Deep Sea Fishing

Yesterday I went deep-sea fishing with six other people from my trip including our director and it was one of the best days I’ve had this semester! Maxime Couque, a Frenchman, was our guide for the day.

            We woke up early to drive to Rossaveal, where the pier is. It was freezing cold out but Max assured us it was going to be a great day. I was a little nervous about being in such a small boat on the ocean because the past two times we’ve been on the sea on this trip, it was nauseating. Max was right it was a beautiful day. I’ve never seen the ocean so calm, it looked like Rainy Lake on a windless day and I would have been content to just be on the water. After about an hour boat ride, we dropped our lines to fish for Mackerel. Max said the fish could be anywhere so we should reel to the bottom and then slowly reel up. Kathy, our director, caught two fish right away! We had been skeptical of how many fish we would get since it was late October but from the start, it looked like we were going to do well. a few more Mackerel were caught and then we moved on to another location to fish for Pollock. We used the Mackerel to bait our lines and Max told us to go to the bottom, which was about 40 meters.

            The sun was shining and we were having a great time, everyone ended up catching a fish and Kate even caught a squid! We were not expecting to catch anything besides Pollock but when she reeled the squid up, it squirted water everywhere and unfortunately it let go right when it reached the surface. After she caught it, Max put a special lure on his line to catch squid and he got three of them all day. When he reeled them up we all had to stand back because they inked right away, it was unlike anything I’ve ever done!

            The most exciting part of the day for me was when I caught a shark! It was a dogfish and it was SO COOL! Like the squid, I was also not expecting to catch a shark but Max got a net and scooped it into the boat. Dogfish have really rough skin and I felt it but I was too afraid to hold it. Catching a shark was definitely the highlight of my day!

            After fishing a little more, we went to Inis Mor, one of the three Aran Islands, to have lunch. I was hungry so I got vegetable soup which is kind of weird here, it is pureed so it kind of feels like eating baby food. I also got a grilled ham and cheese with chips (fries). It was really good! We also had a few casuals and then hopped back on the boat to try and catch some more sharks called Spurdogs. I didn’t catch anything but a few other people caught a shark too!

            It was a great day, we all had a ton of fun and we got to go home and have fresh Pollock fillets for dinner.