Blue Water Gold Rush
After reading Tom Kendrick's Blue Water Gold Rush I yearned to experience what a life working out at sea was like. He writes about his years as an urchin diver out of Santa Barbara and Northern California during the late 70's and early 80's. The descriptions he gives of the urchin business in its infancy here in California makes one want to be transported right back to that time period and place.
The current commercial fisherman living in and around the Channel Islands surely know what Kendrick is writing about. When I see those fisherman off our shores I wonder what it would be like to go out to the islands consistently and brave the harsh conditions. Of course there would be many perks, such as being able to access hidden waves and much interaction with the oceanic ecosystem while making your living off the sea. Yet, as romantic as it sounds it seems that in these current times after which we have pillaged the oceans for everything and anything it might be hard to truly practice sustainable fishing.
My hat goes off to those who do practice it and as Rasta has said if you care about the ocean then don't eat seafood because 90% of it is harvested in an unsustainable way. So as I migrate towards complete vegetarianism with a little meat and fish here and there I always remind myself that the ocean needs us now more than ever. At times I even wonder if there's still such a thing as sustainable fishing today. Maybe we just need to leave the whole big blue sea alone for a few years before we can claim to be harvesting seafood in a sustainable fashion.