A Day in the Life of a Rockaway Fisherman: Forever Two Worlds
Growing up in Rockaway, just a few blocks from the ocean and a short train ride or drive from Manhattan, leaves a person with the exhilarating feeling of existing between two worlds. That precise feeling is what inspired Rockaway native Pat Butera to name his charter fishing business Forever Two Worlds. He took to the water like a “waterette,” learning to swim at just 18 months old, and swam competitively through his teenage years.
He’d been “in” with the multi-generational surf dude community in his hometown since his mom first let him start hanging out with guys twice his age at 11 years old. They took him under their wing, along to the Breezy Point jetty to surf and cast, and he’s never looked back.
Butera credits fishing and surfing with keeping him out of trouble—he swore off drinking, smoking and drugs at 19, and bought his boat at 22. He’s been pursuing his passion professionally ever since.
For Butera, there are commercial fishing days, when he goes about 75–120 miles offshore to catch tuna with a tight-knit, trusty crew—“You don’t want to be trapped out there with someone who’s, like, ‘I wanna go home. I can’t do this anymore!’”—and there are charter boat days, where he makes his bread and butter taking folks out and teaching them how to fish. And then there are the big expeditions like the one he took to Outer Banks, North Carolina, last winter, to catch his paycheck (his crew’s bestselling fish sold for a little more than $5,000). But even on an “off” day, you’ll likely find Butera on his boat because there’s always work to be done.
“I’m married to this boat,” he says.
We joined his crew to find out what a day in the life of a Rockaway fisherman looks like in 2018.
4:30am—Duty calls. If Butera’s taking out a charter for the day, to catch bass (this spring he averaged 3–5 trips per week), before the rooster’s first crow his alarm is now ringing, and he’s up and at ’em.
5:15am—The charter arrives. The new passengers introduce themselves.
5:30am—Butera turns on the boat and its generator, unplugs the shore power and gets the cabin nice and warm, or cooled off with AC, depending on the season. Then he runs through safety measures and tells his fishing compadres for the day where the life jackets and flares are located.
Now it’s time to catch live bait.
6:30am—“For bass fishing, we throw the net. It’s a cast net, and we throw the net for live bunker,” he says. “Bait is very important when you’re bass fishing. Your charter is pretty much based upon the bait. If you’ve got live bait, you can pretty much go anywhere. We do troll a lot, but having the bait is a nice second option. If we can get a few fish on the troll, then we can switch over and everyone has a rod in their hand live bait fishing.”
7:00am—Butera guides his novice anglers through catching their fish. They fish within the legal limits—one striped bass per person, at 28 inches. The allowance used to be more, but Butera thinks it’s better this way. “If you’re one person, I think you’re gonna go home with just enough meat to feed your family or have a nice barbecue, and not waste fish. Tons of people just put fish in the freezer and just forget about it; it gets freezer burn and stuff. So, I feel like it’s a big waste at that point.”
11:30am—Back at the dock, Butera fillets everyone’s fish for them. He snaps their photo; many of their mugs can be found on the Forever Two Worlds Instagram account, stoked about their catch. Butera says most of his customers come to him through social media.
Noon—If he’s pulling a double shift, as he often does, Butera waves goodbye to his charter guests, and does a little regroup to get the boat ready to roll for trip number two. Clean the windows, mop the floors, re-do the tackle, put new leaders on the fly line, “shore stuff.”
6:00pm—“My girlfriend is a trouper,” says Butera. By the time he gets off the boat, it’s often 8:30 or later in the evening, and he feels “zombied out.”
“She cooks dinner half the time or we just get something to eat real quick and half the time once I hit the couch I’m not getting up. I go right to bed.” And the clock resets, and he does it all over again.
Pat Butera | @forevertwoworlds
Forever Two Worlds | @forevertwoworlds
