Capt. Deb Deyo: From Healthcare to Florida Keys Charter Captain

Full transcript of the Tom Rowland Podcast, Episode 444 — Capt. Deb Deyo — From Corporate Healthcare to Blue Water Girl Charters in the Florida Keys.

Introduction

Deb Deyo: Like you said on the podcast about what it takes to become a professional fishing guide here in the Keys, you do have to live in your car. You do have to scrub toilets. You do have to go through all of that, and you do have to put in your time. I was lucky enough to be taken in by a wonderful family at Bud n' Mary's Marina, the Stanczyks. They are just a God-send to me. They started my career, and I got to learn so much — I got to work in the tackle shop and see the day-to-day of the charter business, and to watch the customers come in, because no matter what you do, customer service is number one, whether you're in the healthcare world or the fishing world. This is Captain Deb Deyo with Blue Water Girl Charters, and this is the Tom Rowland Podcast.

Tom Rowland: Welcome to the podcast today. I love finding stories of people who change their life, people who pursue their passion, people who make it happen — who do something extraordinary, something people thought they couldn't do, something that doubts the doubters. People think it's impossible to go down to the Keys and become a fishing guide, but it's not. Our guest today, Captain Deb Deyo of Blue Water Girl Charters, did just that with three hundred dollars and her car. She followed all the advice that I've given out before, and that many others have given out — if you really want to do something, start at the bottom, do whatever it takes, and make it happen. That's exactly what she did. This is an inspiring story, and I hope you stick around for this entire interview with Captain Deb Deyo of Blue Water Girl Charters. Alright, Deb, how are you?

Deb Deyo: Wonderful. How are you today?

Tom Rowland: I'm doing well — doing very well. Outstanding, in fact.

Deb Deyo: Thank you for having me on today.

Tom Rowland: Well, thank you for doing this, and thank you for the note that you wrote — that was really, really cool. I just thought it was really cool that, first of all, I couldn't believe that I've been doing this podcast long enough for somebody to get the inspiration to go get their captain's license and start a business. It seems like I started it yesterday. But tell me your story. What's going on? You're a charter guide now in Key Largo?

Deb Deyo: Yes.

Tom Rowland: So how did it happen? What's the story?

From Nursing to a New Life in the Keys

Deb Deyo: I started fishing the Florida Keys at age five with my mom and dad, and I fished offshore and inshore until I was about twenty years old. Then I moved back and had a life in North Carolina, graduated college, and had a career in healthcare. And one day I woke up and I was like, you know what, I really want to fish. You're such an inspiration, because you've taught me so much from my couch to become who I am today — anywhere from tying knots to stocking a snook rig with the right jig head to use, and the tackle. You're an online teacher, and you have really inspired a lot of people. You probably don't know that you have.

Tom Rowland: Well, I may not know that. I mean, I know that a lot of people watch some of the stuff, but that's very nice of you to say. But I'm interested in this day that you wake up and decide you really just want to fish. So you're in the healthcare world — what were you doing there?

Deb Deyo: I was doing corporate healthcare. I'm a nurse, and I did a bunch of corporate healthcare, and life was stressful. You know, that nine-to-five.

Tom Rowland: And you wake up one day and you're like, I really want to change — but how do you do that?

Deb Deyo: Well, you take three hundred dollars, get in your vehicle, and you drive south as far as you can go.

Tom Rowland: Is that what you had, really — three hundred dollars in your vehicle?

Deb Deyo: Yes. And like you said on that podcast about what it takes to become a professional fisherman here in the Keys, you do have to live in your car, you do have to scrub toilets, you do have to go through that, and you do have to put in your time. I was lucky enough to be taken in by a wonderful family at Bud n' Mary's Marina, the Stanczyks, and they are just a God-send to me. They started my career, and I got to learn so much — I got to work in a tackle shop and see the day-to-day ins and outs of the charter business, and to watch the customers come in. Because no matter what you do, customer service is number one — whether you're in the healthcare world or the fishing world, it's all about who you have on your boat and what their experience and adventure is.

Learning the Ropes at Bud n' Mary's Marina

Tom Rowland: Man, that is awesome. So, from leaving North Carolina with three hundred dollars in your vehicle, how did you get hooked up with the Stanczyks?

