What do a clothespin, a bottle of cheap rum, a section of shock cord, and a pair of gloves all have in common? They’re all essential parts of Calypso’s offshore fishing gear!

We like fresh fish as much as the next person, and catching it ourselves adds some spice to sailing life. After some experimentation with rods and reels, we’ve settled on a much lower tech option: we use a hand reel. It’s a plastic yoyo-looking contraption that we pair with around 120’ of 200 pound nylon line. 

Our lure collection has been pretty well decimated over the years and we haven’t yet spent time restocking it. The basic concept though is to slide a colorful “skirt” over a 2 or 3-pronged hook; this combination is connected to a length of wire leader that in turn is attached to the line.

At the other end of the line is a four foot length of shock cord (bungy cord). This gets looped around our boom gallows post and is the anchor for the whole set up. The clothespin? It’s tied onto the shock cord at about the 3’ mark and is used to loop the cord back to itself. When a fish hits the line, it snaps the clothespin with a loud SNAP that serves as our alarm. The shock cord allows the fish to play the line with stretch.

Ready to fish? Unspool the line into the water (we fish only when we’re off soundings, to try to avoid catching barracuda), lure end first, making sure you’ve attached the shock cord end to something on the boat. Fasten the alarm and go about your business, waiting for the SNAP and the “FISH ON!”

Oh. The gloves. Put them on to pull the line in, hand over hand. Don’t bother trying to re-stow the line on the reel while you’re actually pulling in a fish as that takes too much time and finesse when the adrenaline is pumping. 

Landing the fish? A gaff helps. Otherwise, it’s a jerk up and swing the fish into the cockpit (or onto the side deck, or into the dinghy) - and really hope it doesn’t flick itself off the line in the process. (Unless it’s a barracuda. Then you’re hoping it flicks itself off so you don’t have to come anywhere near those nasty teeth.)

And the rum? Not for toasting your excellent luck (you want much better rum than that) but for killing the fish. Splashing alcohol into the gills will kill the fish pretty fast and hopefully humanely. We use cheap vodka if we have it, but here in the Caribbean rotgut rum is inexpensive and widely available.

Bon appetit!