Blue Highways: Somewhere on the Atlantic Ocean

Unfolding the Map

William Least Heat-Moon (LHM) leaves Ghost Dancing on the shore and goes out on a fishing trawler from Cape Porpoise, Maine for a day.  The interest in fishing, or at least the more dangerous aspects of it, has skyrocketed since the success of the reality TV show The Deadliest Catch.  Since one side of my family is a fishing family, it brings back a lot of memories and reminiscences for me.  Warning, my spot on the map is probably not accurate, but it will do.  To see the area where I think the Allison E. may have been trolling around, sail on over to the map.

Book Quote

"Four o'clock:  On the open sea.  Making ten knots, fast enough to raise a wake as high as the transom.  The forty-foot Allison E. rides up the swells and down the other side.  Up, down, up, down...

"Four-fifty:  Lights of Cape Porpoise gone from the horizon.  Eastern sky cold and gray.  Tom says, 'We can fish in a good year only about two hundred days.  Whatever income from dragging we'll earn, we've got to earn then.  We can't ever make up for a day lost...

"Five-thirty:  Rain stops.  Ten miles offshore and towing at three knots over an area in the Gulf of Maine known as Perkins Ground of Bigelow Bight.  Two hundred forty feet below on the mud, sand, and gravel, the net rouses bottomfish as they bump up into the 'sweep' and on back into the rear bag called the 'cod end.'

Eight o'clock:  Sun out....The weight of the net pulls the boat backwards until we are above it.  An aura of anticipation.  A crew gets paid only for its share of the catch.  There are no salaries."

Blue Highways:  Part 9, Chapter 3

Stern of a Cape Porpoise, Maine fishing trawler. Photo by Michael O'Brien and found on his Flickriver page. Click on photo to go to host page.Somewhere on the Atlantic Ocean

In my previous post, I made reference to going out on the ocean in a boat.  I would love to say that, given the fishing and oceangoing history of my family on my mother's side, I would take to the water.  Unfortunately, that has not been the case.

I have referred before to my uncles and perhaps to my grandfather.  They have all been fishermen.  My grandfather was originally a fisherman, and only left the sea for a while during the Great Depression when he became a logger and, when the logging wasn't good, worked for the Works Progress Administration.  His sons, Elwin and Bob, both became fishermen like their father.  My uncle Elwin fished halibut and other bottom fish on his boat Norcoaster much like is described by LHM on his time out on the Allison E. in Maine.  My uncle Bob, still fishing today in his 80s on his boat Kristy, concentrated on salmon and crab.  I remember when they would go out fishing, and the whole family waited for news - did Betty hear from Elwin or has anyone heard from Bob?  My aunt Betty communicated with uncle Elwin via a shortwave radio, as I believe my aunt Cecilia did with uncle Bob.

The lack of any major incidents on the high seas always masked the fact, to me at least, that fishing was tough, tough business.  I suppose I always thought of my uncles piloting their boats through pristine waters at all times.  Sure, other fishermens' boats sometimes sank, but not my uncles' boats.  Very occasionally, a fisherman would die.  But my uncles always came back from their trips.  I remember them often having good trips, and coming back with full holds.  Unlike the Allison E., whose captain tells LHM that the boat is too small to make overnight trips, my uncles would spend a week or more on the water.  They even took part at times in experiments conducted by the government, which paid fishermen to try new fishing techniques such as long-lining for tuna.  On those trips, they would fish their way across the Pacific to Hawaii and back.

As overfishing led to regulations in California, my uncles began to fish farther and farther from home, first off Oregon and Washington.  Uncle Elwin bought a home on the San Juan de Fuca Strait, and fished from there up to Alaska.  When the season went to a week, then down to three days, Uncle Elwin and his crew, which often included his son Bob and even his daughter Gina, cruised up to Alaska and then fished in deep and rough waters around the clock.  I have seen some of their home movies, showing enormous fish on the deck, and crew cutting and carrying them to the hold.