Deb Deyo: Well, I first started working at Robbie's Marina, flogging pelicans off the tarpon dock. That's how I first started. When you're living out your childhood dream, I guess you've got to start from the bottom, and that was the bottom. But I worked there for about two or three weeks, and they were hiring at the tackle shop, so I applied for the job. And being a woman in this sport is quite difficult, I'll call it. You just have to get up, have tough skin, and be the first one at the docks every morning and the last one to leave. I'd work my eight-hour shift in the tackle shop, then go out in my skiff — or the bait skiff the company used — and I learned how to backcountry fish. Then I started fishing with Richard, Nick and Rick's father.

Tom Rowland: What a legend.

Deb Deyo: I've done over three hundred bonefish trips with him.

Tom Rowland: With him, like, as a mate?

Deb Deyo: Yeah, as a mate.

Tom Rowland: Really? That's amazing. He is — I mean, I'm sure you know, but he is the legend of legends. I used to watch him with all the zinc — does he still put the zinc oxide everywhere?

Deb Deyo: Absolutely, yeah.

Tom Rowland: He could put it on so thick. I'm assuming he has some areas on his face he's had to be super careful of for a while, but he'd put that zinc oxide on, and I'd see him in Saltwater Sportsman, and I'd see him in every magazine, and I was like, man, he's the guy — especially in downtown Islamorada when the big bonefish were there. He was the man. He really was. So you had the opportunity to do three hundred trips with him, starting when?

Deb Deyo: Over the last three years.

Three Hundred Trips with a Bonefishing Legend

Tom Rowland: Over the last three years — so this is really interesting, because as you know, the days of the giant Islamorada bonefish are not quite the same as they once were.

Deb Deyo: No.

Tom Rowland: So what's his opinion on that? I'd love to ask him that one day, but when he's going fishing and you're doing these three hundred charters with him, are you bonefishing, or are you doing something else?

Deb Deyo: It's a combination of bonefish and permit and tarpon, whatever — depends on the time of year, but his passion is definitely bonefishing. He showed me the light of the Florida Bay, the adventures you can have, and the serenity it can give you. The backcountry does something to your soul. His wisdom and his teachings provided me the path to where I'm at now, being able to fish. I started in a bait shop, catching bait every day, and now I have a backcountry boat that I run, and I absolutely love life. And it's because of that family.

Tom Rowland: Well, that's amazing, and we're going to get to what you're doing right now. But I'm interested in the takeaways — the opportunity you had to do three hundred trips with Richard Stanczyk is amazing, and anyone who knows anything about South Florida fishing history would be very impressed with that. So what are the big takeaways when you think about those days you spent with him, and how do you apply them to your life or your new career?

Deb Deyo: Probably the biggest one is patience. You never leave until you're finished. And there ain't no crying in baseball, either — you just have to do it. He was a big motivation, a big coach, and a mentor to me. He allowed me to show other people now what his skill and his level are, and I'll never ever be anywhere close to his level. But just having his company, being able to spend that time with him and learn from a legend himself — when you love fishing like you do and like I do, you know what kind of company that is.

Tom Rowland: And how did that opportunity present itself? I mean, you're working in the tackle shop, catching bait in the mornings — how did that progress to actually going out and being a mate for Richard Stanczyk?

Deb Deyo: Well, he takes some of his employees out fishing with him, and we got to the point — I think he saw the passion I have for bonefish. I eat, breathe, and sleep it, and I have tunnel vision when it comes to fishing. I've done that for the last three years — you've got to grind every day. I guess when you share the same passion as someone else, it's easy to get along with on a flat, and I'd consider him a father figure and a mentor. He's really shown me the light, and also showed me a new life — a happy one.

Tom Rowland: And so at one point you're just kind of an employee that he's taking out fishing, and then obviously something changes to where he's like, I think you're better suited out here than in the bait shop, since you're spending three hundred trips with him. Was there a moment, or a time, where he transitioned you out of the bait shop into full time on the boat?

Deb Deyo: No — that's when corona happened. That was coming, and then it started, and we were shut down, and nobody knew what was going to happen at that point. So I actually just moved to Key Largo because I had to, and started from there. It's a really kind of a weird thing that this went on because of corona — it allowed me to start my business, but it also took me away from that magical experience I had fishing with a legendary captain.

Getting a Captain's License

Tom Rowland: And so when all this happens, you have to move to Key Largo — did you have your captain's license yet?

