Living off the Norwegian Land (Part 2: Fisk!)

One of the most invigorating parts of my vacation was when I went fishing. I strapped a knife to my belt, put on a life vest and headed to the boat. SEM knew what she was doing and GA and I were ready to learn. We put the oars in the water and once we had a good pace we put in the otter trawler.

The otter is this little plank of wood with a long fishing line with 10 hooks and flies coming off of it. The line is connected to a piece of metal that pivots backs and forth so that it can change directions. As long as someone keeps rowing it looks like there are 10 flies dancing across the water. Irresistible. We made loops between the two island in the lake hoping something would bite. Sure enough, one did.

GA was holding the line and it started to pull. I was rowing at the time and to keep the fish on the line it didn't matter where I took us as long as I kept moving and avoided running ashore. SEM winded it slowly back in, being sure not to slice her hand with one of the other hooks. GA scooped it up with a net and brought into the boat. Finally, we had it! SEM took it off the hook, squeezed hard and clubbed it with an old wooden mallet designed just for this (sorry, there is no other way to describe what happened).

The otter went back in, GA guided it, I rowed and SEM pulled in the fish. After two more catches I was ready to change roles. I pulled in a fish of my own, unhooked it and then killed it.

We caught a total of 6 trout that day. After we anchored our little row boat and tied it to the dock I learned how to clean them too. Sem carefully and craftily showed me how to gut the fish. I slid the knife on my belt out of its sheath, cut the fish open and emptied it out.

I wasn't sure how I would feel about this whole excursion. I felt a little squeamish and bad at the though of deceiving and killing something. But, the more I thought about it, I felt that I needed to do it. I needed to be a part of the whole (mild water) hunting process and know how it feels.

It took three of us to catch one fish. We were tired and had worked hard and for hours. I felt truly powerful. I had to use the power of my arms, stomach and legs to keep us going in the rowboat. I almost squeezed a fish to death because I didn't want to screw up when I clubbed it. I slit the fish open and made it ready to eat. I helped feed my friends. We didn't need any middle men. It was SEM, GA and I that took care of it on this day.

(To be historically accurate I should note that we had a second excursion that day to catch our 6th and final fish. JB helped to bring this one in.)


Below are a few very short clips of demonstrations the start of cleaning a fish and taking the skin of in order to eat it (please note KH having her way with the fish behind SEM's slow speed demo.)