Episode 87: Capt. Steve Kilpatrick - The Holy Grail

Mill House Podcast

Mill House

Wilderness, Sports, Leisure, Education, Hobbies

5 • 973 Ratings

🗓️ 22 May 2023

⏱️ 68 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Captain Steve Kilpatrick grew up with a cane pole and a .22… Hunting and fishing has always been his life. I first meet this likable man in the late 80’s when I was fishing the fabled flats of Homosassa. He has always been impressively kind, and when I called to talk to him about the day he and his angler Jim Holland jr. caught the 202.8 pound world record behemoth, he was really excited about hosting us in his home. Remember this is an important fish. This fish is the greatest tarpon ever caught on a fly rod because its the only fish over 200 pounds, The Holy Grail! They caught the fish everyone had been chasing for decades. We arrived at his home in Chiefland, Florida on a beautiful, open 10 acre parcel with large live Oaks with hanging Spanish moss on many. His home is filled with stunning furniture that he’s made; dressers, drawers, beds, tables. All made by a true craftsman. He works on all the equipment in the yard and many of his friend’s boats are rigged by Steve, the Fixer! Over the next few days he and his wife Peggy made sure that we’d leave there like family members. But it would all be about the story of a big fish caught by a legendary guide and a young angler.

Transcript

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0:00.0	For decades, the quest to catch a 200-pound tarpon was in the back of many great record chasers' minds,
0:13.7	Pate, Apt, Evans, and everyone else
0:17.4	who fished homoissass of Florida.
0:19.9	Tremendous fish have been caught over the years, but the greatest one eluded them all.
0:26.2	Many saw her, hooked her, but she had her way until March 11, 2001, when Captain Steve Kilpatrick retied a fly on Jim Holland Jr.'s leader
0:37.5	and caught a 2002-pound behemoth. On today's podcast we speak with Captain Kilpatrick about the largest
0:46.8	tarpin ever caught on a legal I. GFA leader. We broke everything, we broke lines, we broke hooks, we broke rods, we broke our minds, we broke our minds, we broke marriages, we broke the whole thing.
1:08.0	We came up with the idea of going out that night and chasing girls and whoever had the biggest pair of
1:13.6	panties went to pot. I knocked another arrow and he turned around the other way and
1:17.8	I shot him going through the other way so I double-lunged him both ways. But it was nothing for us to paddle an air mattress out into government cut.
1:27.0	I got him on.
1:28.0	All right now, we're going to teach him a lot so.
1:31.0	I'm just an old guy that likes to fish. I'm not quitting yet. And he said, well, who
1:37.2	the hell do you think you are, Sue App? And I said, that's exactly who I am.
1:41.4	Life's journey to the grave should not be one arriving with a pretty well-preserved body,
1:48.0	but rather skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly torn out,
1:53.7	thoroughly used up, proclaiming wildly,
1:56.8	Wow, what a ride.
1:59.4	There's something fishy going on here.
2:04.0	Steve going on here. Steve is really great to have you.
2:10.0	Steve is really great to have you. It's been a little bit since I saw you last. I think it was Evans's Hall of Fame induction ceremony.
2:18.0	Yes, sir. And as a tarpin fisherman as we are, I think this is, for for me the most important interview that we've done out of 80 some
	...

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