Deb Deyo: Yes. So I waited — I waited two and a half years before I applied for one, even though I had the hours because I owned my own vessel in North Carolina. But I didn't want to step on anyone's toes when I got here. I wanted to pay my dues, and I wanted to come in and learn. The biggest thing sometimes about a fisherman is their ego, and I decided I just wanted to learn from the legends — I wanted to learn how to do this the correct way. So I waited a little while, and then I went online, and you probably know Mr. Flint Smith.

Tom Rowland: Oh, yeah, Flint Smith — I want to have him on the podcast so bad. He has been responsible for virtually every fisherman's captain's license that you've ever heard of.

Deb Deyo: Amazing man. He really is. I'm getting ready to go back and get my master's.

Tom Rowland: Okay — did you do it on his boat? Was he doing that with COVID? Because there was a point where he had a boat, and he'd take students out and actually fire the flares and do all that. I was before that, and the boat came later, and I don't know what the status of the boat is now. But that guy is basically responsible for so many captain's licenses — pretty much everybody I ask says, oh yeah, I got it from Flint Smith. He's a cool dude.

Deb Deyo: I did the whole program online, and it was wonderful. They test on Saturdays, and he goes through the whole entire thing — it's like being in the classroom, going through all the techniques online and on the computer.

Tom Rowland: Where did you take your test?

Deb Deyo: Down at his house.

Tom Rowland: You did? He didn't have that ability when I was there, and Miami wasn't exactly the way it is today. I remember you had to go to the Claude Pepper building in Miami — that was the government building. And at the time, I don't know if Miami was just not as nice as it is today, or if I just picked the wrong area and the wrong hotel, but I will never forget going up there. I was super nervous because this was my test for the captain's license. I'd done his class, but then we were going to go up to Miami, and I didn't have anybody to go with, so I went by myself and got a room at the closest hotel, because you had to be at the door of that building at like six-thirty. There wasn't going to be a lot of time in the morning to get there, so I picked the closest hotel, which was a horrible choice. I remember it was the worst hotel I've ever stayed in — I was on maybe the fourteenth floor, and I opened the door and thought, whoa, this place is rough. I closed the door, and there were six locks on the back of it and one of those bars you put against the door with a thing in the floor, so I started locking all those doors — I figured these are here for a reason. Then I went out to the balcony, and there were all these locks on the balcony door too, on the fourteenth floor, and I thought, people are going to crawl up here and get in? That's what they're worried about? I looked out over the balcony — really high. That was the worst hotel I've ever stayed in. I did get up in the morning and go take the test.

Deb Deyo: You actually slept?

Tom Rowland: I don't know if I slept much, but that was terrible. Now, going back to Miami for the boat show or whatever, I've looked for that hotel, and I'm pretty sure it's been torn down and replaced with something much nicer, like a Whole Foods. But I don't know what that hotel was — somebody who's lived in Miami their whole life probably knows exactly what I'm talking about. I hope your experience taking the test wasn't like that. I didn't know if I was going to make it back to Key West. But anyway — so you get this license, and then what?

Deb Deyo: And I just started fishing every day. I fished three hundred days in 2020.

Tom Rowland: Wow. And so you got your own boat?

Running Boats in the Upper Keys

Deb Deyo: Yeah, I do — I have a sixteen-foot Chaos, the bonefish edition. She's got white gunnels, that Carolina flare. I love that.

Tom Rowland: And you were able to buy this boat from working at the tackle shop and being a mate? That's awesome.

Deb Deyo: And then I took a job running a thirty-foot Gamefisherman here in Key Largo, and that's really what moved me to Key Largo — I had the backcountry boat, but I did that more for fun. I had to make money somehow, so I took a job as a mate. And then something happened to the captain, and I was told, well, you can run this boat — you do it. So here I am running a thirty-foot Gamefisherman, single rudder, single screw, three-fifteen Yanmar. It's quite a big change from a backcountry boat to an offshore boat. So I run that now, and run a few trips on it, but my love is in the backcountry. I want to be there full time.

Tom Rowland: So what will it take for you to get back there? Are you running any trips in the backcountry right now?

Deb Deyo: I'm doing some bonefish charters and stuff like that, and I'll do some offshore stuff too. I'm also kind of running a boat in the process of learning, because all of us captains always want to learn, learn, learn. So I actually run a private gig down in Key West on a seventy-foot Hatteras.

Tom Rowland: Alright, good — well, you're on both ends of the Keys, you couldn't be further apart on your two jobs.

