Fishing with the Hermanator
The final days of my trip we were to fish with the legendary Herman Bain, who had been on several ESPN sports programs. Dan called him the Hermanator because he loved high speeds in the boat.
We drove to Red Bay, a forty five minute car ride through thick pine forest to the north end of Andros Island. As soon as we put the boat in the water Herman had the motor on full throttle and we suddenly were skimming over the water at fifty miles per hour.
As we shot across the ocean I could see huge white clouds reflecting in Herman’s polarized sunglasses. Due to the cloud cover he decided it was too dark and we should go to the Jolters where it remained cloudless for the rest of the day.
Dan wanted to wade so Herman poled me around various mangrove islands. At the end of one island he pointed out a huge school of bonefish. There were so many fish the water was vibrating from all the fins.
Herman poled me slowly to easy casting distance. I handed Herman Dan’s huge fly box and he selected a pink sparkly Bonecrusher. I quickly tied it on and laid out a lone line in front of the school of fish. As the fish came closer I took a deep breath. Strip strip strip stop strip WHAM! I was into a nitro powered flats ghost!
Hundreds of bonefish surrounded the boat as the fish made a long run. By the time I landed the five pounder the other fish had vanished into distant green water.
In the afternoon the Yamaha made an alarming cough and came to a halt miles from our take out. The fuel filter was full of sediment. We put the anchor down so the tide would not pull us out to the big deep blue.
After looking through all our flypacks we found pliers that Herman used to bypass the filter. Soon we were once again going fifty miles per hour, which we were happy to see. I should mention that I noticed Dan brought his tool box on the next trip out in the boat.
Herman got out his magic cell phone and called Junior, the local marine mechanic. He told him about our clogged fuel filter problems and made an appointment to meet him at Stafford Creek the next morning.
When we arrived at the appointed time the next day, Junior was waiting with his assistant in a small red car that was vibrating with hot Bahamas music. Wearing orange reflective sunglasses and an outboard motor company hat, Junior pulled the motor cover off and started unscrewing wires and carburetor parts. He put them in a bucket of gas while his assistant cleaned them.
As Junior worked he said, “Ya know last week I tried that Cialis. Wow, oh wow! Hand me that screwdriver. Oh yeah, Cialis. I” put a gold star on the crown of the guy who invented that stuff. Look at all the dirt in this valve. Let’s clean it. Oh, Cialis, I’m back, baby!”
After an hour of motor work and Cialis talk amid roaring laughter, the Yamaha came back to life. We gave it a long test run up and down the bay. Dan handed Junior dollars and he took off in a dusty Cialis purple haze.
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Copyright © Bern Sundell 2007. All Rights Reserved.
