A s a guide nothing annoys me more than a bunch of cheapskates that couldn’t fish their collective ways out of a soggy sandwich sack wanting me to wipe their noses, powder their butts, massage their egos, replace instantly all the flies they are decorating brush and trees with, while playing super-sycophant in hopes of doubling that $2.00 tip.
or not… It is extremely unlikely you can get where I go on your own. It is a lot more than a day’s fishing in the end and I do not do day trips anymore. I have been given many “staggering” tips over the years, often well in excess of the charter. Knowing what I am doing and what is going on around me is usually appreciated…
If I had ever even had the slightest inclination to hire a guide , this would be the No.1 reason why I would shy away from it ,
the chance I would be in the same boat as the big ego client
and get a guide with a better than all attitude each would ruin a quite day
for me on the water…
Guessing you missed the smiley wink there… This thing
And thinking you meant to call me the “big ego guide” rather than client.
I run a 40’ boat out of Kodiak. There are no bare boat charters, none. If there were you would be more than a little foolish to try it solo.
With a USCG Masters License I had to document 2 years (720 days) running boats and two more years for each renewal at five years. That would be '94, '99, '04, '09… That would be 2,880 days on the water… and I have far more than that. And I have been fishing AK since the '60s and Kodiak since the very early '80s. On my soggy turf I stand by the notion you could not reasonably get there on your own, nor know what you are doing when you get there.
I have years worth of stories that would leave you hurting from laughter of clients refusing to take advice; it happens.
Alex, I’ll take sycophant guides for $500 please
art laughing
What gets me about many guides, not all by any means, but quite a few, is the inland use of the term, “Captain”. I find it silly, falling into the category of, “How stupid do you think we are?”. One of the prominent Fly Shops out of Casper, WY has a guide that refers to himself as “Captain”. Of what? They guide the Grey Reef area. Captain of a canoe? Rowboat? Float tube? Puleeze!
A 40’ boat needs a Captain. The North Platte isn’t deep enough to float anything that needs a captain. He may have earned the title along the coast, but it just sounds silly around here. Leave it on the coast.
If it has an engine on it, you have to be Coast Guard licensed captain to operate commercially, so if the person ever operates a motorized craft commercially, “Captain Whoever” is in fact a legal title. I know quite a few guides who fall into this category.
I absolutely agree with you on the Captain thing… Take a look back at other posts and you may notice I do not even capitalize my name. When I write magazine articles I do not ever use the title…
But didn’t they run paddlewheelers and steamships up the Platte River back in the day?
Actually it has to do with paying customers or freight rather than source of power. There have been some recent changes on less rigorous 6-pack licenses for inshore waters and I am not completely up on them, but the idea is a boat for hire needs to be driven by a licensed person. Even drift boats…
Funny thing to my way of thinking is the fact you have to have a Master’s License to haul freight, but only a 6-pack license to haul people… People are enough of a problem I see the value of the 6-pack, too.
art
I am sure you are right about the paddle wheelers and steamships, but it is a good bet they didn’t get much past the confluence of the North and South Platte Rivers at North Platte, Nebraska if that far. The river just won’t handle it. Up around Grey Reef, a powered boat of just about any kind would be ridiculous. Up river a tad at Alcova, Pathfinder, or Seminole Reservoirs, it’s a different story, but not at Grey Reef.
Western rivers are small. Most wouldn’t make good sized streams back east or along the west coast. Over much of it’s length, the South Platte River isn’t as wide or deep as some of the “spring creeks” that get pictures posted by our members in the northeast. I can’t cast, but I can cast across the North Platte anywhere between Alcova and the east end of Casper.
The title may be valid, but when you are captain of a rowboat with a trolling motor, it seems more than just a little pretentious, particularly to those of us raised in the West where titles mean very little.
Regardless the licensure requirements, I’d sooner designate myself SUPERMAN than "captain " of a rowboat.
Hap, you “steer” a 40’ boat ?. Dude, you are a CAPTAIN.
Mark
PS: So hap, do you, as Captain, also consider yourself a “guide”?
I am actually licensed to run a lot more than a 40’ boat, including tugs (not just the asisstance towing rider) and bigger stuff for hire. Last summer we ran a little boat (32’ Nordic Tug) from Juneau to Whittier, about 800 miles and lots of it in water where there were no other boats for days… I have made various versions of the run from Seattle up a number of times. And I have commercial fished from SE to Kodiak, back in the day.
Some very bad politics were just dished out by NMFS on halibut charters and for that reason I have not purchased my guide license this year… and may not at all. But I have considered myself a guide for a very long time, and carried the licenses to do it. We used to do quite a bit of flyrod halibut fishing, as well as most other saltwater species here. I will just leave it there as I can already feel the bile rising.
I am currently looking into the FFF certified casting instructor program with intentions of picking up that certification for several different reasons. I consider myself well beyond average in fly rod experience and ability, which based on former protests of modesty on my part probably sounds a little lame, but it reminds me of the Winston Churchill quote, “To shoot a good game of pool shows a well-rounded youth. To shoot too-good a game of pool shows a misspent youth.”
art
Hap.
Anyone who appreciates and can quote Winston Churchill can’t be all bad, in fact YOU just BLEW my mind. I did make “assumptions” and have hereby “learnt” ( at 68") a lesson.