Deb Deyo: Yeah. But offshore is what I grew up doing with my father, so I enjoy the troll. But there's something about sight-casting, being out there in skinny water, seeing the fish that come out of there, the environment around you, and the serenity of just watching nature — that's what I'm going to do.

Tom Rowland: So if you were to blue-sky it — what kind of customer base would you most like to have if you were able to fish like that every day?

Getting Women into Fishing

Deb Deyo: I'm really big on providing women's fishing. I'm on a board called Sisterhood of Fishing, and there's a bunch of us who fish all around the United States. I travel and fish with them, and they come down here and fish with me. I want to introduce women into the sport and show them that they can — I go to the boat ramp and put my skiff in every day, and I take it out every day by myself. You can do anything you put your mind to as long as you have passion for it. So that's what I do — promoting women and bringing them into the sport, showing them that the outdoors is fun, the beaches, the islands, the crocodiles, the roseate spoonbills — just the nature out there. Women and children and small families are definitely what I enjoy teaching.

Tom Rowland: Why do you think there aren't more — when you explain that to me, you say you want to promote it, but why is it a challenge? Why aren't there more women in fishing? Why is it a male-dominated sport?

Deb Deyo: Because fishing's hard.

Tom Rowland: And that's why women don't like it? But women do like it.

Deb Deyo: Right — that's what I'm saying, they love it, absolutely. But it takes a lot. I put in fourteen, fifteen-hour days every day when I fish. I'm at the boat ramp before dawn, and I'm back at sunset or a little after, and then by the time I get home and wash my skiff, I'm putting in some hours.

Tom Rowland: Well, yeah, of course — that's on the guide side. But let's put yourself in the position of just an angler, just a tourist. Why, in your opinion, as a woman who likes to fish, is it that we always talk about the growth of fishing being in women and children, and that's mostly because it's a male-dominated sport right now?

Deb Deyo: Correct.

Tom Rowland: What are the reasons? You just said on the guide side you're doing fifteen-hour days, but you don't necessarily do that as just a tourist — you could take a half day. Why is fishing thought of as male?

Deb Deyo: I think that when you get offshore and inshore, I've seen a lot more women in the sport, and I've seen these flats guides and backcountry guides with women on board now. I think it's coming more and more, especially since corona happened — more women are getting outdoors and seeing that, and they enjoy it. I'm not really sure why women aren't taking over the outdoors, honestly, but I absolutely love it. I have no problem being on a boat all day. Some women just don't like that sun, some women just don't like that experience — some men don't either. It's just what's your cup of tea.

Tom Rowland: Yeah. But I always wonder — when you talk about growing fishing as a sport, one of the biggest things is that fishing and hunting are both kind of a passed-down tradition. If your grandmother or grandfather likes to fish and teaches you as a child, you take that with you for life. And it seemed like, before corona, the fishing industry was like, wow, we're losing kids, we're not getting these new kids — and especially in hunting, how do you incentivize people to pass it down? What are the reasons kids aren't fishing? That's pretty easy to me — there's video games, computers, good stuff on TV, a dopamine hit every time they touch social media. There's a million reasons. But with women, I just wonder what the major challenges are. I'm sure it's really hard to walk into a tackle shop full of guys drinking coffee and telling jokes, and you're like, okay, I need a dozen shrimp — that's an uncomfortable situation for anybody who's never walked into a tackle shop before, and it probably makes it doubly uncomfortable if you're a woman. What do you think are the big challenges, the barriers?

Deb Deyo: Probably the biggest challenge is couples fishing. A lot of women want to either go with their husband or their significant other. But if women came together and fished together, as a friendship and a bonding thing, I think that would inspire so many, because when you're around a strong woman, determination happens — good things happen out of that. So getting more women together and fishing together, versus letting your husband go out with the backcountry guy while you go out with me — it's a different experience when you have a woman on the boat, I think, and it's a different experience when you have a woman in the tackle shop. Those women are more comfortable when they come in and buy that dozen shrimp, whatever they were buying. It's teaching from the beginning — getting them in, getting them involved. And then once they get involved, their children become involved. I was extremely lucky to have both of my parents into fishing, and I did it a lot, and I knew at about age ten I was going to be a charter captain.

Tom Rowland: Really?

Deb Deyo: I just knew. I knew that when I was here in the Keys, I was going to be back here one day — I just didn't know when.

