Any one out there had any experience or advice for fly fishing off of a cruising catamaran? I will be taking my family on a bareboat this summer on a 37? catamaran (payoff for all those fishing trips) and have never had the opportunity to fly fish in salt water so thought I would have two experiences in one. We will be leaving in mid-July out of Miami and heading south as far as Marathon Key if the wind is friendly. I suppose I have a couple of questions; first am I crazy to try to fly fish off a sail boat and if not any suggestions. The second would be any general fly pattern suggestions? Since I will not be targeting anything specific should I just tie up a bunch of clouser minnows and deceivers and hope for the best?
You’d be crazy not to. I do it. First beware of the rigging. Stand at the stern of the boat and you can cast sideways with your rod hanging over the rear or over a rear quarter. Trolling is usually too fast for effective fishing, but I would not hesitate to drag a popper across the top with a spinning or bait rod. When docked, you might be able to fish from a dingy or other craft. One alternative is to have a dingy available and if you see fish, you go in the dingy and fish for a little bit, then catch up to the sail boat. Depending on the speed of both boats it is not a difficult or scary thing to do.
Went out one day on a 60 footer off Manchester-by-the-Sea with one of my business consultants. A spectacular vessel. I asked if he ever fished off of it. He damn near threw me off the boat. Apparently fishing from a sailboat is bad form. I now have little use for sailboats. (Though chicks do dig them. That is a dilemma.)
Epo,
I am sorry to hear your tale. My friend the boat owner is an avid fly fisherman. We go for weekends with the wives and kids. They do beach things, town things and other things. We do fishing things. The dingy is the main fishing platform, but the sailboat is the staging platform. Makes for a great weekend.
Thanks for the advice. EPO having raced performance cats when we lived in wetter areas I could see your friends point if it were a race. I guess he feels the same way about sailing as my friend who will not fish unless it a trout and only on a dry fly. Nice work if you can get it but it does cut out a lot of possibilities. The charter company supplies conventional tackle so I am guessing fishing is ok just so long as I don?t throw a big 2/0 clouser into the mainsail.
