"Shark tore off half the body with one bite, swam down, then came right back and grabbed the head just as I was reaching for it. You could hear its teeth slap together.”

Tony Biski shook his head, bloodshot eyes squinting from beneath a weathered baseball cap against the late-summer wind and sun. His boat planed over unseasonably calm seas, always scanning for signs of fish.

“Damn thing musta been 15 feet long.”

His shark tale was spurred by passing one of the many yellow buoys around Monomoy Island, just off Chatham, MA, which scan the surrounding Atlantic seeking radio transmissions from tags embedded in the more than 100 great white sharks known to cruise the area. Sharks have been a hot-button issue for the region as more and more great whites arrive every year to feast on a huge, protected and rapidly multiplying seal population. The toothy interlopers continually cause beach closures and experts predict it’s only a matter of time before a fatal attack on a human occurs. It’s a hard thing to ignore as we skirt sandy shores lined with mountains of honking seal sausages, many bearing the telltale marks of a close getaway...

Tony points a weathered finger off the bow, cigarette-hoarse voice rasping, “There!” Sharks are forgotten as tails and fins whip the water to boiling. Silver scales catch the sun as false albacore tear into a disco bait ball of bunker under a swarm of squawking gulls. Hilary Hutcheson is already standing, casting into the fray, and soon her rod bends and reel whines as a false albacore’s greasy muscle mass launches away from the boat. Perched at the stern, JT Van Zandt shouts as he, too, hooks into a fish. Tony stands at the ready between them, a hint of a grin etched into his round, sunburned face.

When I say, “I’m from Cape Cod” to anyone who lives outside a three-hour drive of the place, their eyes glaze wistfully with daydreams of JFK’s Camelot. A sea breeze rustles their hair, sand fills their shoes, embroidered whales breach on pastel pants. Patti Page’s “You’re sure to fall in love…with old Cape Cod” rides an aromatic wave of coconut suntan lotion while Rockwellian children play in the surf. My whole life is reduced to a preconceived notion, a postcard from their brain’s nostalgia center with hazy hues, high tax brackets and never-ending tumblers of vodka on the rocks. Who isn’t fond of sand dunes and salty air?

This fantastical fever dream is, of course, a fabrication. Cape Cod isn’t an idealized, sandy version of the American dream. Looking for a place where the sun is always shining, and rich and beautifully tan people in vintage SUVs choke down lobster rolls while waving to passing sailboats? I know the spot. It’s a hundred miles south, at the tip of Long Island. It’s called the Hamptons.

Cape Cod, on the other hand, is Mad Magazine’s sardonic take on that Hamptons life. We too have loads of vacationers every summer, but our traffic jam of doughy, angst-ridden invaders is a far cry from the tabloid-fodder celebutantes and plastic surgery disasters cavorting on Montauk’s beaches. You’ll spot the occasional pastel-pushing stereotype, but they’re usually not the fashionable scions of wealthy families. They’re real estate agents, or someone who just got hustled by a real estate agent and hasn’t weathered enough off-seasons to see their preppy dream decay into ritualistic liver flogging in shabby, nautically themed bars with ironic names.

Like anywhere with a long seafaring history and large population of fishing folks, the Cape has had its fair share of illicit activities and sordid deeds. We were taught as kids that Blackbeard himself was attracted to our waters, drawn by a bounty of easy fishing and the beauty of a local lady, an alleged witch named Hannah Screecham. So taken was he that it’s whispered he chose to bury a chunk of his famed treasure near her house on Dead Neck Island off the mid-Cape village of Osterville. Ironically, the former site of Screecham’s home is now a massive estate belonging to some modern-day pirates, the Koch brothers, so if gold wasn’t there before, it sure is now.

Cape Cod isn’t an idealized, sandy version of the American dream. Looking for a place where the sun is always shining, and rich and beautifully tan people in vintage SUVs choke down lobster rolls while waving to passing sailboats? I know the spot. It’s a hundred miles south, at the tip of Long Island. It’s called the Hamptons.

While not cast in 24-karat gold, JT and Hilary were learning the exhilaration of hooking into albies, and then some. With torpedo-shaped bodies topped with brilliant, oil-in-mercury swirls of green, blue and black that give way to a mirrored silver, they’re taut with muscle and capable of incredible speed and endurance, as evidenced by the amount of backing that sang off their reels. Also called bonito or “little tunnys,” false albacore are the most common tuna found in the Atlantic. But since they prefer warm water, Cape Cod fishermen only have a short window during the dog days of summer to chase them as they rip around in endless pursuit of prey. A testament to Tony’s expertise, he kept their rods bent almost nonstop, gunning after schools as they vanished into the depths, somehow knowing just where they’d reappear. Adrenaline hung in the air, its giddy energy almost physical.

