At promptly 4:15 a.m., the alarm went off.

An old fisherman’s credo goes: Early to bed, early to rise, fish like hell and make up lies. Well, three out of four ain’t bad.

I was up at that time of day (is it really day?) to participate in the Puget Sound Angler’s Blackmouth Derby on a cloudy, rainy Saturday. I had gathered all the gear, all the local secrets and even my grandparents, John and Norma Berto, who traditionally don’t get up until around noon.

We loaded the gear onto our plush cruise boat. It wasn’t one of the sleek, well-equipped fishing boats that had beat us out of the harbor by an hour. We found where everybody was trolling for the elusive King salmon, the largest of the species.

Joining the procession of boats a couple hundred yards off shore, we marched like a herd of turtles, going as slow as possible hoping the lure of flashing light, a squid-looking device and herring-flavored hooks would be too much to resist to the fish.

I must say one thing, we were persistent. Up and down the coast we preyed on pretty much nothing. Not even the high-tech screens in the boat could tell us how to catch a fish. The GPS told us where we had been and led us to a place that was aptly named Fish Haven, although on that day it was more like Fish Barren.

In five hours, we travelled about two miles, had not seen fish one, checked and rechecked our bait and consumed a pot and a half of coffee. But the best part of it (yes there was a best part) was all of that. Fishing is a way to cleanse the soul (sometimes not the liver). It frees you from the burden of life, the clamor of deadlines, paying bills and children. While fishing, you know what the most stressful part is? Making sure you are at the proper depth — that’s it.

Lessons from a grandfather

So, I have never really been salmon fishing, sure I have thrown a Buzz Bomb into the end of Penn Cove along with the rest of the island, but I’ve never done the up-at-4 a.m.-cold-rainy-how-slow-can-you-go salmon fishing.

My grandfather on the other hand is the true definition of an old salt. We’re talking hurricanes in Baja, close your eyes and get home kind of guy. I felt like young Luke seeking the knowledge of Yoda. He informed me on how to properly tie the sinker and how to rig the leader. He even let me drive the boat, how cool is that?

Health has kept him from even looking at his fishing gear in more than a year and he was all smiles to have the opportunity to drive his boat in circles and catch nothing.

He is full of stories about Whidbey Island and its history. I had no idea that Ebey’s Prairie used to be farmed by Chinese immigrants. Penn Cove used to be teeming with fish. He told me about the wreck near Coupeville. It was like being on a history tour, not a fishing trip, but that was OK, because it was worth it.

Nothing caught, nothing earned

So here we were, my reporting duties warranted an early arrival back into the marina. The scales opened at approximately 2:30 p.m. and that’s where I needed to be. We decided to stop and try the passage into Penn Cove, which historically has been fruitful for my guides. After trolling for a while, my grandmother’s line begins to spool out, a sure sign of dinner.

A brief struggle and momentary panic ensues as none of us are really sure what to do in the event an actual fish is on the end of the line. She struggled to reel in the line, sure it was a behemoth. After what seemed like an hour of battling (Really about 45 seconds) we saw the spectacle that was her fish — all eight inches and maybe two pounds of it. It was so difficult to bring in because it was sideways, causing a bit of drag in the water.

We released the infant, allowing it time to grow into next year’s champion fish and headed for port.

We stowed the gear and wiped our hands of the smell of bait. We would have loved for an actual fish, but we settled for a day of stories, hot chocolate and admiring other people’s hard-earned meals.