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We had left conception island at three in the morning to put us into San Salvador in time to meet my buddy Mike’s plane, we pulled into the now familiar anchorage, dropping the hook down just as a large commercial jet passed overhead in the midday sun. Not bad timing for dodging storms and traveling over a 120 nm to get back to this point. By the time we had the dingy lowered, Mike was just getting to the dock after hitching a ride from the airport.
Mike is one of my oldest friends, having grown up together in Chicago and both having found our way to Florida after that. The one thing that bonded us above all (at least of the stories we can tell in good company) was our addiction to all things fishing, and then Spearfishing. Somehow, we now found ourselves on a remote island that jutted up out of the great depths of the ocean to create a sport fisherman’s dream. We’d come a long way from fishing the local ponds for bluegill and largemouth bass off our bicycles in Illinois.

The weather wasn’t perfect but we immediately hit the water to check out the reefs. Mike was borrowing one of my Gatku pole spears and he practiced by missing big grouper after big grouper. I think the Indian was having a tough time adjusting to this particular arrow but that would eventually change in a big way. We retired back to the boat early, caught up on old times and got ready for the next day ahead. It was supposed to be a beauty and we had big plans.

Chasing Wahoo in the wild waters north of San Salvador

The ocean was glass and we skipped across the surface at full throttle, the 10 ft dingy was packed with gear, gas, food and bait for the day. The day is warming after an hour of running, I slow down and turn on my recently installed depth finder. As we suit up, I watch the screen for the ledge. The depth drops from 200 ft to 500 ft in an instant,

“You ready?!”

“Yea buddy!”

Mike replies as he swings his legs and fins out of the dingy into the water. The brown missile darts out! Slapping against Mike’s fins and breaking the surface.

“Holy hell!” Mike shrieks

We’re not even in the water yet and we’ve nearly have our first shark attack. The 6 ft reef shark continues to circle with menace.

Mike brings his feet in, I lower the flashers, (a string of lures attached to a buoy) to a depth of 30 ft and the shark follows. That gives us enough space to hop in and access the situation.

Immediately greeted not by one but three reef sharks, darting back and forth, excited to have visitors in their water. The eager sharks need to be poked away multiple times with the tips of our pole spears, back to back, we drift through with the current till we hit the shallower water and the sharks leave us alone.

“Well that didn’t go as planned”

I state the obvious as we hop in the dingy. I motor us a little ways away and try again, while not as aggressive as the first batch, we’re still surrounded by sharks and no wahoo on the next try.

After a couple drifts with all sharks and no wahoo I was getting a bit weary of this spot. Once again, I motor away a short distance and we hop in. Finally with no sharks in sight, I settle into the third drift. I grab some chum and let it drift off into the deep blue surrounding the flashers. Minutes pass as I breath up for a dive, I’m just about to dive when I get that feeling.

I look up to see a pair of monster wahoo cruising on the surface right towards me, my heart skips a beat and its all I can do to look away and pretend I didn’t see them. The only way to get close to these fish is to use their natural curiosity, I steal a glance and see they are getting close. With a quick prayer, I close my eyes and move as smoothly as possible to dive below the water, leveling with the wahoo, I see that they have been disturbed enough to halt their approach 15 ft away, swimming parallel. With a speargun I’d have a shot at the 80 lb wahoo, but with a pole spear he’s just out of range. As hard as it is, I swim away back towards the flashers and chum. This counterintuitive move triggers their curiosity and they’re following me now, just what I hoped. If they start feeding on the chum, we’ll get a chance. As I’m swimming towards the chum, Mike finally spots the wahoo. Not one to pass on a shot, he swims past me and right towards the wahoo. It spots Mike late and it turns broadside, giving Mike a beautiful chance. He doesn’t waste it… the Gatku pole spear powers through the slender fish, the slip tip toggles into a place and it takes off like a rocket. As it disappears the float it’s connected to whips into action and gets towed towards the distance, Mike has the line in his hand though so I hop in to chase him in the dingy. To my surprise Mike joins me in the dingy,
“Didn’t think it’d be that strong, ripped it from my hands.” Mike explains
“Well let’s hurry and get it before the sharks do!!” I reply.
It takes painful seconds to get the dingy started and the flashers in, full throttle, I race after the buoy that’s 300 yards away now. Pulling up to it, Mike jumps in,
“get it in fast!” I yell as he goes.
I quickly follow with my polespear ready for a backup shot. As I enter the water, I see Mike hauling on the line and only one reef shark in sight, we stand a chance if Mike hurries! From the depths the wahoo appears, struggling against the line. You can see it is spent and the shot is good, only a race to beat the sharks. For thrilling seconds it looks like they haven’t found the scent and Mike pulls the wahoo closer, only 60 ft down… then a second reef shark appears, and a third, fourth, fifth…. oye, only one hope now. I take a full breath, heart pounding, I dive down. If I can reach the wahoo before the sharks bite, I can scare them away. I kick hard, my heart racing is taking away my oxygen, 20 ft, 30 ft down I go, wahoo is only 20 ft away but the sharks are swarming. One goes for it, its teeth hitting home as it rips into the great wahoo’s tail, that’s all it takes. The small bite starts the feeding frenzy, the reef sharks rip into the wahoo without inhibition now, tumbling over one another for the feast. I’ve got no business in the water anymore so I head for the surface. It’s all I can do to hop in the dingy and catch the rest of the frenzy with my GoPro. We’re disappointed as the sharks finish off the last bit of the once majestic fish but no one said this was going to be easy…

