Robson Green - Extreme Fishing

Also by Robson Green

Robson Green: Just the Beginning

First published in Great Britain by Simon & Schuster UK Ltd, 2013
A CBS COMPANY

Copyright IWC Media Limited (a Zodiak Media Company) 2013

This book is copyright under the Berne Convention.
No reproduction without permission.
All rights reserved.

The right of Robson Green to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with sections 77 and 78 of the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.

Simon & Schuster UK Ltd
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Simon & Schuster Australia, Sydney
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A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library

Hardback ISBN: 978-1-47112-748-9
Trade Paperback ISBN: 978-1-47112-803-5
Ebook ISBN: 978-1-47112-750-2

Typeset by M Rules
Printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd, Croydon, CR0 4YY

I dedicate this book to my beautiful son Taylor and to my Uncle Matheson who gave me everything I needed to know about Fishing Robson

To my darling High Tower, Mom & Pops, Mo Granny and Robson Charlotte

May 2008

Im in the mid-Atlantic, off the coast of the Azores, powering through the waves on a high-tech fishing yacht. South African Captain Ian Carter and shipmate Steve Hall are taking me on a deep-sea adventure in pursuit of the Holy Grail of game fish, the Atlantic blue marlin. The sun is warm, birds are flying high in the sky above, and dolphins are leaping just metres from the boat. Conditions are perfect for catching a billfish and Ian tells me Im here at exactly the right time, when the Gulf Stream brings the marlin within striking distance.

Weve been motoring across the ocean for four and half hours and at last were approaching our destination. Ian slows down and we put out squid lures at the back of the boat and begin to trawl. The vibrations of the boat should help attract marlin and maybe, just maybe, one will take the bait. We trawl and we trawl but nothing is going for our lures. The hours tick by. Unlike our reels, everyone is at full tension.

Suddenly, Steve tells Ian to change course. He can smell fish. I sniff the air; I cant smell a bloody thing. I sniff again: nope, nothing. Ian swings the boat round and heads west. Steve points at a small slick of oil on the water; were going to head straight through it. Its a sign that something is feeding on bait fish, possibly sardines or mackerel. Were closing in on our target. I ask Steve for some advice in case I am lucky enough to hook a blue.

He is a man of few words. He says, in his North Carolina drawl, Ill be watching from the corner of my eye. Ill say Go to the chair, and you go. Just take your time and dont go all scrambled egg, do you know what I mean?

Right, got it. No, actually I havent. What the hell does that mean?

About twenty minutes later, and with little time left on the clock before we have to return, one of the reels starts making a loud whirring sound, like a primitive yawn. We are in! The line is taken out at high speed, 200 metres or more.

Hold me glasses. Hold me glasses! I say, panicking and flapping like the actor I am. My heart is pounding as I click on the harness and take the rod. The fight is immensely powerful. It must be a marlin but Im not certain. I am yanked forward violently and swung round in the chair. I lean back with all my might, release and reel, ten to the dozen. And very slowly I begin to bring the fish closer to the boat. But soon it turns and runs again, stripping the line out another 150 metres.

Please, please stay on the line. I beg you to stay on the line, I say.

Relax, says Steve, but that is impossible right now.

I wind as fast as I can without letting the line go slack, otherwise I could lose the fish. Think positive, Robson. My muscles are burning and my arms feel as if they are going to drop off. Ian is backing up the boat to help me. I am hard-boiled, not scrambled. Hard! I shout at myself internally, like a fishing coxswain. Come on, Robson. Come on! I fight with all my might for fifty minutes, winding and pulling, when suddenly a 500-pound blue marlin bursts though the crest of a wave, piercing the sky with her spear.

She is the most amazing creature I have ever seen. Her body is midnight blue with a silvery white belly and faint cobalt stripes on her side. I am awe-struck. Makaira nigricans, the black sword of the Atlantic (in Latin, machaera is a sword and nigricans means becoming black). She is the reason we have come here and its taken only a matter of hours to find her. It took poor old Santiago eighty-five days to catch a marlin in Hemingways The Old Man and the Sea. Our budget just wouldnt stretch to that.

Jaded, I slowly reel in my beautiful fish. She is tired, too. Steve grabs the line and pulls her to the side of the boat. For this to count as a catch, he needs to get hold of the last bit of the filament, called the leader, which connects the line on the rod and reel to the hook. We cant bring the fish on board as the species is not only protected but also seriously dangerous. Steve leans out and grips the leader with his right hand and smiles at me. We have officially caught an Atlantic blue marlin.

We all stand and stare silently at the magnificent fish moving with the waves at the side of the boat. With a gloved hand, Steve carefully bills the fish by firmly grasping her spear so she cant injure anyone. Marlin use their bills to slash and kill schools of fish before they feed and they have been known to spear boats and the odd fisherman, too, including one woman I read about on the Internet who was pierced through the chest when a marlin leapt onto the boat. The only thing that saved her was her breast implant. Perhaps Katie Price should be doing this show instead of me. After all, she is better equipped.

I run my hand across the marlins back and say goodbye. Steve unhooks her and releases the bill. Capable of swimming at up to 68 m.p.h., she is gone in a matter of seconds. Everyone is pumped with emotion and adrenalin; the marlin was truly astonishing and her magic lingers. We hug and engage in male back-slapping.

Dont forget to breathe, says Steve.

We return to shore, the marlin flag upside down to show weve caught and released an Atlantic blue today. I am a hero and this episode is a triumph except that this is television and our fishing adventure hasnt been quite as clear-cut as it would seem.

In reality, we have just pulled off a miracle at the eleventh hour. The show was on the verge of being cancelled and my career well and truly down the pan. Extreme Fishing could have been my second Vietnam, the first being my singing career with Jerome. Director Ian Lilley and I hug each other out of pure relief. He goes back to projectile vomiting off the side of the boat, which he and his assistant, Anna Hassan, have been doing for the past few days. I have done most of the filming myself, by fixing the camera to the side of the boat and talking into it. Its the eighth day of a disastrous trip and we are all exhausted. Catching the blue marlin has pulled us back from the brink and its all thanks to one extraordinary man, Steve: The Man Who Can Smell Fish.