My uncle took my father fishing once or twice up to Alaska, in an attempt to dry him out and keep him away from the booze.  I think it worked as long as my father was on the boat.  When the trip was over, my father just went back to drinking again.  I thought about doing one of those trips myself, signing on as a crewmember with my uncle and earning some good money fishing.  I heard the stories about the poker games on board at night, after dinner and, if a crewmember was off duty, even some alcohol.  There were also stories about "exotic" fishing towns, rough bars, and lusty women.  I just had one small and minor problem.

I have always been prone to motion sickness.

I grew up in a small coastal town where the only way in and out was on winding, twisting roads.  As a child, these roads were torture to me.  We'd carry a coffee can lined with a plastic bag in the car so that I could puke in it as needed.  It took me until I was at least nine or ten years old before I could get past those roads with a reasonable chance of not vomiting.

While I outgrew my car sickness, I suppose I should have been surprised when I discovered, on a cruise vacation to Alaska that my family made on a Soviet cruise ship, that if I was inside and the ship rocked a little, I would get nauseated.  And if the ship rocked a lot, I would be full-flown seasick.

I thought the answer was being outside, on a boat's deck, in the fresh air.  A ferry trip across the San Juan de Fuca Strait from Victoria, British Columbia to Port Angeles, Washington led me into that little fallacy.  It was very windy and wavy, but I had a great time on the prow of the boat as it went up and down, up and down, like LHM describes.  The only time I had trouble was when I went inside, but as long as I was on the deck I had no symptoms at all.

But then, a whale watching expedition out of my hometown that I took with my wife dashed that belief.  On the deck of the little boat, I sat in the back, only occasionally glancing at the flukes and the spouts of the whales as the boat bobbed in the water matching the whales' speed.  I probably should have allowed myself to heave over the side, but instead, I held back the nausea and quietly rejoiced when we got back into port.

I'm afraid that I would not have made a good crewmember for my uncle unless I could have outgrown my seasickness the way that I outgrew my car sickness.  And until then, any fishing trips would have been torture.  I still think twice about taking a boat on the open water, just because I don't like feeling nauseated.  Given all the dangers of fishing, the inconvenience of seasickness seems like a small one, but my uncles always seemed larger than life to me - men who tamed the sea.  It's enough, and amazing to me that they tamed their inner ears and their stomachs while working an immensely dangerous occupation.

Musical Interlude

One of my favorite songs, is about Maine and fishing.  The song is called The Reach, by Dan Fogelberg, who lived in Maine and died of cancer only a few years ago.  At the end of the video, you can see him on the sailboat he owned in Maine, the Minstrel.

This next song is a whimsical one by Lyle Lovett called If I Had a Boat.  I don't know why I include it, except that I like how it mixes two things that are almost mutually exclusive - riding ponies on boats.

If you want to know more about the Maine fishing industry

Fishwatch - Maine Haddock
Historical Maine Commercial Marine Fisheries Landing Data
Maine Commercial Marine Fisheries
Mapping Maine's Commercial Fisheries
Saltwater Fishing in Maine
State of Marine Fisheries in Main 2008

Next up:  Boston, Massachussetts

Blue Highways: Quanicassee, Michigan

Unfolding the Map

I feel like carping on a few things in this post.  Okay, I'm really going to be carping on carp, while also reflecting on my lack of enthusiasm for fishing.  All of this, in context of Blue Highways, takes place near Quanicassee, Michigan.  Drop some bait on the map and see if you can hook Quanicassee's location.

Book Quote

"Near Quanicassee, canals draining the wet land to make farming possible flanked the highway.  In the ditches, mile after mile, violent flashes of polished bronze roiled the murky water.  I stopped to see what it was.  The hot, muddy banks frothed with the courtship of eighteen-inch carp.  Males, flicking Fu Man Chu mustaches, metallic scales glittering like fragments of mirrors, orange tails thrashing, did writhing belly rolls over females as they demonstrated the right of their milt to prevail."

