She Was Lured In by Fishing

Denise Carton and Peter Wishney are getting married this summer in Sun Valley, Idaho, where there is no salt in the air, no rocking of the boat.

There, the horizon has hills and the hills have trees, which rustle in the wind and tower over meandering streams teeming with fish that rise up after small insects.

Fish that aren’t any bigger than those the anglers from Dana Point are accustomed to using for bait.

“The ocean is beautiful but, then again, it’s beautiful up there too. They are two different extremes,” Carton said Wednesday via satellite phone, from the deck of the Foxi Lady, which is docked in Pinas Bay on the west coast of Panama. “You really appreciate one, and then the other.”

Two different extremes indeed. The 44-foot Pacifica has been this dynamic duo’s home away from home since they embarked, in 1997, on what was intended to be a one-year odyssey to Costa Rica and back.

“We liked it so much, we just kept going farther and farther,” Carton said, only hours after hooking and losing an estimated 450-pound black marlin. “We kept meeting people like us and it just became a way of life.”

She was referring to people with the means and determination to take fishing as seriously as they do.

Seriously enough to have visited 18 countries since setting out from their home port, testing their skills first off the west coasts of Mexico, Costa Rica and Panama, and then, beginning in 1999, on the other side of the Panama Canal at such Atlantic/Caribbean locales as Cuba, Venezuela, St. Thomas, Dominican Republic, Bahamas and Florida.

Ultimately, they decided to see if Carton could make fishing history. And from Nov. 1, 2001, through Oct. 31, 2002, she came through by logging a tag-and-release tally of 196 billfish, including 122 white marlin, 50 blue marlin, 22 sailfish, one Atlantic spearfish and one swordfish.

It was more than any other angler, male or female, caught while fishing in the Atlantic division of AFTCO Manufacturing Co.’s annual tag/flag tournament. And with her effort, Carton became the first woman to be named angler of the year by the Irvine company, which recognizes conservation efforts involving tuna and billfish in the Atlantic and Pacific oceans.

She was honored two weeks ago during an International Game Fish Assn. awards banquet in Palm Beach, Fla., and during an interview this week she humbly gave credit to Wishney, for his handling of the boat, and to mate Luis Duran, whose duty it was to get the billfish safely tagged and released.

“Anyone who does this knows it’s a team effort,” Carton said. “And we have a very good team.”

Wishney, 53, is a renowned angler and skipper, with 22 years’ experience at the helm of Foxi Lady. Duran is a Venezuelan deckhand hired for a dream job full of adventure.

As for Carton, 39, she didn’t do a lot of fishing before setting out in 1997, but has obviously become a seasoned veteran since.

During her run for angler of the year -- she also is being honored this month by the Billfish Foundation -- she said there were too many highlights to list. The actual number of billfish she caught was probably closer to 230 but only those they were able to successfully tag counted.

There was the estimated 750-pound blue marlin that struck off St. Thomas, poking its massive head out of the water and making them all gasp. There was the 250-pound tuna that struck off Venezuela, working the angler harder than any of the billfish, during a fight that lasted four hours.

Most of all, though, there were all the friendly people, in such places as Cuba, Venezuela and Panama.

“It all seemed like a dream at first,” Carton said. “But then it became a reality.”

Sounds like something you’d hear after a wedding.

Fin-tastic

* San Diego long-range: Albacore alert! Polaris Supreme Capt. Tom Rothery reported Thursday to 976tuna.com that he had encountered a large school of the longfin tuna 200-plus miles southwest of Fisherman’s Landing, while en route to and beyond southern Baja California on a 19-day trip.

His passengers experienced a wild bite with fish averaging 18 pounds before moving on.

“I can’t believe the volume of fish we’re seeing in this area so early,” Rothery said, adding that he had metered a long stretch of albacore much closer to the landing in “nasty” south winds on Wednesday. This bodes well for an early start to the season.

* Santa Monica Bay: Halibut remained active until the rain came and, barring a big post-storm wind, the weekend bite should be fair to good. The biggest “flattie” was a 40-pounder caught late last week by Doug Duval of Marina del Rey aboard the New Del Mar.

* San Clemente Island: A good sign for the spring yellowtail bite: Pete Gray, host of the “Let’s Talk Hook-up!” radio show, visited the island Monday and caught several 25- to 30-pound yellowtail on heavy and light iron lures. “There seems to be a good volume of fish, and when squid comes available [as bait] it should make it easier for the sport boats to make a catch,” he said.

* Santa Ana River Lakes: This lunker factory in Anaheim contains freshly stocked hatchery-grown trout said to weigh more than the state-record 26.08-pounder, which was grown to record size, put in and promptly pulled out of the same water last year.

Reports Assistant Manager Gary White, “There are still two or three out there that’ll break the record, but they haven’t been caught yet. They’ve been broken off a bunch. These regulars think they can catch ‘em on two-pound test, but that ain’t going to happen.”

* Cabo San Lucas: Striped marlin are as active as they’ve been all winter -- and they’re luring anglers from far-away lands. From Pisces Sportfishing: “Anglers with names that sound unusual to our ears, Ravolwelk, Vrolyk, Traas, Gerris, and Marion, all from the Netherlands, fished aboard Karina and Adriana and in five days released 22 striped marlin and captured 15 yellowfin tuna and four dorado.”

Bucking for Bass

Pro angler Gary Klein joined an elite group last weekend with his victory at a CITGO Bassmasters Tour event at Lake Seminole in Bainbridge, Ga. Klein, a former Northern California resident who now lives in Weatherford, Texas, earned $100,000 with a four-day combined weight of 69 pounds 15 ounces for 20 bass. That pushes his career earnings to $1,067,644 and makes him only the seventh member of the Bass Millionaires club.

Bucking for Bighorn

Daniel Smith III of San Jose recently bought the right to hunt bighorn sheep in New Mexico. His bid of $130,000 was the third-highest offered at the annual Foundation for North American Wild Sheep auction, and gives Smith a license to target desert bighorn in the Peloncillos Wilderness or Rocky Mountain bighorn in the Pecos or Wheeler Peak Wilderness areas.

The two highest bids were $200,000 for a bighorn license in Alberta, Canada, and $132,500 for a Montana license. Proceeds will help fund conservation efforts.

No Even Keel

Sailors in the Around Alone solo race around the world left Tauranga, New Zealand, Sunday for the 7,850-mile run that will take them around treacherous Cape Horn and ultimately to Salvador, Brazil.

With three legs already complete, and with prospects of the most grueling leg ahead, emotions are becoming frayed among some competitors. Said Brad Van Liew, skipper of the Tommy Hilfiger Freedom America, which is leading the Class II division for boats 40 to 50 feet:

“I know there is an iceberg 11 miles wide 400 miles north of the Falkland Islands. A dark stormy night with icebergs present is not what I am looking forward to right now. I miss my daughter and I miss my wife.”

Four years have passed since Van Liew last rounded Cape Horn, at the tip of South America. He rolled his boat completely upside down and survived 80-knot winds and eight-story waves, and ultimately sailed to a third-place finish.

Show-Boating

The 47th annual Southern California Boat Show begins a nine-day run Saturday at the Los Angeles Convention Center. An annual rite of pre-spring, it features the latest and greatest, including among more than 600 models on display, the West Coast debut of Meridian’s new 57-foot 540 Pilothouse; Sea Ray’s new 54-foot 500 Sundancer, and Tiara’s 4200 Open luxury cruiser.

Admission is $10 for adults and free for children 12 and under. Hours are 10 a.m.-9 p.m. Saturday; 10 a.m.-6 p.m. Sunday; and 2-9 p.m. Monday through Friday.