2014 Fan Pier Fishing Tournament!

     As always, around the end of July every summer Save the Harbor hosts a fishing tournament for the staff and select groups out in the harbor. Personally, the fishing tournament is my favorite event of the entire summer. For one day the staff gets to take a breather after working so diligently at program sites and go fishing out in the harbor on some beautiful boats. The day began with the staff enjoying a delicious breakfast courtesy of J.Pace. The breakfast gave everyone the fuel they needed to land a huge fish! Afterward the staff and some members of the local Boys and Girls Club were divided among the boats. From there it was game time!

Breakfast time!

     Seeing that I was the previous year's winner, I had high hopes for this tournament. I had the courtesy of being on the Legacy boat with my sister, Thi and my fellow coworker Abdi. In addition, we also had a member from the Boys and Girls Club named Jedidiah. A half hour into the harbor one of the lines bent over with the sheer force of a heavy striped bass. However, when I grabbed the rod and reeled it in the fish let go. I was disappointed, but I knew that the day was far from over. Our captain Rick tried a few of his secret spots but to no avail. Despite the letdown of not catching any fish this time around, I still had a spectacular time out on the harbor enjoying the cool breeze and the refreshing waves.

The staff with the winning fish!

-Vinh Tran
Lead Harbor Explorer

An amazing fishing trip

Hey it's Marco and this week has been the best week!  This week started off with catching  a stripe bass at the children's museum. As well as  catching green crabs and spider crabs. This past Thursday started off really early. I met every one at fan pier and then we all had breakfast together. Then later that morning we all went off on to the fishing boats, some of us stayed near the shore and others closer to the ocean. That day was a lot of fun in the end I never thought I would be one of the people to win one of the contests. I was able to bring some fish home to my family. The next night we had a cook out in our yard we grilled some of the fish I brought home. It was delicious.  Then on Friday the mlk staff had a meeting at BU. It was pretty cool. I will continue to say this but I am having a great summer and I can't wait to keep having fun the rest of the summer and enjoy spending time and having fun with people.

Holding the winning fish

Bringing my fish to the judge!

See you all on the harbor!

-Marco

Holy Mackerel a Great Year!

The Annual Fan Pier Fishing Tournament this year was a blast! This has to be my favorite time of the year, even better than new years! I mean who would not want to fish with the kids from Boston, and try to win first place with the largest fish, it is something very different, fun, and I am happy I could be apart of it for the past four years!

I love the way this year is going so far, and honestly have no problems. My role as a LHE, has helped me teach the kids and help everyone substantially. During the tournament, I helped Preston catch five Mackerel, and had a great time on the Fallon boat. I was shocked when Marcos came to the pier with a huge striped bass and won the tournament, it was awesome watching him and seeing how happy he was. It has been a lot of fun! 

- Ahmed Hassan

Fan Pier Fishing Tournament

Today we set out to Fan Pier for an exciting fishing tournament! The day started and ended with nothing but smiles from us all. This was a great experience, from sailing out on the harbor to fish, to riding on a $1.1 million boat, to actually catching my first fish. This was a great day! There were many winners for awards such as most fish and biggest fish for both boys and girls. Although all of us didn't win a fishing award, we were all winners at the end of the day.

We had a few guests today as well, Red Sox's players Will Middlebrooks and Jackie Bradley Jr. We were surprised by their guest appearances at Fan Pier. We had a chance to talk to them, and get their autographs. They were even surprised at the number of fish we caught and even the sizes of the big ones.

Overall, today was a joyful day. Everyone went home with a new experience. For me it was catching my first fish and riding a boat for the first time. Although we had a good day, like all days it had to come to an end. I just cant wait until the next fishing tournament, where I hope I can be the winner!






See you next time,
Preston

Fishing 101

This week was a very interesting and entertaining one. Save the Harbor along with the Boys and Girls Club came together and had a huge fishing tournament in The Harbor. I was paired with one of the kids from the Boys and Girls club; his name was Sammy. Sammy is a upcoming senior who has done amazing activities including diving and snorkeling. However, Sammy had never gone fishing before and was a bit disturbed at the thought of holding the fish and cutting up the bait. It reminded me of myself before I started to take the same risks he was facing. I told him about how I was afraid of touching worms and always wanted someone else to put my bait on for me. I told him that things like this will happen. Worms, particularly sand worms, do look reallllllyyy gross but  I knew that after he caught his first fish he would want to put his own bait on to get back to fishing. He was still a bit shook up, so we decided to pair up as a team and fish. I first showed him how the fishing rod works starting with the correct finger placement and ending with tugging and reeling when a fish was biting. I then gave him the rod and let him have at it. Not too long after I saw him throwing his line out, tightening the slack and even switching his own bait. He seemed more experienced than me ! I came over a few times and asked how things were going, but I was sure he knew exactly what to do . Not too long after that Sammy caught a nice sized flounder! It made me happy that I taught someone how to fish and that he caught one without my help.