Tom Rowland: That's terrific. There's something to women getting together — several of our other guests have had Cheyenne Orvis on, she does a bunch of women's trips where they get together and try to make it real casual, no dumb questions, just show a few things. The Gale Force twins are doing a good job of that too.

Deb Deyo: Great girls.

Tom Rowland: Yeah, they really are, they're awesome.

Deb Deyo: They're an inspiration to women anglers out here and a lot of the kids. And another one of your guests is Chasten — she's wonderful as well. I remember seeing her walk the docks at Bud n' Mary's, fishing with Nick before, and she's really made leaps and bounds — such a wonderful heart that girl has.

Tom Rowland: Yeah, she's great — she's been true to her mission since before I even knew her, and that was what drew me to her, that she was really trying to do something much bigger by helping others. That's the reason I reached out to her, and she was the first podcast guest.

Deb Deyo: Yes, she's great. I really like her.

Tom Rowland: Yeah. So what are you fishing much now, right now?

Chasing Bonefish and the Right Bait

Deb Deyo: Yeah, I fished two days ago — went bonefishing two days ago. I still trailer my skiff down to the boat ramp and go from there, because a lot of the nicer downtown Islamorada flats are right off of there.

Tom Rowland: What's your opinion of the bonefishing? You seem to be doing a ton of it with Richard Stanczyk, and a ton of it yourself. What's your opinion of the Islamorada bonefishing right now?

Deb Deyo: Well, of course, I believe, like you said earlier, it's definitely not what it used to be. I've seen some videos that would blow anyone's mind — the tailers that used to happen, and we just don't have that now. But when we had that fish kill back in 2016, it took a lot of the bonefish away, and now they're starting to come back. I caught quite a few the other day, and it depends on the conditions, but our flats are coming back — our grasses are starting to grow. When you pull onto a flat and see nothing but nature and activity around you, you want to see that, and luckily that's all starting to come back, downtown Islamorada and even our oceanside flats too. So I'm very excited about the season with bonefishing, and the more I can get out there and chase those fast suckers, I will.

Tom Rowland: And what's your favorite way to fish for them — fly fish or bait?

Deb Deyo: I'm a bait girl — spin tackle bait. I do fly fish, but I don't do it as a guide. I'm not there yet, but I do enjoy it.

Tom Rowland: What about Richard Stanczyk — what's his bait of choice? Is he a shrimp guy or a crab guy?

Deb Deyo: He's a shrimp guy, of course he is.

Tom Rowland: Matter of fact.

Deb Deyo: I used to have to take care of his shrimp for him.

Tom Rowland: Why don't you tell me how he likes his shrimp taken care of — I could probably order a thing or two.

Deb Deyo: He has to have the most perfect shrimp — they have to be all hand-picked, a certain size. When you're legendary at what you do and known for it, you learn the best. I remember one trip, we were getting ready — he was going to the Bahamas for blue marlin, and he needed bait, so we went and caught, I think, forty-three ladyfish that day. We sat out there in a mud, tossing jigs and catching all these ladyfish — I had ladyfish slime from head to toe.

Tom Rowland: I guarantee you — that's the dirtiest fish there is in the ocean.

Deb Deyo: I smelled awful. Nastiest, stinkiest — but it's easy to rig when you're marlin fishing. And we get a thousand shrimp in from the shrimp truck, and I'm over at the bait-sealing machine for two or three hours, sealing up shrimp so he can take it on his plane and go bonefishing over there. Bait matters. With fly fishing, of course you tie everything yourself, but when it comes to bait, it's the number one thing here in the Keys.

Tom Rowland: Yeah, and the supply of bait — for a big marina like Bud n' Mary's, did they have difficulty getting bait through corona? I don't usually stop in to get bait, so I don't know what their situation was.

Deb Deyo: Well, of all the bait shops in the Upper Keys down to where you are, Bud n' Mary's usually has the bait more than anyone, because of the relationships with the bait suppliers over the years. But if the shrimp boats are going out and it's windy, you're not going to get big shrimp, you're going to get little shrimp — you've got to have a backup plan. Some days those shrimp just don't come.

Tom Rowland: Right. But they don't come to smaller, more obscure marinas any less often than they don't come to Bud n' Mary's — I mean, Bud n' Mary's is a king marina.

Deb Deyo: It's the sport fishing capital of the world in Islamorada. If you talk to any charter captain or guide, at one point they either worked, mated, or were on a boat at Bud n' Mary's Marina. So it's the number one spot to be, and it's a family place — it saved my life, I have to say that.