It’s the adrenaline rush that draws those with an addictive personality and love of living on the edge to fishing. Often, this personality type is also drawn to the copious amounts of illicit substances that have woven their way into the Cape’s culture. Myths abound of JFK’s father, Joe, famously alleged to have been a bootlegger, standing sentry along the coast under the guise of angling while keeping an eye out for the cops or awaiting a black-market delivery. All too often the Cape Cod Times has headlines implicating fishing boats in the illegal importing of drugs ranging from pot to cocaine. One legend in particular holds that a group of well-known Irish sympathizers sent contraband the other way, smuggling guns to the IRA. Most recently, the Cape has found itself to be ground zero of our nation’s opiate epidemic, subject to countless national articles and even an HBO documentary. As the body count rises, finding orange-and-white syringes alongside the usual cigarette butts and piles of nip bottles in parking lots has become the norm.

Most recently, the Cape has found itself to be ground zero of our nation’s opiate epidemic, subject to countless national articles and even an HBO documentary. As the body count rises, finding orange-and-white syringes alongside the usual cigarette butts and piles of nip bottles in parking lots has become the norm.

JT and Hilary had finally come to visit after false starts and countless scheduling conflicts, lured by hog stripers that could tie a nine-weight in knots. While that had yet to happen—the seasonal striped bass migration can be fickle, and we were pushing the envelope between late summer’s dead season and early fall’s blitz—I hoped this bluebird day of whining reels and leaping mackerel made up for the lack of striped beasts a little.

I’d been worried. Being entrusted to entertain and find steady fish for a couple of professional guides—Hilary is a legend on Montana’s rivers and JT leads clients to fish all over Colorado and Texas—bore with it some weight. Despite being more of a dirtbag adventure-chaser than polished angling professional, I was well aware it was going to be challenging to produce the epic fish I’d played up when we’d first made this plan months back. But this was when schedules aligned, and I was determined to make it work. I’ve heard something about boundless optimism being a good mask for stupidity.

After prowling the Cape’s coastline hunting striped bass, it became clear we were ahead of the curve, migration-wise. Schoolies—young stripers ranging from 8-20 inches—popped up here and there, but the leviathans I’d raved about were proving elusive. Luckily, Tony had offered to take us out, magically finding a hole in a schedule that can book out months in advance. His reputation as a guide and character proved well deserved amid a combination of fish-finding and yarn-spinning. I breathed a sigh of relief at the smiles on JT’s and Hil’s faces at the end of the day—at least the trip wasn’t going to be a total waste of their time.

And after wearing ourselves out cranking in all those fish, good food was one thing I knew how to guarantee.

At any given moment on Cape Cod, you’re not more than 10 minutes from the best damn seafood of your life. I’m talking fried clams so golden, so crispy, so fresh, every bite is like the flour-encrusted mollusks are making love to your mouth, their hot salty juices mixing with your own in climactic gastrointestinal ecstasy. Our lobster rolls are second to none, unless you happen to be from Maine and want to get all pah-tay-toe/pah-tah-toe. Every clam shack has its own chowder recipe, each better than the last, leaving you blissed-out with a sweaty sheen of heavy cream running down your chin. Then there’s smoked bluefish, a local delicacy that transforms brutish, oily-fleshed monsters into a delicate treat. Save room for a stuffed quahog, deep fried in its shell and as soaked in microwaved butter as you are by now in local beer.

Unfortunately, man does not live on fried food alone. Fortunately, every Cape bay and stream houses its own muddy flats of oyster claims, each with a unique flavor profile. My personal favorites hail from Cotuit Oyster Company on the south side of the island. They’re sweet, buttery perfection, best consumed at the village’s only watering hole, the Kettle Ho, named for the two items settlers conned the local Wampanoag tribe into taking for the patch of land upon which they founded the town.

Fully embracing my less-than-alpha status as a human, I openly balked at the thought of paddling seal-gray kayaks through shark-infested waters, but, after an internal pep talk, I arrived at there being worse ways to go than showing a fellow angler a good time.

The next morning Hilary caught her flight back to Montana and JT and I considered our options. Yesterday he’d been taken by the clear waters around Monomoy, more so by Tony’s stories of pursuing tailing stripers across the shallow sandy shelf running around the island. Fully embracing my less-than-alpha status as a human, I openly balked at the thought of paddling seal-gray kayaks through shark-infested waters, but, after an internal pep talk, I arrived at there being worse ways to go than showing a fellow angler a good time. After a quick stop to stock up on liquid courage, we were on our way down Cape.

Cape Cod’s Route 6A is heralded as one of the most scenic drives in America. Winding more than 60 miles from the two bridges separating us from the rest of America via manmade canal, it runs all the way to Orleans, gateway to the outer Cape’s miles of sandy beaches, towering dunes and surfable waves. It’s one of the only ways to cross multiple villages without getting on the actual highway, which devolves to a hot mess of sun worshippers and speed traps during the summer months. Driving along, it’s impossible not to notice that Cape Cod is a place where fishing is a way of life that borders on insanity.