Me Explaining How to Use the Rod

Sam Fishing by himself

- Chemar David

Fan Pier Fishing Tournament & A lot Of Fun

   Hello everyone,
 
       Tuesday was great day for me because it was Save the Harbor / Save the Bay's Fan Pier Fishing Tournament. It was nice weather, not really hot. Also it was my first time on a boat. I am really happy that I got a chance to go fishing on a boat. I really enjoyed the Fan Pier Fishing Tournament because it was fun being on a boat in the Boston Harbor. I started to learn to fish too. I did not catch any fish because I had never been fishing before. Hopefully, I will catch something next time, but my cousin, Roza, caught fish and we brought some home for dinner. I was really happy to eat fresh fish for dinner.

Fish!

      My mom cooked the fish, and my family and I enjoyed a delicious and healthy fresh fish dinner. Fish was not really my favorite food but I really like it.

My sister eating fish with enjera 

Roza's mom cooked fish for dinner too which was different and very healthy. It was really delicious food. Also I learned how to cook fish with different things. Now fish has become my favorite food.

Fish with onion, oil, hot sauce and lemon 

See you on the water,
  Filmawit.

 

For The Love of Cod

This Thursday marked Save The Harbor's annual Fan Pier Fishing Tournament, and it was an eventful one to say the least. I along with four others were placed on the Dive Inn, with its captain Steve Sacco at the helm.

With no bait on board, we had to stick to trolling and jigging to pull in our fish. To me this was a nonissue, as I often prefer the challenge and work of lure fishing to the waiting game involved with bait. Additionally it gave me the opportunity to better explain the finer points of fishing to the other members of my boat. One of the kids, joining us from The Boys and Girls Club, really took to the instruction and wanted to know everything he could about fishing; which lures to use, how to use different types of reels, what types of fish we might catch, and so on.

While learning the basics of fishing is great, it can become quite tedious if there is no catching involved. Fortunately after only a few minutes of trolling we were able to get him on a rod with a small striper on the other end. I was happy to hear that this was his first.

Not too big, but still a fun fight.

After a little more trolling with no luck, Captain Steve decided to make a location change, and had us reel up and lock down for the run out to Graves Light. Rumor had it that, despite the relatively early date, some bluefish had been spotted out that way, and I was excited to get my first of the season.

Once there, we got right back to trolling, hoping pick up a bite. With no luck and the clock running down on the tournament I suggested a change in tactics, so Captain Steve cut the engines, and I outfitted our rods with a selection of jigs. After giving everyone some instruction on what to do, we had our jigs deep, hoping for some cod, or anything for that matter, to put our boat in contention for the win. Jazeel was first, as he hooked into a nice 24in cod, caught on a pink and chartreuse butterfly jig. I was next with a much smaller, but at least in my opinion, better looking fish.

Jazeel with his.

And me with mine.

Capt. Steve managed to hook a nice bivalve

Unfortunately, the long run back in meant that we had to pack up before we had the chance to hook into another fish. On the bright side, we were able to get a nice fish in the boat and I had the excitement of nice fight. All in all, a great day out on the water. Many thanks to Steve for his time and the use of his beautiful boat.

- Happy to be catching,
                Tom Rebula

Fan Pier Fishing Tournament

Save the Harbor/Save the Bay's Fan Pier fishing tournament was today. We started the day with breakfast. The breakfast was very good. After breakfast they passed us a white Save the Harbor/Save the Bay fishing shirt that we all had to put on. Next, Bruce divided the Junior Program Assistants and paired us with kids from the Boys and Girls Club. Then, we all got on different boats.

Boats Docked at Fan Pier

                           
As we left the dock, we picked up the bait that we were given to catch the winning fish. On our way to one of the destinations, I saw a lot of lobster traps and an island that has a lot of rocks filled with birds. We used defrosted clams and blood worms as bait to catch the fish. We also used different fishing poles.

Hours had passed and we still hadn't caught a single fish. We did get stopped by the Coast Guard to do a routine check, but it was fun being on a boat in the middle of the Boston Harbor. When we came back to the dock, there were only two teams who were able to catch a the winning fish.

