And the Sky Turned Black

The day before we left the islands I planned to fish in the morning and then put the gear away and not fish the evening incoming tide. As the day went on and Linda and I talked she really wanted me to fish the evening and of course I wanted to try and catch some final fish.

We have been running a shuttle across the channel to the flats to the south, I paddle over with Don and we leave the gear with him. Then I paddle back pulling the empty kayak and take it to Caroline. It works real smooth and we have gotten good at anchoring the boats with a rock, and then stalking the bones.

This flat feels like it has not been fished as hard and the bonefish are not as spooky here. They tail in larger groups and we get better shots at them when the wind is down.

Tonight the wind was dead calm and we can see the bones tailing. There was a huge cloud bank to the north of the island, it looked mean but it also looked like it would go the other way.

We started moving to the tailing fish and I had several good shots at some of them. Once I think one was taking my fly when another chased him off, no catch though. Caroline was the first to look over her shoulder and spot the thunder heads coming in. She headed for the boat and paddled over to the gazebo, telling us she would be back if needed.

The weather came in so fast! The next thing Don and I know is the lightning is starting to hit the north end of the island. I loaded my gear into Dons boat and he paddled as I swam the channel. We got to the gazebo, tied up the kayak and hid under the little building cover just when the first rain hit.

It was amazing! The rain came in buckets and the thunder and lightning was right on top of us. I did the '”one potato, two potato” count to see how far it was and most of the time I got to five and the thunder went off like dynamite. I love lightning and thunder, but some of this scared the crap out of me.

We had one clap so close that all of us jumped and ran to the abandoned house by the gazebo. We huddled there for the next 45 minutes as the skies let lose their furry. All I could do is think about Linda knowing how frightened she would be. I told Don and Caroline the I was going to go to Linda and they wouldn’t let me, Don said “Linda is scared but she is safe, do put your self in danger.” So I waited for about twenty minutes till the lightning got past us.

I drove as fast as a golf cart could go in a foot of standing water with more coming down.