No fly-fishing in Crete

The only fishing in Crete was with my feet

(In May of 2012, Dottie and I joined some friends for a trek across Crete.  Here is a three-part account of that trip)

So one day last fall, Dottie said, “I want to go on that trekking trip to Crete with Karen (Collins).”

Karen is a Sonoma resident who operates Going Places, a guided travel business, in which she personally leads small groups of folks on walking/hiking tours of interesting places around the world.

Knowing that Dottie's idea of roughing-it usually means a place without room service and no Nordstrom’s within easy driving distance, I responded, “You do realize the trekking is outdoors?” 

I got the look, for my impertinence.

And with little more said, we signed up and became two in a group of 12 (mostly Sonomans) who last month made the trip and trek across the incredibly                 picturesque,  mountainous and challenging island landscape.

What were we thinking?

Crete is Greece's biggest island and practically a mini-state of its own. It takes only about 45 minutes to fly from Athens to Crete, and even if you didn't trek (dare I say especially if you didn't trek) you'd love it.

Rich in ancient history, the island was home to the Minoans, the earliest advanced European civilization that peaked in about 1950 B.C., centuries before Athens became the Greek powerhouse.

Civilized the Minoans may have been, but they did not fly fish. In fact, there is no fly-fishing on Crete, in spite of the fact that there are numerous very trouty looking streams that tumble out of snow-capped mountains rising to more than 2,450 meters (about 8,000 feet). The problem is there are no trout in those streams, no bass, nothing that one can cast a fly to, which is why readers of this fishing column might want to skip the opening paragraphs and read the real fishing report (for our area) at the end.

So we trekked instead. I should have made Dottie look up the definition before we left. The term means – “a long arduous journey, typically on foot.” Arduous means exactly what you think it does. 

We trained for the trip by walking three-to-five miles a day around the Valley's country roads. We should have been bushwhacking and rock-climbing from here to Napa and back every day over the Mayacamas.

A lovely place for goats, just not old goats.

Crete is beautiful – steep, green mountains rising sharply from a bright blue sea. The lower elevations are covered in fruit orchards and vegetable farms, while higher up millions of olive trees cover the hillsides. Charming villages, populated by equally charming, hospitable people make many parts of the island seem like a real-life Shangri-La.

While there are no cows on Crete, there are thousands of goats.

This is another important fact, along with the definition of trekking, that we should have known. Goats (except old goats from Sonoma) love trekking, especially on steep mountainsides.

What we did love was Greek food – the fresh vegetables and fruit, feta and yogurt made from goat's milk, coarse bread and rich, tangy olive oil. Every dish, many prepared with wild native herbs, was a taste delight, and the wines of Crete were surprisingly good.

Our guide, Manolis Mavrakis, a native of Crete (cretanwalks.com), with dual U.S. and Greek citizenship, capably led us across the challenging landscape, but perhaps his greatest contribution was his knowledge of the best inns and little family-run cafes where we were treated to the real Greek foods most tourists rarely experience. Manolis is a passionate advocate for his island and knows it as only a native son can. As much as one person can do for another, we saw the island through his eyes, and this too, was a great pleasure.

Part II

Crete, Greece’s largest island, was the home of the Minoans, Europe's oldest advanced civilization, although they were apparently not fly fishermen.

After the Minoan civilization faded, the Greeks created a myth that it had been ruled by King Minos, a son of Zeus, who periodically demanded a tribute of young maidens to be scarified to the Minotaur (half man, half bull), the monster of the Labyrinth.

Today, it is a beautiful green land, rich in agriculture, where tourists mingle with ancient gods, and trekkers wander, like followers of Odysseus, in search of Zeus knows what, succumbing frequently to the siren call of the nearest taverna, and eventually ending up back where they started.

The labyrinths trekkers explore are the numerous gorgeous gorges cut through the high mountains to the sea. The Minotaurs are long gone, but there are lots of goats. Tribute is paid in sweat, blood and blisters, along with swollen joints, and in my case, frequent whining.

“What in Zeus's name was I thinking? This stopped being fun five miles ago.”

Trekking is either for the young, fit, and adventurous, or it is a pastime for those who love the gods of nature (Cybele, Dionysus, Hera, Pan, et al.) so much that they are willing to suffer for that love.