Tom Rowland: Yeah, how?

Deb Deyo: It introduced me to a passion that I never thought could take me to where I am today.

Tom Rowland: Where were you, and where are you today?

Deb Deyo: Well, when I started here, I was living in my car, and I didn't know how to chase bonefish. Now I go out and I put a smile on my face every day, and it motivates me to get out there and chase fish. I'm pretty big on Instagram and Facebook with my videos, and I want to be someone's eyes out there — someone who can't get off the couch, someone in a wheelchair, someone who just needs a little bit of happiness during the day — and show them a fifteen-second video. It makes me feel good, as well as the people watching them.

Tom Rowland: Awesome, I love that, that's so cool. Well, I want to ask a technical question, since you've done a lot of bonefishing and you've done it with the king of bonefishing — what kind of hook are you using when you're rigging shrimp? Or Richard's doing his shrimp, I guess — that's really the question I'm asking. What hook does Richard Stanczyk use?

Deb Deyo: Oh, boy — you're trying to get me in trouble, aren't you?

Tom Rowland: Well, I wouldn't say in trouble — he sells them right in the tackle shop, I'm sure. It's public information. It's just which one he actually picks himself.

Deb Deyo: Yes — it's a wide-gap worm, freshwater hook. The reason is because when a bonefish picks up bait, they pick it up in their crushers, so they'll hold the bait a certain way. What that allows is — if you use a regular J-hook or a circle hook, the fish will gut-swallow it and you'll end up killing the bonefish. With that wide hook, not only can you put a little more shrimp on it, but you can also prevent it from sliding down their throat and killing them. So it's more about not killing the fish than anything else.

Tom Rowland: Is it offset, the one you use?

Deb Deyo: Yes.

Tom Rowland: That's a really good — a wide-gap offset was one of my favorite hooks. A three-aught, I used to use one made by Matsuo — I don't know if that company's still in business — but they had a really nice bonefish hook, a wide-gap offset standard J-hook just like you're talking about. I learned that trick from — Mark Croco used something similar, and I figured whatever he uses, I'm on board. And it sure did improve my fishing right away, because I was using some other kind of hook and couldn't rig the shrimp right. Once I got that longer shank, wide-gap hook, it went to almost a hundred percent hooking right away. It's amazing what a little detail like that can do.

Deb Deyo: Yeah, and another thing is the length of your leader relative to your hook size, your reel and your drag set — it's all one motion. It even comes down to how many buckets you have in the boat.

Tom Rowland: How many buckets you have in the boat? What do you mean?

Deb Deyo: Because you want to only take out a few shrimp at a time to put in your bucket and leave the rest in the livewell. There's a different technique to different things we do. Being in that routine with him, he got me to where I did the same thing over and over for ten or twelve trips, and I was like, okay, I got it, I understand. And he told me more than once — there ain't no crying in baseball. You get up and you do it. If I didn't have that, I don't know where I'd be today, to be honest with you.

Tom Rowland: Yeah. Well, fishing — and there are lots of things that can provide that for people — but mostly it's passion, mentors. That tends to be a really good way to get somebody out of a funk, to change your life. But if you have a mentor with tremendous passion for what they do, who's super professional, that's a really good place to find yourself, especially if it's something you also have passion for. That's a tremendous opportunity. So now you have this other opportunity, running the big charter boat and your bonefish boat — you want to be fishing the backcountry all the time, but you're still fishing on the big boat. Do you see that changing anytime soon, or what do you want to do?

Building Toward a Bay Boat

Deb Deyo: I'm looking at purchasing another skiff. My sixteen-foot Chaos, comfortably, when you're poling, is a one-person boat, and I want to maybe get a bay boat or something like that, where I can take families out, or groups of women. But my Chaos is my little play toy — I do a lot of solo fishing, it's how I relax, it's how I make sense of this crazy world we live in, as I go out and hunt fish. Just like when September comes and I'm in North Carolina hunting deer, it's the same way. So I want to get some kind of small bay boat, like a Contender or even a Yellowfin — man, those are sweet as can be.

Tom Rowland: I know — a couple of guys I know have those, they're really nice.

Deb Deyo: They are very nice. But I like running the big boat too — it fuels my adrenaline for offshore fishing, but it's also very rough on the body, and here at forty years old I've got to kind of watch what I do and how I treat my body now. In the backcountry, it's pure relaxation with a little more excitement when a bonefish hits.

