As the Oarlock Turns

Fishing Camp
By Josh Mahan

Rowing across upper Lake Mohave we run into Abe Karam, a fisheries biologist with Arizona State.

“You guys are living my dream,” he says. “All day when I’m out here I stare at the GPS that lists the names of the rapids buried under here, and fanaticize about what this used to be like.” With that he tells us he camped in Carp Cove and that we should join his team for camp.

“Don’t be surprised if we pull in well after dark,” I say.
They’re studying the Colorado native razorback sucker, a species that is being pillaged by the exotic striped bass laid down thick in the reservoir. Every year they release millions, only to see 15,000 or so make it. The future looks bleak for the razorback in these conditions. The team had spent the day diving for tags that were once on fish, but now had passed through the digestive tracts of stripers and pooped back out to the lake bottom.

The fire was typical fishing camp, men around a fire cussing and telling tales. As beers went down and the night evened out, talk turned to the dams and what they mean for cities like Phoenix, Las Vegas, and Los Angeles. Team leader Brian admits he just bought a house in Phoenix with a swimming pool.

“If you have a pool you have to keep it filled or the concrete cracks and you lose value,” he said, citing a value system that seems obscure after three months afloat.

I mention that the future looks bleak for these boom towns built on water that isn’t really there.

“Well we can’t all live like hippies,” he says.

“I believe the term is sustainable,” I reply.

The next day we set out into Cottonwood Basin, seven miles long and four miles wide. When we first started, the wind pushed firmly at our back, but no whitecaps. Making good time we hit the middle of the lake and sure enough the swells the fishing camp had warned us of picked up. Happy chit-chat shuts down as we see a dust devil move across the bay whipping water into a small tornado. Then the swells move in. Our talk goes silent. The wind whips up a storm of monster ocean waves. We know we are in a tight spot.

“We’re going to make it,” I tell Jen as she battons down the edges of her Paco pad gusting up in the whole gale force. We thought we’d seen wind in Mead, but we had yet to be in a bay with this much fetch.

Suddenly Jen and I found ourselves in the midst of 10 to 12 foot ocean swells threatening to upturn us.

I fought for another hour to reach shore, literally surfing the huge moving waves. Standing waves are one thing, but when a set of four big boys rocks in at your craft every thirty seconds and land is distant the Fear sets in. We were happy to hunker down in Shelter Cove, finding a small nook from the wind and hitting a much deserved nap until the wind died.

Life is good.