I prefer to follow Trouticious, goddess of fly-fishers.

OK, there is no goddess of fly-fishers, but if there was, I'd gladly follow her.

For days, our group trekked, and trekked, and trekked – down steep, rocky trails, through narrow ravines, over big boulders and along steep, treacherous rocky cliffs. There was pain – more for some than others. Dottie’s knee gave out on the second day, and we skipped a couple of the treks. 

Pain was the price the ancient Greek gods demand for invading their domain – including the lovely little seaside villages of Sougia, Agia Roumeli and Loutros, where we rested and enjoyed wonderful meals; the beautifully restored village of Vamos, where we took a class in Cretan cooking from Koula Barydakis; the ancient Venetian port of  Chania, and the ruins of Knossos, the center of the Minoan civilization.

Our companions were perhaps the best part of our trip – our hostess, Karen Collins (of Going Places), and Sonomans Tom and Katherine Culligan and Peter and Maggie Haywood, and Jim Lamb, as well as former Sonoman (and my childhood friend) Janet Richman, and Tom and Bonnie Herman of Oakland, and Randy and Celeste Ferguson of Vancouver, Wash.

We were ably led by our guide, Manolis Mavrakis, a native of Crete (cretanwalks.com). More than a guide, Manolis was an evangelist for Crete. He looked like a son of Zeus, and spoke with passion about the island history, its people, its beauty and even its faults.



Part III

THE BEST PART of our trip to Crete may have been the time we spent in the tavernas with our companions. Many times they worked harder than I did on the treks, so I served the refreshments.

The unexpected often becomes the highlight of a trip, and this can be said of our weeklong trekking adventure on Crete, Greece's largest island.

I expected to dislike trekking. My expectation was met. 

What I didn't expect was the natural beauty of the island, the snow covered peaks and incredible richness of the agriculture. The fabulous food was also a surprise, and, of course the company was excellent – our guide Manolis Mavarkis, the people of Crete who hosted us at their family inns and tavernas, and especially the members of our little group, organized by our hostess, Sonoma's Karen Collins of Going Places.

Here are a few do's and don'ts, if you are interested in Crete:

 • Do use a guide if you want to see the real beauty of the island, enjoy its people, food and culture. I recommend Manolis Mavarkis (cretanwalks.com).

• Unless you are very good condition (or a glutton for pain and punishment), don't sign up for more than one trek through a gorge.  One you might survive, two or more is just plain hell.

• Include the little village of Vamos on your itinerary and try to stay there a night or two and take the cooking lesson from Koula Barydakis. Manolis can arrange this and also a very pleasant three-hour walk from Vamos to the beach, which was the easiest and most pleasant trek of the trip.

• Don't pet the cats of Crete. They're everywhere, including Crete's largest Greek Orthodox monastery. They appear very friendly, but one chomped down on Katherine Culligan's arm so badly that she had to be treated an the Chania hospital emergency room. She's OK, but it was not an experience any of us would wish for.

And finally, if you like seeing interesting, out-of-the-way places, traveling with friends, and making new ones, Karen's Going Places tours are for you (goingplaces.com). She organizes everything perfectly, and you see and enjoy things you might never find on your own.

Just one caveat (but consider the source) – however Karen rates the degree of difficulty of the trek – double it.

Squidheads heat up Loreto, Mexico

That's no bag lady. It's me with a small roosterfish

A crazed Steve Kyle fights a dorado

Les Vadasz with skipjack caught trolling a fly

Michael Ross holds up yellowtail he caught

Steve Page wrestles with a big yellowtail

(In June of 2010 I flew to Loreto, Mexico for a fishing trip with a bunch of Sonoma guys who call themselves the “Squidheads,” led by the irrepressible Steve Kyle. This is a four-part account of that trip.)

Loreto is located on the Sea of Cortez about midway down the peninsula.  The chain of California missions began there in 1697, and over the next 150 years, it stretched all the way to Sonoma, with 21 missions established in Baja and another 25 in Alta.

It wasn't for a review of early California history that 15 Squidheads disembarked onto the hot tarmac of the small Loreto airport last Thursday, but rather for the manly sport of fooling fish with feathers.  I should note that a few knuckle-draggers in our midst also resorted to bait.