Tom Rowland: Yeah, for sure. Well, the bay boat would be a great choice, because when my kids got a little older, the skiff was a great opportunity to go out, and it was very simple, but the gunnels are very low and a little kid could easily topple over, or walk right off the bow. Then when I got a bay boat, I had this one day where both my boys were a little older and could communicate pretty well, and they were like, we're going fishing, Dad? And I've got a skiff on the trailer and a bay boat on the trailer, and I said, well, which one do you want to take? And they looked at me like I was crazy and said, that one — like, how would we even go in that one? And I was like, I guess you're right. They were pointing at the bay boat. That's the one we're going in — why would we want to go in the other one? A lot of people really like going in the little one, but they were like, we want to go in the big one. But the bay boat's great because you can take more people, and you can carry bait all over the place — it's a good business move to have a bay boat, I think. Not that you can't do it in a skiff, but a skiff is more limited.

Deb Deyo: You can't do it in a skiff. You just have to — it's a certain clientele, your VIP customers, I guess you'd call it. I don't know that for tournament-wise fishing, that technical skiff — but I can get into five inches of water.

Tom Rowland: Right.

Deb Deyo: And with my Stiffy hybrid, I can go anywhere I want and catch redfish, snook, bonefish, tarpon — I can do whatever I want and go wherever I want. And I just installed Florida Marine Tracks on my new Simrad, and I tell you what, I'm not scared about going to explore now.

Tom Rowland: Yeah, there's a lot to explore.

Deb Deyo: There's a whole lot to explore, but now I feel safe that I can do that. I think, honestly, if you have the opportunity, you really need three or four boats to live here in the Keys — you need a skinny-water skiff, a center console, a bay boat, and an offshore boat, and then whatever you're going to go chase that day, you just pick whichever boat you want. Now, that's in a dream world — maybe we'll get there.

Tom Rowland: You can get there for sure — you can make anything happen. But it's also nice to have friends — you've got your friend with a skiff, your friend with a center console, your friend with a big offshore boat, and then you don't actually have to own them all, because sometimes, like they said in Fight Club, the things you own end up owning you. And that's the way it goes with multiple boats sometimes — the best thing you can do for a boat in saltwater, in my opinion, is use it every single day. The worst thing you can do for a boat in the Keys is use it a little bit, put it away for a long time, and then get it back out.

Deb Deyo: Leave a cover on it.

Tom Rowland: Yeah, and expect everything's going to work when you get it back, and it usually doesn't. The salt — that's a really difficult environment, really rough on wiring, really rough on boats. The best thing you can do is use it, the worst thing you can do is not use it. With multiple boats, you can only be on one every day, so the other three sit there, and that may not be the outcome you were hoping for.

Deb Deyo: But I want to be on the water every day. Yeah, I want to — you know what I really want to do? I have this thing about a Keys Slam I want to make up, and it's catching a sailfish and a bonefish in the same day.

Tom Rowland: Okay.

Deb Deyo: That's two of my favorite fish to chase, and I think that's why I fish a little on the offshore side and now on the inshore side too — there's no fences in the ocean. But there's a way you can do both of those. They're two of the fastest fish here, and it's just something that excites me inside to catch either one of those.

Tom Rowland: Yeah, that's cool — well, you can certainly do that on a bay boat on a nice day.

Deb Deyo: Oh yeah, exactly — that's what it does.

Tom Rowland: Easy and exciting to catch both.

Deb Deyo: And that's probably the next move I'm making — a bay boat. I'm not ever going to get rid of my skiff though, that's my baby. But I think a bay boat would make a lot more sense right now versus a big offshore boat.

Advice for Changing Your Life

Tom Rowland: Cool. Well, when you inspire people, I'm sure you're getting some messages and emails from people who see this big transformation you made in your life. What kind of advice would you give somebody who's in a place they're not happy with right now, or unsatisfied — maybe it's not a bad place, maybe it's just a place they don't particularly like, similar to the situation you were in? What advice would you give them? Maybe they don't want to be a fishing guide, but they're just unsatisfied where they are.

Deb Deyo: You've got to change your life. You do. You've got to just full send it — two feet in. You have to. And if you have a passion for something, it's going to lead you to great things. I tell people, don't give up — there is light at the end of the tunnel. It may take you a while to get there, but as long as you have a good heart, you're good to people, and you don't do people wrong, that'll give you enough great karma to get through life, and the world and the environment will take care of you.

