ROANOKE TIMES
Copyright (c) 1997, Roanoke Times
DATE: Monday, March 17, 1997 TAG: 9703180098
SECTION: SPORTS PAGE: B-6 EDITION: METRO
DATELINE: HATTERAS VILLAGE, N.C
SOURCE: BILL COCHRAN OUTDOOR EDITOR
Wind is the foe of winter bluefin-tuna fishermen. If you reach the fishing grounds one day in three, you've done well.
There had been two days of decent fishing weather, and the evening forecast promised a third, with the wind kicking up a bit, to 5-15 knots - rough, but doable.
Then two hours before daylight, a heavy blow came whistling out of the northeast. The seas began to moan and a cottage, appropriately called ``Whitecap,'' began to sway as a dozen anxious anglers from Western Virginia slept.
Welcome to the Graveyard of the Atlantic. Even the local radio station, WYND, calls itself ``Wind radio,'' and the wooden rib cages of century-old sailing ships appear in the surf to remind everyone that nature is boss around here.
You can't talk about the world-class, bluefin tuna fishing just offshore without mentioning the weather and its ability to dash the hopes of anglers. You'd best come prepared to spend a day or two on the dock for every one on the water.
``If I can get out every other day, that is what I would like to do,'' said Walt Spruill, a charter boat skipper who operates out of Oden's Dock.
Spruill often books in three-day blocks, hoping he will be able to put his party onto fish one day out of the three. February was exceptionally cooperative.
``I fished 22 days in February,'' he said. ``Last year, I fished 15 and thought that was real good.''
March has been more lion-like. When Carl Higginbotham of Goodview left Whitecap cottage on a recent morning to meet Spruill at Oden's, there was a small-craft advisory. Some of Higginbotham's buddies headed for home, others stuck around hoping the winds would die the next day.
They didn't. Spruill called the next morning and told the anglers, ``Go back to bed.'' The wind was blowing 35 knots with gusts to 50.
It was the third year of winter tuna fishing for Higginbotham. The others had treated him kindly.
``Last year, everybody was worn out from fighting fish and wanted to sit down by 11 o'clock,'' he said.
Higginbotham is building a 48-foot sport-fishing boat at his Smith Mountain Lake home with the idea of trucking it to Hatteras by next tuna season.
``Then, when it blows we can sit back at the dock and drink coffee and not have to worry about the weather,'' he said.
LENGTH: Medium: 53 linesby CNB