Fisherman are dreamers... We dream of past adventures and do the same for future ones. Always the consummate believer that the newest HOT SPOT is going to show up on the radar screen as soon as a few sport boats trip over it and raise some impressive numbers. I have had the joy of this happening in a few places in my life and have felt guilty about throwing these spots into the international spotlight of discovery knowing it may never be the same when word gets out.

Recently I had such a "discovery moment". We are currently in production of a new television series in the U.S. and Canada called IGFA Salt Water Adventures on the World Fishing Network. Many of these places are common names in the industry with years of multi media exposure to their credit. A few are "diamonds in the rough" that may attain such notoriety when anglers know they exist.

We are fortunate enough to have IGY; a company that produces and manages several high end international marinas come on as a location sponsor to the series. One of the marinas they wanted to promote was their St. Lucia island facility on this "crown jewel" of the Caribbean.

Having never been to St. Lucia, I did what any host of a show would do to get acquainted with an unknown destination.. Put out an ALL POINTS BULLITIN to see who the hell in the marling industry knew any thing about the place. Emails to Skip Smith, Fly Navarro, Mike Myatt, Guy Harvey, and a ton of others came back with "humm, never knew anyone who has fished there". Not exactly the data I was looking for, so a GOOGLE search was next on my agenda. Not a whole lot there either except a few websites and the confidence building enigma that not much was there to charter and that getting a good show from there may be a dilemma.

We hooked up with a great local Captain who was bound fully confident and had the right attitude for success. We booked him. Captain Bruce Hackshaw on the HACK ATTACK an elderly Bertram 38 that was surely fishy enough to get the job done in style.

When the pulled up to the dock the first morning, we started shooting the introduction piece and he immediately stated with a Chessy Cat smile that we would be catching a blue marlin for sure. Here we are in February, a time which I have no idea supports any type of a blue marlin bite in an area famous for trade winds that give the "Windward Island group their nickname. But we loaded the gear put our sponsor's lures on the rods and waited for further instructions.

The place is like the Kona coast of Hawaii's big island. Steep volcanic mountains end with their toes in the sand creating deep drop-offs adjacent to the coastline. You can literally put lines out just minutes from the famous fort port of Rodney Bay, but on this day we were heading straight for the FAD buoy about 15 miles south.

Slowly approaching the numbers just north of the buoy it was lines in, and there it was approaching the FAD just 10 minutes into our first morning it all happened. The right rigger clip barked out the call to action and a thick bodied blue marlin grey hounded across the wake. An easy 500+ pound fish instantly got recalled a 600-700 lb. fish when she shoulder humped away and spit the hook. We were frazzled. Completely non-expected by all of us...Except Captain Bruce... He just knew... An hour later we caught a nice 175 lb. blue, then raised another 300 lb. fish to a rigger lure, and the end of the day hooked up a smoker on the shotgun position lure. After clearing 6 lines and burning out ¾ of the 50 lb. line on the spool, it parted company even though I had backed off the drag considerably.

The next day we raised another two blues, got one to bite, and caught a nice 25 lb. dorado and a respectful 40 lb. wahoo within eye view of IGY marina. Did this really just happen, two days of fishing on an island no one knew a word about, raised 6 blues just a few miles off from an island that is a photographic paradise and exhibits a lay back fully Caribbean Rasta atmosphere. So my dreams will continue as a lifelong memory of a place that WAS the unexpected pleasure.