Every Dunkin’ Donuts parking lot—and there are dozens of them—is jammed with jacked-up Jeeps and pickup trucks bristling like rusty porcupines with surf rods. Splayed liberally across their chassis, often covering the salt-infused rust spots that overcome every metal surface due to ocean salt in the summer and rock salt in the winter, are all manner of kitschy, cutesy fishing stickers. Obligatory cooler and sunglass company logos mingle with giant striped bass chasing lures, social statements such as “piping plovers (an endangered local seabird) taste like chicken,” and nautically themed brand names with cheesy heavy-metal fonts. Wobbly old men weave in and out of traffic on “canal cruisers,” rusty vintage bikes with PVC tubes attached to hold fishing rods and a milk crate lashed on for beer and bait. Dilapidated seasonal bait-and-tackle shops are propped up every quarter mile, some a little too close for comfort to a neighboring seafood restaurant. Even the graffiti is fishy—one highway underpass along 6A is famously tagged with a giant striper courtesy of local painter Edie Vonnegut, whose famous writer father used to sell cars down the road in Barnstable.

The action on Cape Cod is not limited to the salt. More than 1,000 lakes and ponds pock the landscape, many bleeding to the sea through brackish rivers that were home to some of our young nation’s first trout clubs. Emerging from this cultural detritus is a small, not-exactly-close-knit community of fly anglers. The scene is equal parts nose-in-the-air retired CEO types kitted out in the latest and greatest gear and a particular salty, East Coast version of a trout bum: working-class folks who ride the seasonal economy as best they can in order to spend the warmer half of the year in waders chasing the striper migration out of beater trucks, surviving on the graciousness of friends with restaurant jobs and a clammer’s meager income.

Meanwhile, the sharks go about their business, unseen, giving absolutely zero thought to the over-evolved skin sack full of mollusks, fry grease and beer bobbing in a plastic bowl above them.

Here’s the impossible thing about kayaking in a place you know is heavily populated by great white sharks: pushing those toothy, gory Jaws scenes out of your head. You try to avoid looking down while paddling in even, steady strokes so as to not unintentionally impersonate a wounded sea creature and trigger the prey instinct of any passing apex predators. This is best accomplished with eyes fixed ahead, teeth gritted, Neil Diamond’s greatest AM radio gold running through your mind to keep that overactive imagination at bay. Meanwhile, the sharks go about their business, unseen, giving absolutely zero thought to the over-evolved skin sack full of mollusks, fry grease and beer bobbing in a plastic bowl above them. I sighed, staring ahead as JT stalwartly led the way, navigating a moderate chop and passing fishing boats without a thought to the stunning irony of fishermen being caught and eaten by a fish. Would I even want to be caught and released? Would it be better to just have it end in a bloody flash of bubbles?

We weren’t caught, or even hunted, so far as I could tell. Then again, we also didn’t catch anything ourselves. Apart from casting to a few shadows, which slunk around in formation and uniformly ignored us, we returned to shore without so much as a schoolie or snapper blue. All I could do was shrug and apologize lamely—I’d lured the pair into something of a bust, striper-wise.

It’s easy to get caught up in the negative aspects of where you live, especially when it’s overstuffed with milling tourists battling for the same limited resources locals are. You find yourself letting frustration and a sense of entitlement take over while waiting in long lines at the store, getting stuck in traffic in the middle of your small town, or showing up to fish and seeing the shore lined with cigarette-flicking strangers. But there’s a reason all these people choose to spend their vacations crammed shoulder-to-shoulder or bumper-to-bumper, and it’s the same reason locals brave the gray, bone-chilling winters and limited employment and cultural opportunities—because Cape Cod is a uniquely magical place. Sure, anyone can find reasons to hate on where they live after a while, but at the end of the day, locals know we have it good. Maybe that’s why it’s so easy to be snarky about the place to outsiders—a subversive, reverse-psychology play at keeping them away.

As he pulled his bags from the back of my truck at Logan Airport before dawn the next morning, JT vowed with a handshake to return to Monomoy’s flats in peak season. From the determined glint in his eye, I fully expect to see him next summer. There’s an old wives’ tale that claims once you get Cape Cod sand in your shoes, you’ll always come back. Smiling and waving goodbye, I had a hunch that hooking up with a striper, no matter how small, has much the same effect. I just hope this time he gets here before the sharks do.

The Flyfish Journal Volume 8 Issue 4 Feature This is Not the Hamptons

above A trio of bait fisherman man in the jetty in Falmouth, MA. A common scene during the summer, the shoulder seasons will see the number of anglers swell, often with elbow-to-elbow crowds casting for scup, snapper blues, sea robins, stripers and anything else they can coax with frozen squid, sea worms and whatever other enticing morsels they find. It's common for pier fishermen to have whole buckets of fish ready to bring home for supper.

8.4 Issue Features

The Farthest Flats

THIS IS NOT THE HAMPTONS

Looking for Mr. Johnson

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