we reorganize, move to another spot and keep at it, we see plenty of wahoo all day and get a couple more chances but we never connect again. The sharks keep us constant companions throughout the day making things tough, even a fleeting visit from a nine ft tiger shark, too cool!! In the midst of all this madness, with sharks all around and danger at every turn, I had a sudden onset of worry for Alyssa. Whom I had left at home with just a paddleboard to get into town. This feeling never left me all day after that.

We go home empty handed. It’s likely our only chance at the wahoo of San Salvador with the weather coming up but it’s hard to feel sorry as we race the sunset on our twelve mile trip back to our boat. It’s been an incredible day battling the monsters of the deep, one that won’t be forgotten soon. Alyssa is happy to see us home safely and greets us with sundowners to soothe our fish less arrival. I’m just as happy to see her with that nagging feeling I had… then I see the bandages! Apparently a coral wall she was walking on had given way and she’d had a good bit of a fall. With a nasty scratch on her shoulder and leg and a knock on her head to prove it. Oye, intuition had proved right but Alyssa was already nursing herself back to health in good spirits.
Read on next time to hear about adding a new crew member, a bloody departure, and a lovely sail to Rum Cay!!

Safely tucked into Joe’s sound, I set anchor and enjoyed a beer after my adventure. One beer has a way of making me very social. A couple sips in and I had lowered the dingy and headed over to my neighboring sailboat. Moments before, I’d seen them arrive in what seemed a dingy parade. Two dingies going to the other two sailboats, and one headed to a houseboat tucked away in the prettiest spot of a stunning anchorage. I was social but not too ambitious so I went to the closest sailboat. They were French Canadians and they explained in broken English that they had just come from town and that the man in the houseboat had shown them the way between some tricky shallows. We talked a little, I gave them some Mahi. The best line of the night was that they were told anyone going through Joe’s sound cut was either very experienced or crazy… so after drinking to the fact that we were all crazy I bid them adieu and went home to Heritage.

The next morning I had to meet up with Alyssa, if all went as planned, she would fly into Long Island and I’d meet her around ten. I just had to find my way into town and pick out a meeting point a cab driver could find. Not knowing my way, I set off in the dingy but made a call to the houseboat before I left the sound in hopes of some good directions. As I approached on my dingy through the aqua blue water, a voice boomed out good morning. Slowly the shape on the two story houseboat came into focus and I was introduced to Patrick,

“I heard you might know the way into town, my fiancé is flying in and I’ve got to find a spot to meet her, some directions would be great!”

“Say no more” Patrick replied.

Patrick disappears into his houseboat only to emerge a moment later hopping into his dingy, he pulls the motor to life and starts off, “follow me!”

It’s all I can do to throw the motor to full throttle and catch up to the wake Patrick is throwing. He expertly weaves through the shallows he must know like the back of his hand… the water is so clear that in 2 ft of water it appears your motoring through the sandy bottom and 6″ of water looks all the same, so easy enough to leave yourself high and dry hitting bottom. Weaving through the shallows, the water gives way to 5 ft of depth and Patrick slows down.