See you on the Harbor,

Edward

Fishing Tournament

                                                                                      Big smiles, we have a lot of fun .                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                           Yesterday was cloudy. We had fishing trip in the ocean. At the morning, we arrived to Fan Piers to meet each other. We had two boxes of donuts and two bottles of coffee. It was for breakfast. We went to the dock and we got in the boat. There were five group in five boat. I was in a boat with four people. My group went to the ocean near Long Island, we stayed there and we started fishing, we put a fishing rod with six fishing hook into the ocean. We caught a stripe bass that was twenty two inches, but it wasn't enough size to get it, so we put it back into the ocean. 

We caught a stripe bass.

We went to mainland, Cyndi bought hot chocolate for us. We went back to the ocean, we were fishing, I caught seaweed three times. My teammates and I didn't get any fish at that time. We went back to the dock, we ate lunch, and we took the pictures with everyone. My group was the team that caught a biggest fish, the other group caught thirty little fish, so my group won, we got fishing rods. We have a lot of fun and a great day.

Fishing On The Harbor

So i thought i was all warmed up and ready to go for this big fishing tournament. It was a rainy and cold day and not a great day for catching fish but i kept my hopes up and gave it a try. We were out on the Harbor for about 4 hours we also had a opportunity to ride on some pretty cool boats for the morning. I wish i could of caught at least one fish but all i got was seaweed every time.

It was a really great day despite the weather i enjoyed taking a little trip around the Harbor with my co-workers. I also want to say thanks to all the guys that let us go out on their boats for the day. Hopefully next year i can bring a big catch home. For now its time to get back to my favorite part about my job working at my favorite site and working with the kids.  



 
Live, Love, Laugh


Mark Rose

Prepping for the Fan Pier Fishing Invitational

This morning the Save the Harbor summer staff participated in the 3rd Annual Fan Pier Fishing Invitational!  Each Junior Program Assistant (JPA) was asked to invite a guest this year; whether that be a friend, parent/guardian, or any other family member.  The JPA's were so excited when they found out last Thursday about bringing a guest, that many informed me on Friday the name of their guest.  The summer staff and guests will be on one of five fishing boats tomorrow, with the biggest boat being The Belle.  

But before we can "fish-on" some necessary preparations needed to be gathered....

Stop 1: Meet with Michael Fallon - The Fallon Company and Kevin Lussier
Matt and I headed to Fan Pier late morning to discuss the final plans for the fishing invitational.  I had never been to Fan Pier before and it was simply amazing.  The new buildings, pier, and Strega on the Waterfront all at your disposal, who wouldn't love this area?!  We discussed logistics, who was fishing, how many boats were being used, departure and return times, lunch and awards the winners.

Stop 2: John Nagle Co.
In order to catch Striped Bass or Black Sea Bass tomorrow we need bait and what better place to get three frozen flats of Herring then Nagles.  This was my third time at Nagles and every time they are very helpful and efficient, never making me wait long for the bait.  I always have to remember to wear sneakers and grab a hairnet while getting the Herring.  Thank goodness there aren't any photos. Seriously.

Stop 3: Fishing Fanatics - Everett, MA
Shortly after picking up the Herring, I headed to Everett to visit Peter Santini at Fishing Fanatics.  I was sent to pick up prizes for the fishing winners (and no I am not spoiling the surprise as to what they are!), sea worms, sinkers, circle hooks, and frozen clams that Peter thought would be great to use as extra bait.  The shop was loaded with different fishing rods, hooks, bait, and pretty much anything you would ever need to fish - even crab traps!  Peter and his staff were so friendly and kept cracking jokes as to all the equipment I was picking up, I couldn't stop laughing.
 

A fisherman's dream

As I drove back into the Fish Pier, Iris, Matt, and Becky were waiting for me to unload my car.  There WOULD be a photo but it was vetoed and nearly impossible to take while balancing a flat of defrosting herring in one arm.  Oh well, maybe next year!

Stop 4: Target
Matt stopped in for some water, Gatorade, and ice tea.

This morning's preparations included:
   1. Dunkin Donuts - coffee, munchkins, and muffins for the staff before the fishing begins
   2. Cafe Trio - LUNCH!
   3. Emack & Bolio's - unfortunately there was no ice cream today...Emack and Bolio's was closed.

I'm sure you are wondering how this fishing tournament went.  Here's a sneak peak at my team for the day:

Ready to catch some fish!

See you on the harbor,
 Bridget