We were met by Sonoman Les Clark, who, with his wife Linda, purchased Las Cabañas de Loreto in 2003 and have been hosting (with the assistance of his daughter Jill and son-in-law Richard Jackson)  a growing number of anglers, including Sonomans, ever since. 

The day we arrived it was so hot the locals were chewing jalapeños to keep their mouths cool.

The Squidheads included Dale Downing, Michael Ross, Kevin Jaggie, Clem Moore, Ed Moore, Mike Sangiacomo, Les Vadasz, Steve Page, Jeff Walter, Jim Powers, Bill Brinton, Charlie Brinton, Bobby Brinton, Kyle and myself. We were loaded with all the necessary weapons and materials needed for the mission, including saltwater fly rods and reels, SPF 5000 sun block, and super-strength liquid cork (aka Imodium).  Most of the other necessary supplies, Mexican fishing licenses, 250 cases of beer, 100 cases of wine, chips, salsa, etc., were requisitioned in-country.

Our first briefing, held in the lovely tiled and shaded courtyard of Las Cabañas, began with these five most dreaded words…"You should have been here...(last week, last year, last century?)."

"El Niño," or "La Niña," was messing with the currents and the water temperature in the Gulf of California, causing the sardines, to divert to Tahiti for their summer vacation.

"So? We're not fishing for sardines," I muttered to myself.

Les Clark explained that the sardines and large game fish such as the Dorado had an intimate relationship of the gastronomical kind. No sardines meant no Dorado.  But our fearless leader, Kyle, who would cast a fly into a storm drain if he thought it held fish, had a backup plan, beautiful in its simplicity – "If it swims, we fish for it."

And to this task the Squidheads bent their backs and elbows for the following four days, catching and releasing everything from marlin to tuna, roosterfish, bonita, skipjack, jack crevalle, snappers, moray eels,  guppies, goldfish, and even a few small dorados (the one's that didn't get the memo about Tahiti). It was in the water, some Squidhead threw a line at it. Letters of apology (and new bikini tops) are being sent to a few young ladies who swam just a little too far from the beach.

The results, though less than spectacular, were just enough to brag about every evening as we shared our accomplishments. It should be noted that the bar was set relatively low and the most outstanding achievement was that of a certain member of our group who managed to leave home without his wallet and survive the week with only his passport – no money and no credit cards.

Part II

Any avid fisherman who says he has not pondered the idea of owning his own fishing lodge somewhere on a river, lake or beach is probably lying. But how many of us would actually be willing to do it.

I know only one guy – Les Clark, our host at Las Cabañas de Loreto.

Les, a 40-year Sonoma resident who had a long and successful career as a trainer and dean of a Police Officer Standards and Training (POST) School in Sacramento, has always been an avid outdoorsman and fisherman.  One day in February of 2003, he and his wife Linda were doing some fishing and touring in Loreto when Linda spotted a "Se Vende" (for sale) sign on a small set of bungalows nestled just off the beach.  She showed Les, and before they knew it, they were negotiating a deal to buy the place.

No strangers to the hospitality trade having run a small local B&B on their east-side Sonoma property, they had some idea of what they were in for, but it was still quite a commitment, considering Sonoma is a challenging two and a half day drive from Loreto.

Undaunted, they signed the deal and began operating that very spring, eventually adding four more cabaña units, a pool, and covered patio and cooking area.  With that arrangement, they can host up to 12 people, and when necessary, will even move out of their home on the property and accommodate a few more. You can find all the information you need to book a cabaña on their website at www.lascabanasdeloreto.com.

Les and Linda spend a little more than half the year in Loreto, and when they are not there, their daughter Jill and her husband Richard Jackson, a talented nature photographer, run the place.

He has lots of interesting stories about his early days in Loreto and could probably write a book about the trials and tribulations of being an American and trying to build, expand and operate a resort in Mexico, but he doesn't seem to be showing any signs of regrets.  In fact, he and Linda are working on getting dual citizenship to make it better from a business finance perspective. There is a growing number of Americans moving to Loreto, and those considering such a move often seek Les and Linda out.

Most important – he bought a boat and gets to go fishing three to four times a week. 

