Beast not fit for cat nor man. At least there is a picture to prove this fish story!

In most cases, when one of the fishing reels starts spinning wildly, it's either Mark or Louis who grabs it first. Barry has hauled-in one or two, but he's usually in the galley. Tom loves to eat fish, but is perfectly happy to let someone else work out the details of acquisition. Having already made a bird's nest out of one reel of fishing line, I generally step away to avoid annihilating anything else. With that said, I was far and away the closest to the reel when it took off yesterday. As I jumped up to grab the rod, being extra super specially careful not to let it get pulled into the sea, Mark and Louis pulled the giant sock down from the top of the mast and over the big red spinnaker to slow the boat. The consensus was that I was reeling in a pretty good sized dorado. Having only brought in one other dorado, I was in no position to argue. All I knew for certain was that this fish was not nearly as willing to go quietly as the one before. By the time it was fifty meters away, we saw a flash of brilliant green at the surface. Oh yeah, that's a dorado. See how it goes to the top? As someone was speaking this wisdom, the beast plunged straight downward and then away. I mentioned that I didn't want to rush this guy in, as I was worried about breaking the rod.
"Ohhh no. You won't break that rod," Mark said. I nodded and was now 100% certain the rod would snap in half.
I pulled and reeled, pulled and reeled, pulled and reeled. The fish got close enough to the top of the water to see us, and for us to see him, and nobody on either side of this struggle was terribly pleased with the result. This thing had a mouth on it that would have given a British dentist night sweats. After sussing us out, the savage brute made straight for the bottom. I finally got it to the aft steps, and Mark somehow got it onto the low decking - tail first. It was a barracuda, and neither one of us wanted much to do with the business end. Barry pulled the leftover mahi mahi from the fridge and chucked it overboard, "fresh fish tonight, then." For the sake of conversation, we dropped a tape measure on the sea ogre. 1.35 meters. That's 53 inches in English measurement, and in American that's a nickel of high-fives and back slaps all around.
Our victorious troglodyte dance was cut short when Barry appeared from the cabin with a book in hand. "We can't eat that," he said, "we might die."
"What? Okay wait, define 'might'."
Apparently, according to the "book", a barracuda of this size was almost certain to carry with it a toxin called "ciguatera". Little fishies have it in low doses, and the higher you go up the fishy foody chain, the more concentrated the dose becomes. This dinosaur we just winched out of the water didn't spend a whole lot of time looking over its shoulder. The thing was the king boss dictator of the deep. Everything he ate contained some ciguatera, and he held on to all of it. I wasn't about to be convinced just because it was in a book - paperback no less, but then Mark and Louis both said yeah, it'll make you really really sick or even kill you. Mark added that it was particularly deadly to cats. Interesting tidbit, albeit a tad odious and tangental. So the barracuda was committed back to the deep where his neighbors now had a chance to have a go at him for a change. We sailed onward with the spinnaker back up and the winds climbing.
During the night we made great speed under a brilliant and clear sky. One note; Louis reports having seen a very strange thing at about 01:15, St. Lucia time. In the sky high above and to the east of us, there appeared a huge white streak. It was like a falling star, only much larger. Then, the white streak burst open into what looked like a white explosion overhead. It was so bright, it lit up the sails. A moment later, the white streak continued from east to west. Meteorite? Satellite launch? Can you hear me, Major Tom? If any other boats saw this, or if anyone has some information to add, we'd love to hear it. Our position at the time was 14º 20.982N - 056º 25.886W.

After sunup this morning, Louis brought in another large fish. His was a 1.2 meter-long dorado. He didn't make anywhere near the fuss that I made, and his is a completely edible delicacy. The clouds are heavy and almost gray today. The wind remains high at around 23-25 knots, and the waves are often more than five meters high. We are less than 200 miles from St. Lucia, and still hope to make landfall in the late afternoon tomorrow, Wednesday.

and onto some Dutch...
2 mannen van boven de zestig zitten ’s morgens om 6.00 uur op het bovendek de zaak te bespreken. De vorige en de dag van vandaag, hoeveel vis we vangen, wie gaat koken hoe we geslapen hebben etc.De wereld bespreken is er niet bij omdat we daar niets en dan ook niets van weten. Heerlijk!!!
Reuze gezellig en dat bij een wind van 25 knopen of meer. De 2 oude mannen zitten nu meer dan 3 weken aan boord en ze weten al veel van elkaar. Als er wat moet worden gedaan aan de boot of aan de zeilen stampen we met de voeten en komt het jonge volk uit hun bed en doen ze wat ze moeten doen.
Nu om 9.00 uur is de eerste vis, een hele mooie Mahi Mahi, van ongeveer een meter gevangen en is het diner weer voorzien van verse vis. Het fileren en in porties verdelen gaat bijzonder efficiënt. Iedereen heeft een taak. Ze weten dat ik vis hou maar hem zelf pakken is er niet bij.
Gisteren mocht ik even voor de foto een Barracuda van 1.35 meter vasthouden. Dat was wel de laatste voor deze reis.
Morgen komen we om ongeveer 16.00 uur lokale tijd dan is het 21.00 uur Holland dus dan zal ik nog proberen te bellen anders wordt het donderdagochtend 11.00 tot 12.00 uur in de morgen jullie tijd.
Cheers from the almost home crew of Maverick Dream