Fishing With Ray……A Day I’ll Never Forget

After leaving the wonderful world of being a fishing guide in 2001, I entered the corporate side of the marine industry. Within a few short weeks, I found myself traveling across the country, heading to airports or driving toward the next challenge of the week. It was a great career and still tied to the water, but without the fishing. Even when I took the job, my plan was to keep fishing at the same blistering pace I had maintained for the previous five years. My new boss told me that wouldn’t be a problem. He was wrong.

In reality, my fishing stopped completely. Between time on the road and in the air, I rarely made it on the water. My downtime was spent with family, catching up on chores, and too often still working. Even weekends weren’t safe. My beautifully restored 1976 Shamrock sat quietly in the slip, waiting for a trip that never came.

After several months of this fast-paced but frustrating routine, I had enough. One afternoon around 3:00, I shut down the laptop, put my phone on vibrate, grabbed a spinning rod and a small tackle bag, and headed to the marina. I was determined to disappear from corporate America, even if only for a few hours. The early fall weather was perfect, 73 degrees with a light southwest breeze.

I stepped aboard and gave the boat a once-over. It had been sitting, but everything checked out. I backed her out of the slip and idled across the Intracoastal Waterway toward Wrightsville Beach Marina for fuel and ice. At the dock, I was greeted by Sam, the ever-smiling dockmaster. We exchanged a few words, I paid for the fuel, grabbed a bag of ice, and picked up a Diet Coke from the vending machine. Finally, I was ready.

I fired the engine and listened closely, the steady thump of the Chevy inboard sounding like an idling Harley. I eased away from the dock, the Velvet Drive transmission humming smoothly beneath me, and slipped into the ICW toward Motts Channel for my first cast of the day. Just past the marina and behind Motts Channel Seafood, I spotted an oyster bed where I had seen others fish before. Quietly, I anchored in about three feet of water, perfectly positioned.

I started casting a plastic bait into a small creek, careful to avoid the razor edges of the oysters. After several empty casts, I shifted my attention to the channel. On the second turn of the reel, I felt a tap, then another, followed by a heavy, steady pull. I eased the drag, knowing immediately this was something different. This fish wasn’t fast, it felt like a slow-moving bulldozer beneath the surface.

For the next 45 minutes, we battled. I would gain line, then lose it. The fight moved up and down Motts Channel as boats slowed to watch, wondering what I had hooked. I couldn’t pull anchor to give chase, so I stayed put, locked in the fight. Eventually, the fish moved toward the MarineMax docks and wrapped the line around a piling. Just like that, it was over. The line snapped.

I stood there for a moment, staring at the water where my opponent had just been. Gone. I walked back to the helm, dropped onto the bolster seat, and started laughing. Over the years, I’ve caught a massive Bluefin Tuna off the Carolina coast, big Redfish in Louisiana, and Wahoo and Mahi in the Florida Keys, but the best fight of my life happened on a Thursday afternoon in October, just a few hundred feet from my dock. And it wasn’t a trophy fish. It was a stingray, a so-called trash fish, four feet wide with the strength of a Georgia mule.

I put the rod in the holder, fired up The Reel Article, pulled anchor, and eased back toward the dock. I had only been gone a little over an hour, but it was an hour I’ll never forget. Driving home, I realized something had changed. The stress that had been riding on my shoulders was gone, replaced with a sense of calm and perspective I hadn’t felt in months.

Since that day, I’ve told that story many times. Now, I just call him “my friend Ray.” That fight wasn’t about the fish, it was a reminder to slow down and make room for the little things, because sometimes those are the moments that stay with you the longest. And maybe, just maybe, it’s further proof that God loves fishermen, and has a pretty good sense of humor.

I still wonder where Ray is today… and if he’s out there telling the story of the day he caught that big ole white boy back in 2001.