But it isn't just the fishing.  

One night after a dinner with the group on the patio, Les invited me up to his favorite spot on the resort, a covered second story patio overlooking the beach.  A moon was rising from the Sea of Cortez, and a gentle breeze kept the warm night a perfect temperature. Smoking a cigar and sipping a cool beverage, he talked about life in Loreto; about how much he liked the people, the local government, the town and life there in general.  If there was ever a man at peace with his life-changing decision it is Les Clark.

The Sonoma Squidheads, there only for the short term, were more intently focused on the fishing, on which a "score" of sorts was kept.

Photo by Squidhead Photo Service

LES CLARK (standing) hosted the Sonoma Squidheads group, including Bill Brinton and Dale Downing,  at his Las Cabañas de Loreto resort last week in Loreto, Mexico.

Part III

Before flying to Loreto, I had no clear idea what ocean fly-fishing was really like.  My angling days are spent on mountain streams and lakes, fooling small trout with feathers made to look like bugs.

I knew something was different when our trusty leader, Steve Kyle, sent us a pre-flight list of flies to purchase.  I went to Leland Fly Fishing Ranch in Schellville and gave my list to Art Hau, who showed me Leland's selection in those patterns.  The so-called flies were bigger than most of the trout I catch, weighed more than my cat, Lizzy, and had huge, ugly, googly eyes. 

"How in the heck am I going to cast that?" I wondered to myself.

Hundreds of dollars later I had my answer – a new, big, saltwater fly rod and equally big (and expensive) saltwater fly reel.

I didn't have time to hire a personal trainer to help me beef up the muscles in my right arm and shoulder, so I began practicing casting the new rig with two hands. The technique I chose was something I'd seen at the hammer-throw and shot put events in the 2008 Olympics.  I was as prepared as I was going to be.

There were humans living in Baja more than 3,000 years before the arrival of the Sonoma Squidheads. Deep in its rugged mountains are caves on which the ancient inhabitants made drawings.  In a shallow cave not far from the Squidhead digs at Las Cabañas de Loreto, is a faded painting that appears to show several men fishing from a crude dugout canoe.  Two of them are using small fish for bait, while a third seems to be casting a bunch of feathers.  One of the men using bait is gesturing to the other bait angler by pointing the thumb of his left hand back over his shoulder toward the third guy, and twirling the index figure of his other hand near his head and rolling his eyes. (It is truly amazing how sophisticated those early cave painters were).

My first hint that this was not Isaac Walton country was on the first morning, when my fishing partner for the day, Les Vadasz, and I spent the first 20 minutes on the boat watching a guy net a whole bunch of big-eyed bait fish, which Jesus, our captain, put into the boat's live well.

We had no sooner cleared the breakwater than Jesus pointed off our port bow to a chaotic scene of diving birds and boiling water.

 "Bull.... something," he shouted.

 My Spanish is not as good as it once was, but from the way the hundreds of little fish were jumping out of the water virtually into the gaping mouths of diving pelicans, I assumed that there was a BFF (big friggin' fish) after them from below.  Jesus gave the outboard a little more throttle and brought our boat within 40 feet of the scene, pointed to Les and me and said, "OK, work!" 

The night before, we had both tied on the flies that Kyle had recommended.

I swear one of their googly eyes winked at me as I swung my rod into a false cast and then let the line go.  The fly landed well short of all of the action and Jesus rolled his eyes.  I quickly made another cast, again falling short.  By this time the BFF and its prey were moving rapidly away from the boat followed by the flock of diving pelicans.  Without wasting any more eye rolling, Jesus picked up a big bait-casting rod the length an width of a closet pole, reached into the live well and pulled out flopping big-eye about six inches long, put a hook through its mouth, and cast it about a 500 yards toward the boiling water.  Within seconds his rod jerked and the reel started screaming.

Les and I just stood there with our limp rods in our hands. 

Jesus handed his rig, the reel still screaming away, to Les, pointed in the general direction of the fish and again said, "Bull." 

At first I thought he meant the fish was strong as a bull or he was saying "pull," because it appeared to be pulling Les over the side.

Actually the local name for the fish he'd hooked was "Toro" (bull in English). The official name for it is Jack Crevalle, a very tough, hard-fighting, tackle-busting fish.