“See the hill about a mile away, on the right side is a dock you can tie up to, its deep till you get there. About a ten minute walk from there to the MGS store, biggest spot in town, have your girl tell the cabbie to meet you there,”

“Can’t thank you enough, was just hoping for a kick in the right direction, that was way more help than necessary!”

“No worries, as the unofficial mayor of Joe’s sound I consider it my duty and when I heard it was for love, I had no choice!” Patrick states.

I tip my cap and take off for town knowing that a couple drinks was in our future between the mayor and myself. His directions lead me to the mgs store, a fine grocery store about 30ft long x 20 ft wide  that even had a couple pieces of fresh fruit!! A rarity for us this past month. I bought some $12 grapes, chatted with the friendly locals and waited for Alyssa.

My lovely fiancé arrived once more, two and a half days somehow had seemed a long time. The cabbie gave us a ride to the dingy and I impressed with my newly acquired knowledge of the shallows on the ride back. Weaving in between the white sand banks, and ending with a whoosh as the dingy came off plane into the turquoise water of Joe’s sound. If this anchorage didn’t impress Alyssa I knew I should give up then and there but luckily the look on her face told me I wasn’t dreaming and that we were anchored in paradise.

We spent the day catching up on each other’s adventures, napping between paddle board sessions and getting the boat ready for the storm that was coming late that night. Earlier, I had paddled to the houseboat and invited Patrick over for Sundowners, now he made the 30 second commute to our boat just as the sun was dipping below the tree line blocking our proper view. He clamors into our smaller cockpit with a gift, “try a swig of this, the game warden makes it!” Can’t say no as he passes the small bottle of moonshine. It burns going down but better than expected for an out Island concoction. The moonshine sets the tone for the night as I find myself cracking into nice whiskey for myself and Rum for Patrick. As we toss quite a few back he tells us of his writing for the NY Times, his summer work sailing an 80 ft wooden ship and how he came to find himself in Joe’s Sound on a houseboat. Alyssa makes some wonderful spaghetti squash and the storytelling goes on well into the night. It’s not until a strong gust reminds us a storm is coming and that it’d be best for Patrick to get while the getting is good.

It’s not ten minutes after Patrick leaves that the front hits full force, cutting rain and enough wind to heel Heritage over while she’s sitting at anchor. Safely tucked in at Joe’s sound we don’t even feel a ripple in the water as the winds reach 45 kts and it’s easy sleeping as the storm rages!

As the sun came up the next morning the wind was still howling outside and thankfully our anchors (three to be exact) had us planted in the deep water as the current came racing through the cut. Alyssa went up to have her coffee and watch the sunrise, her shrieking woke me fully and I hopped up to see what all the commotion was about. Up on top she spotted a little “stow-away”, a small manatee that was taking refuge in the lee of our boat. As the current ripped through, the manatee floated along using our boat to cut the current. He must’ve had the same idea to wait out the storm in Joe’s sound and we were happy to have the friendly company. He hung around a half hour before the intrepid explorer (Supposedly only about 15 manatee in the Bahamas, so he must be quite the adventurer to get all the way out here) left for other waters. We pass the rest of the day playing board games and baking fresh bread, not too exciting but nice to have a storm day to recoup every once in a while.

We spend a last day in Joe’s sound enjoying the calm after the storm. Patrick’s girlfriend has arrived from Norway and he invites us over for some fresh Conch and sundowners. The houseboat has windows everywhere and must’ve been a hell of a view for the storm or any day for that matter. On the second floor, standing on the picnic table, we were just able to see the sun setting over the pine trees, catching a green flash as the last of the sun hit the sea! We say goodbye and it’s only been three days but Joe’s Sound has left a hell of an impression and can’t help but think of all the windows on the world. The mayor of Joe’s sound has certainly found himself one of the most beautiful.

At high tide the next day we navigate the very tricky cut without incident and are off for Conception Island. An uninhabited island protected as a national park. The conditions are just right and we enjoy an easy sail and afternoon exploring the shell swept beaches of Conception. Not much I can say about the island that pictures can’t do better so I’ll let them tell the story.

The next day we’re off to San Salvador to meet my friend Mike who is flying in for a chance to spear the giant Wahoo out there. Tune in next time to hear about our sharky adventures!