next year,  to win.