Blue Highways: Part 7, Chapter 15

Framework and Chimney. Photo of an abandoned house in Quanicassee, Michigan taken by The Gallopping Geezer and hosted at Flickr. Click on photo to go to host site.Quanicassee, Michigan

I was never much of a fisherman.  I remember taking a fishing pole and some fish eggs down to the river at some property we owned in Northern California and sitting and trying to get the fish to bite.  The fish were river trout, and they were small fish.  I remember that when I hooked them, pulling them out of the water was always interesting because they went from a greenish color in the water to gray and silver in the air.  They always seemed to be bigger in the air than in the water too.  I would watch them gasp for breath as I removed the hook and then I'd throw them back because rarely did we get a large trout in the river.

Lately I'm reminded how little interest I really had in fishing, which might seem strange since I have two uncles who were commercial fisherman, another uncle who was a sport fisherman, and a brother-in-law who likes to fish both ocean and fresh water.  I just never got into it, which is funny since I'm a relatively introverted person and fishing is a somewhat solitary pasttime.  It's an activity that encourages an inner-life in some people, and a zen-like calming solitude in others.  But it's never been my thing.

Which again is funny, because I love eating fish.  I think that there's nothing better than fresh fish, especially if the bones are removed and you can really enjoy the meat without picking needle-like bones out of your mouth.  I'm relatively picky about my fish, and my mother even more so.  For her, fish had to be so fresh it had to be almost wiggling on your plate.  Any fish that had a hint of fish taste for her was bad fish.  While I can get by with fish that has been flash frozen, for her that's an extreme no-no.

Nor did I ever get interested in other things about fish.  I never had an aquarium, and never learned much about the types of fish, fresh and saltwater, that live in the world.  I enjoyed looking at fish in aquariums, but never truly considered taking it up as a hobby.

Yet fish are a huge part of our existence.  Our evolution may mean that we are ultimately descended from fish-like creatures that crawled tentatively out onto the sand and ultimately adapted.  Fish have been a staple food source for eons of human diets.  Some of our most compelling stories have been about fish.  Jonah may have been swallowed by a "great fish" or whale depending on how one interprets the text.  Aphrodite and Eros, in escaping the terrible god Typhon, either turned into two fish and swam away or were saved by two fish whose images were immortalized in the constellation Pisces.  Jesus fed a multitude by multiplying loaves and fishes, and exhorted his apostles to be "fishers of men."  In an Indian story, Manu was instructed on how to save himself from the great flood by a fish.  Beautiful mermaids, half woman and half fish, are said to lure men to their watery doom. 

I knew that goldfish and koi, types of carp, are considered to be important symbols in Japanese and Chinese culture.  In Japanese legend the carp was the only fish strong enough to swim to the top of the waterfall where it then became a dragon.  Therefore, in Japanese culture, the carp symbolizes strength, bravery and going against the current as well as the benefits of attaining one's goal.  In Chinese and Japanese culture goldfish and koi, both members of the carp family, are used, either in the form of paintings or with their physical inclusion in environmental surroundings, as elements leading to what the Chinese consider good Feng Shui.  Koi represented in a home symbolizes the desire for more happiness, better success, prosperity, good fortune and energy.

Unfortunately, Asian carp in the United States are now a pest.  Originally imported by Southern farmers to clean their ponds, these invasive species have been multiplying and adversely affecting the environment.  They can be dangerous too.  One species of Asian carp, the silver carp, is easily frightened by boats and leaps high out of the water as they pass by.  It has been known to cause injuries to boaters.  Here's a montage of some people trying to bowhunt Asian Carp as they jump out of the water.  It can be pretty frightening, as you can see, because these flying projectiles can really hurt a person.

