This was our third trip to Maryland in roughly a year. Last August we visited Camden Yard to see the Astros play the Orioles, and caught rainbows on a side-trip to the Gunpowder River.  In May we fished the Chesapeake for one day. We got blown off the water and caught nothing.

We fished in May with Captain Tom Hughes.  It was terrible weather, but that’s what you get sometimes, particularly fishing with the Thomases, and allowing only one day for a place doesn’t always work, particularly in saltwater.  Captain Hughes told us to come back and fish a half-day for the cost of gas. We split the difference and booked a whole day.

Fishing once with a guide is kind of random. You don’t know the guide and the guide doesn’t know you. Fishing the second time with Captain Tom was fishing with a friend. First thing he said was we’re getting your fish. We started north up the bay, a big working waterway like our home Port of Galveston, to where the freighter UBC Sacramento was anchored under load. There were birds working and bait popping, and for the next three hours we fished, both of us with his 9-weight Orvis Helios rods, fine rods, but me with a 350-grain Orvis Depth-Charge line and weighted Clouser and Kris with a popper on a floating line. In 50-feet of water she was fishing poppers. It didn’t matter though what we were fishing: we both caught fish.

I had fished freighters once before, offshore from South Padre Island just north of Mexico, where freighters stacked up for the Port of Brownsville. We were fishing king mackerel, called kingfish in Texas, at 30 feet with 10-weights and for blue runners on the surface with a 6-weight. There were big rollers and I was seasick, really seasick, and the guide was annoyed that I didn’t know what I was doing with a sinking line, but who knows how to fish a freighter? Captain Tom knows. And unlike that South Texas guide Captain Tom knew how to tell us what to do.

Of course that South Padre guide may also have been annoyed that I kept throwing up over his boat’s gunnels. Mostly I made it over the gunnels anyway.

I was surprised how much I liked fishing the Depth Charge line. It was easier to cast than I thought it would be, and Captain Tom knows how to translate the screen of a fish finder into presentation of a fly at a depth. That’s pretty amazing when you think about it, and together with knowledge of structure (including the UBC Sacramento) and observation of birds may be the best way to consistently fish big water like the Chesapeake. Periodically he’d tell me fish were stacked around 20’ and 40’, and to let the line sink for a 12-count, about a foot a second with the heavy Clouser. I asked him why if the fish were at 20 feet he didn’t tell me to let the line go for a 20-count? These fish, he said, are aggressive. These aren’t lazy fish. They’ll come up to the fly if they’re feeding. If they won’t come up to the fly don’t bother.

Sometimes when we were in a flock of working birds and there were stripers crashing the surface I stripped in the Clouser as soon as it hit the water. I was fishing poppers too.

Captain Tom has to report to Maryland how many fish are caught out of his boat when he guides, and he somewhat conservatively came up with 56, all in the first four hours. All of us thought he under-counted a bit. It was hard to keep up, and and in addition to the fish landed Kris and I both missed plenty of strikes. The fish weren’t giants, the smallest few were not much more than a pound and the largest probably three, but there was nothing tentative about them. They were saltwater-bright and strong even at a pound, and whatever: I know I caught my fish. I caught my Chesapeake rockfish. That’s the right color of fish for Maryland.

When I go back to fish stripers again maybe I’ll want to hunt for larger fish. Or maybe not. 56 fish is anybody’s good day.

By the end of the day we covered 35 miles of water, and when the fish finally shut off Kris and I were worn out. We ate lunch drifting in the bay. Later I napped a bit while Captain Tom explored the bridge pilings, but there was nothing there, at least nothing worth breaking out the rods for. Kris said she never got to nap because I wouldn’t shut up. Later still Captain Tom gave us a water-side tour of the Naval Academy and the Annapolis waterfront. There are lots of sailboats in Annapolis.

It was a good day. Every angler should fish the Chesapeake, it’s quintessential American water, and anybody who’s interested in fly fishing big water should fish the Chesapeake with Captain Tom. It’s pretty great fly fishing, fish or no fish.