Les fought that bull valiantly, but it appeared to be winning. We fly fishers are used to letting our little buggy-whip rods do all the work tiring the fish, but there was no whip in the rod Les held and it was hooked to what appeared to be a passing '89 Buick headed for Cabo San Lucas.

Jesus finally took mercy on him and showed him how to use the heavy rod as a lever, literally "jacking" the Buick back toward the boat and then reeling in line quickly as leverage was gained. After another 30 minutes, Les had the bull alongside.  It weighed about 30 pounds, but until we saw it, both Les and I thought it was much bigger.

"That was a very strong fish," Les stated. He looked done for the day and it was only 6:45 a.m.

I learned two important things in that first hour:

1. Pound for pound, saltwater fish are a hundred times stronger and faster than freshwater varieties.

2. Those guys in the cave painting, the two using bait, were right.

(More about what I learned about salt water fly fishing next week.)

Part IV

Jesus says, "Where there are boobies, there are fish."

He is a great fisherman with the eyesight of a blue footed boobie.    These sharp-billed, sharp-eyed sea birds glide through the air, a few inches above the water, dip their beaks in at just the right time and catch their dinner.

The Squidheads were assigned in twos to a panga every day.  On three of the four days, I was fortunate enough to have Jesus as our panga captain. My daily partners included Les Vadasz, Steve Kyle and Steve Page.

Jesus had the uncanny ability to see boobies miles in the distance.  He could also tell the difference between a slight ripple on the surface of the sea caused by the wind and ripples made by schools of sardines and other bait fish.  

My partners and I were always looking for boobies and ripples too, but if it wasn't for Jesus, we wouldn't have even seen a fish, let alone catch one.

He would watch for boobies, spot the bait fish, motor us close and then shout, "OK, work!"

We're were expected to jump up on the deck and cast our googly-eyed sardine flies to the area where the bait fish were visible.  More often than not our casts would fall short, or in the wrong spot, and Jesus would roll his eyes, sigh and motor us into position again.  If we failed two or three times in a row, he'd put some live bait on a hook and cast out himself, more often than not hooking a fish and handing one of us the rod.

The resemblance to traditional fly-fishing with bug imitations was nil.  The heavy flies and equally heavy fly rods made casting a challenge, particularly with the boat rocking in the waves and the air temperature in the low hundreds.  After five minutes of this work, I was glad to let Jesus try his hand while I sat down and caught my breath.

We played this hunt, motor and cast game over miles of water from dawn until our brains were fried by the sun. Once in awhile, I'd actually see a fishing follow my fly. Finally, on the third day, I  made a cast close enough to the boiling bait fish that a dorado launched himself at it like a jet-propelled torpedo, grabbed it, and headed toward the equator at the speed of sound.

I learned the hard way that you don't "palm" your reel when fighting a salt-water fish.  The reel handle bloodied my knuckles and the turning spool burned a nice line in my hand.

The fish just kept taking line.

Dorado are strong, athletic fighters, who unlike many oceans species, like to jump. My dorado jumped, dove, circled the boat, went deep, bent my fly rod nearly double, and only after about 20 minutes was I able to bring him in.  He weighed eight pounds, which is small. We let him go.  I was tired.  It is hard to imagine what a 30 to 50 pounder would have done to me.

Not all of my fellow Squidheaders were as reluctant to use bait.  Several used boat roads, heavy duty reels rigged with heavy line and baited to catch some really large yellowtail (tuna), a sailfish and some large dorado and roosterfish.

The flyrodders were less successful, but we did manage to hook a few dorado and some roosterfish as well.

The story from our leader, Steve Kyle, is that when the sardines are in, everybody can catch big dorado on flies (or using a spinning reel casting imitation sardines.)  We'll have to wait until next year.

People ask me if it was a good trip, and I answer "Yes. It was actually a great trip, not so much because I caught a lot of fish (because I didn't), but because of the shared experience with a great bunch of fellow Sonomans and especially the warm hospitality of Les Clark and his family at Las Cabañas de Loreto. I look forward to the next one. If you want a little more information, check out a little video I made (warning may not be suitable for all audiences).

Great Squidheads Adventure of 2011 http://vimeo.com/13138232