It's ironic that in the U.S., carp, a fish that is seen in Asia as lending balance and harmony to life, is such an agent of imbalance in our environment.  It is literally screwing up our national Feng Shui.  Furthermore, it is maintaining its symbolism for strength and meeting goals in the worst possible way.  How did this happen?

It happened like everything else that is besetting the embattled fish populations of our world.  We, humans, are the ones that put everything out of balance.  In the oceans, we are overfishing as sushi has become a must-have food in the United States and elsewhere.  That overfishing has led to entire salmon seasons along the West Coast of the United States to be severely restricted if not canceled some years.  Five of the eight species of tuna are feared to be in danger of extinction.  We have, sometimes with good intentions, introduced non-native species like Asian carp into rivers and streams in an attempt to accomplish some good, but the lack of natural enemies has let those populations explode and crowd out the native species. 

Somehow, humans need to discover that our actions affect the balance, the Feng Shui, of the world for better or for worse.  Is there a way that we can meet our goals and be strong, like the carp that scaled the waterfall and turned into a dragon, but also create balance and harmony, like the koi?

Musical Interlude

The musical interludes in this post are all about my sister Pauline.  She was a big fan of this first song, Fisherman's Blues by The Waterboys.

She is also a very close friend of Chi Cheng, the bassist of The Deftones who seriously injured with traumatic brain injury in a car accident.  Though I've never met Chi, my inclusion of this song, Street Carp, co-written by Chi, is dedicated to him and hopes that he will recover.

If you want to know more about Quanicassee

Wikipedia: Wisner Township

Next up: Caseville and Port Austin, Michigan

Blue Highways: Depoe Bay, Oregon

Unfolding the Map

We get into the nitty-gritty of fishing and fishermen, amid the sound of buoys.  In Depoe Bay, I find a lot to compare with my hometown.  And, you get some sentimental feelings about my uncles who were fishermen.  Fishing is a declining occupation in the United States, fast becoming a piece of America that was.  To see where Depoe Bay sits on Oregon's shores, a map is at your disposal.

Book Quote

"A high concrete-arch bridge crossed a narrow zigzag cleft on an inlet leading to a small harbor under the cliffs.  Depoe Bay used to be a picturesque fishing village; now it was just picturesque.  The fish houses, but for one seasonal company, were gone, the fleet gone, and in their stead had come sport fishing boats and souvenir ashtray and T-shirt shops.  In Depoe Bay the big fish now was the tourist, and, like grunion, its run was a seasonal swarming.

"....I went down to the harbor, slipped past the Coast Guard station, and pulled up at the wharf....Cold wind stirred the surf, but the little harbor lay quiet.  I heard laughter and a card game on a boat, and from out in the Pacific came the deep-throated dolor of sonobuoys groaning in their chains (seamen say) the agony of drowned sailors."

Blue Highways: Part 6, Chapter 4

Bridge at Depoe Bay, Oregon. Photo by BubbaB0y at the Tripadvisor site. Click on photo to go to site.Depoe Bay, Oregon

Two things stand out to me in the end of this chapter in Blue Highways.  First some setting.  LHM pulls into Depoe Bay and describes it as in the first paragraph above.  Then he finds a restaurant and talks to a local or two.  One guy gives him an earful on how things have changed in the town's main economic activities.  The man has a sport fishing boat where he takes tourists out on the Pacific to fish.  He used to be a commercial fisherman, but overfishing and regulations have killed the commercial fishing industry.  After talking with the man about how the "new fish" are now tourists looking to spend their money, LHM finds a place to pull up his van and sleep down by the wharf, lulled to sleep by the low moan of buoys.

This story is so familiar.  This tragic tale of lost livelihood is one that just missed two of my uncles, one of whom fished almost until he died, and the other who is still fishing.  This conversion of a town's economy over to tourism is the story of my hometown, which lasted longer in its blue-collar ways than Depoe Bay but eventually fell to the same forces.

