Mike Jackson on the outdoors
SAN JUAN de NICARAGUA — Sometimes I feel my friends and I seem to walk through life with a series of dark clouds hanging over our heads.
I look back over the years and recount the times when my fishing and hunting partners and myself wound up in predicaments that could have resulted in major incidents.
Once before, I detailed some of the experiences former Daily Herald photo chief Mike Seeling and I wound up with — injuries incurred while being in the wilds or on various fishing trips, both domestic and in faraway bush environments.
One of us would wind up hurt one way or the other. Both Seeling and I had cracked ribs. His injury came when he was thrown from a horse, and my troubles came about as the result of a boating accident on Eagle Lake, Ontario. Unfortunately the list of incidents is quite long.
The mighty Greek superman and angler extraordinaire Spence Petros never saw the ground nest of wasps that almost killed him while he and some friends were dove hunting. It took a paramedic and jolts of electricity to bring him back to life in the back of an ambulance.
The latest out-of-country debacle isn't going to rank very high on the scale of dangerous mishaps, but it was enough to cause my pal Ken Kortas and yours truly some anxious moments.
Ken and I recently returned to Nicaragua for another round of tarpon and rainbow (guapote) bass fishing. We struggled for several days, trying to find the fish. Our guide took us deep in to the back country where at times he had use his machete to chop his way through the heavy vines and fallen trees that blocked our way.
Once in the open we managed to tie into some snook, rainbow bass, and a couple other jungle species.
One the way out we slinked our way through narrow channels to get to another location that held some promise of bigger fish. Ken started to come off the front deck of the small boat when the Central American curse hit once again.
Ken was wearing a pair of sandals and because the deck was slippery he lost his footing, he then went horizontal, and wound up crashing down on his butt, subsequently breaking his fall by putting his hand out as a stop-gap. Unfortunately the hand found its way to a set of treble hooks. Two of the hooks became impaled in a finger and the lure hung off his hand like a Christmas ornament.
There is a special technique I've used the past involving a piece of heavy monofilament which in turn is used to free the hook away from the point of impact. Ken's injury was far too serious to go with that tactic.
I suggested to our guide that he speed us over to a nearby village and see if we could find either a doctor or nurse. After searching the village we found an RN who inspected the wound and then began a surgical procedure while Ken grimaced as the first injection was applied to numb the finger. The nurse made a couple incisions and then removed the hooks.
Neither the nurse nor his assistant would take any money for the “surgery,” so we returned to boat and called it a day.
Quite a few anglers I know have had similar experiences, some not as bad — others far more serious. I know of one chap who had to have a set of trebles removed from his lips. Ouch.
I know of another guy who hooked his wife in the jaw. No comment.
And years ago fishing buddy Roger wound up snagging another friend in the crotch with a large, deep-diving Rapala.
Is there a moral to this rambling? Perhaps, but I haven't figured one out yet.
Ÿ Contact Mike Jackson at angler88@comcast.net, and catch his radio show 6-7 a.m. Sundays on WSBC 1240-AM.