Taurus and Piscis

“All right, you can pick a fishing-rod but not the most expensive one.” That’s what the WorldWalkers’ old man said when István told him he would try fishing if he found a place... So the boys packed in the most expensive rod and off they went.

by FERENC IVANICS
Practically we walked through almost the entire European continent having the fishing-rod as a Tom Sawyerish accessory, with absolutely no practical value, though. My brother tried his luck near Valencia, Spain first, at the mouth of a river. The bait was made of bread and salami pieces but it didn’t work, probably a healthy earthworm would have helped. Frustrated, we hooked a salami stick.


Near Essaouira, in Morocco we went for the blue ocean. István experimented with baits made of shellfish, sea urchins and canned fish. With no luck. Probably he would have needed a stronger fishing-line to be able to throw the baits farther offshore, and to use a stronger, larger blinker. We realized that this rod was not designed for costal fishing.



He tried his luck next time in Mauritania, it was a short try. The plumb-bob was lost somewhere on the rocky seabed in Morocco, so István used a huge rusty nut. This replacement worked fine but the line was weak or just damaged, during the second throw the whole equipment split off.


So, we had walked more than 5000 miles, and there was still no catch. I have to mention, though, and quite proudly, that I did catch a sea creature using my bare hands. It was a miserable octopus, trapped in a small pond on the rocky coast. It was windy on the beach and we couldn’t find any firewood, so it was the eight-legged creature’s lucky day, he joined his friends in the ocean.


My brother gave up fishing in the ocean, at least with this rod. But when we arrived in Seville, a slow, quiet river awaited him, with some funky fish. So István drew his fishing-rod—this time he replaced the plumb-bob with some coins glued together—, it was all set, he just needed some bait.


We had some bread but we had become distrustful about it. Then I mentioned that I would get some earthworms. “Heh” he replied. But my gardener instincts were telling me that on the riverbank, under the green grass there had to be some. And there was. Since we imagined that a permit was needed to fish in the river we started the action after dark. I was feeling extremely tired so I went to my tent to have a sleep. But István was wound up by the movements around the baits, and in fifteen minutes he appeared in front of my tent with a medium sized fish in his hands. He found out that these fresh-water fishes bite on bread. We had a dinner before, it was quite late so he released our fish friend back to his family.


A few days later he gave it another try, in less than half an hour he caught a larger fish. He released that one as well, but next time we won’t be this warm-hearted. We have already imagined a fish-soup or a roasted fish meal. Let’s hope these slimy fish taste good.