My grandfather on my mother's side was a fisherman and a lumberman.  He fished when fishing was good, and went logging when it wasn't.  He owned his own boat, and taught his sons how to fish.  They fished out of a little harbor, Noyo, near Fort Bragg, California.  The description of Depoe Bay's harbor could just as easily be that of my hometown.  Back then, there was a fishing fleet, and in the morning you would see the line of boats heading out to sea.  It might take an hour for them all to leave.  In the evening that line of boats came back into harbor.

Fishing is a rough life.  You put up with the vagaries of the catch, the unpredictability of the weather and the water, the rough work of putting out your lines or your pots and then hauling them back in, hoping for a catch.  The work is cold and wet because the ocean is cold and wet.  In Depoe Bay, farther north than my town, the water probably feels even colder.  Fisherman's wives constantly prayed that their husbands and sons would come back safely

By the time fishing was taken over by my grandfather's sons, my mother's brothers, it was starting to get sketchy.  In California, the catch started getting smaller and smaller.  The U.S. territorial waters, once only 3 miles offshore, was extended to 12 miles in an effort to keep foreign fish factories sent by the Japanese and Russians from taking the catch.  Unfortunately, even this was not enough.  I noticed, even when I was young, that my uncles were fishing farther away from our town.  One uncle made regular trips up to the Oregon and Washington coasts.  Another uncle moved up to a town on the San Juan de Fuca strait in Washington and used that as a springboard to run up to Alaska.  The fishing seasons kept getting shorter, and the permits harder to get.  When the halibut season was reduced to 24 hours of fishing, my uncle Elwin would run his boat up from Washington to Alaska and they would fish 24 hours straight, hopefully fill their holds, and then make the run back to an Alaskan town to sell the fish.  My uncle Bob, now in his eighties, still takes his boat out to fish salmon, and has taken it as far as Hawaiian waters.

Of course, when you're in a 60 foot fishing boat, you are nothing more than a speck upon the huge ocean, and the farther out on that huge ocean you are, the more chances that something might go wrong.  Fishermen are always staving off the hand of Davy Jones, who wants to pull them down into the coldness and darkness of the briny deep.  I believe that every fisherman's wife breathes a sigh of relief when her husband decides to hang up his lines and retire.

Another uncle, Rusty, who worked in the lumber industry all his life, bought a small boat in his retirement and took it out regularly to fish.  He had also been taught to fish by his Italian speaking father.  Some years, Rusty filled his freezer with salmon.  But some years, there were no salmon and some years, there wasn't even a season.  Now, there's fewer seasons than non-seasons, leaving many frustrated and angry.  Now, Rusty's boat sits in a garage.

My town used to have a fishing fleet.  Now, our once vibrant harbor is mostly quiet.  Only a few boats leave in the morning, and only a few return in the evening.  My mom, who once got regular supplies of salmon, crab and halibut from her brothers, and who won't eat a fish unless it's s fresh that its practically wiggling on her plate, is getting fewer chances to have a good fish meal.  Where once the sound of boat engines and water rushing over many bows almost drowned out the moan of the buoys, now a silence reigns except for that low wail, so eloquently described by LHM as the agony of a drowning man.  At night, when the fog pulls in and everything fades into a monochrome, you can still sonorous moan of the buoys, their sad song almost, but not quite, conjuring up the sounds of a fishing village's past.

Musical Interlude

I'm dedicating this post to my Uncle Elwin, who died a few years ago after a struggle with prostate cancer.  He was a fisherman all his life, and a nice and generous guy to boot.  His boat, the Norcoaster, was known from California to Alaska.  The song, Fisherman's Dream by Capercaille, always reminds me of him and brings a tear to my eye when I hear it.

If you want to know more about Depoe Bay

Depoe Bay Chamber of Commerce
Go Northwest: Depoe Bay
Lincoln City News Guard (newspaper)
Little Whale Cove: Depoe Bay
Oregon Coast Visitors Association: Depoe Bay
Wikipedia: Depoe Bay

Next up: Haystack Rock, Oregon