Tom Rowland: Nice, I like that. What was the hardest thing for you in this whole journey, do you think, when you look back on it? What are the things you're most proud of, the challenges you overcame?

Deb Deyo: Probably just getting into this Islamorada fleet — that was a big challenge. Working in the tackle shop, I got to know a lot of the captains and guides, and they're real people, great people, and awesome fishermen. Being able to give them that — booking charters, running bait — made them respect me more, because I'm not following fishing for the money, I'm following it for the passion. I spend a lot of money when I go fishing. But I think just being a woman, getting into a skiff, getting my own boat, and becoming a captain — I had some hard roads, but there are some wonderful people on this island. Islamorada, they say, is the heart of the Keys because it's in the middle, but it's the community there — it takes a village, they say, and that's very true. If it wasn't for the people on that island supporting me and giving me the opportunity to live my childhood dream, I wouldn't be here. I really wouldn't.

Tom Rowland: Well, there are a lot of good people there, and certainly a lot of good fishing guides, and you have carved out a place for yourself — really, when you think about it, you left with three hundred dollars in your car and went to the most intimidating, the most competitive, the most challenging place you could possibly go. Maybe you could've gone to Venice, Louisiana — that would be another intimidating, challenging place to carve out a niche, no matter your background or how good you were at fishing. Islamorada, Key West, Venice, Louisiana — those are three intimidating places, and you were drawn straight to the bulls-eye.

Deb Deyo: I put my feet in the fire.

Tom Rowland: Yeah. Did you — it's a long drive from North Carolina to Islamorada, you could've stopped anywhere along the way, in Jupiter, in Boca, lots of places.

Deb Deyo: I landed in Big Pine Key first — that's kind of where I lived my childhood dreams.

Tom Rowland: That's where you went as a kid, to Big Pine?

Deb Deyo: Yeah, because that's where I went, and I wanted to get back. My parents just fell in love with that island, and we stayed at a little fishing lodge there called Big Pine Key Fishing Lodge. I remember when I was five, we used to stay in a tent at the lodge, and every year we'd increase our housing and stay for the whole summer. But I went back to where I remembered being happy. I was at a point in my life in North Carolina where I didn't know what the next day was going to bring, and I wasn't smiling at all anymore. I just wanted to find my soul, and my soul came to Islamorada, and to flats fishing, backcountry fishing — and just being a charter captain here, I'm on cloud nine every day, every day I wake up.

Tom Rowland: That's awesome. It's funny you say you couldn't smile in North Carolina, because we've been doing this for forty-eight minutes and I don't think you've stopped smiling since we started.

Deb Deyo: No, that's the whole thing — this is the first time in my life I've really been happy. I'm happy chasing fish, and I'm happy showing people what it's like to be out there.

Following Your Passion

Tom Rowland: So you said you knew you wanted to be a guide when you were ten years old, but then you go into nursing — somewhere along the line, did it seem impossible, or not something you do, not realistic? Where did you kind of abandon that dream?

Deb Deyo: Well, I got married and had a few children, and life happens. I'd watch you every Saturday morning — I'd DVR my fishing shows. When I'm watching TV, I'm watching fishing shows, and it's really the only thing that kind of made me relax. I worked corporate healthcare — you didn't smile on that job. I mean, there are people who can do that job, but it was very stressful, and it doesn't matter how many hours I put in on my skiff now, it ain't one day compared to one hour on that job. So it's just crazy — one day, I was thirty-five years old, and I woke up and I was like, I hate this. What if I go down there and what if I make it? You don't think about your failures, you think about whether you get a flier or not.

Tom Rowland: You did — not everybody does that. A lot of people look at that and go, what if I fail, what if I fail — all these things that talk themselves out of doing it. But it's interesting that you thought about what if I make it — that's a different way of looking at it.

Deb Deyo: Yeah, I always look at the positives instead of the negatives, so you're just going to be a whole lot happier.

Tom Rowland: But did you always do that — when you were in that healthcare job you didn't like, did it seem easy to go to the negative?

Deb Deyo: For a couple years of my marriage, I didn't do that either. When you're looking to change your lifestyle, change your whole entire life, people say, oh, you had a midlife crisis — well, I hope my midlife isn't at thirty-five, but whatever, I guess I did. I changed my whole career and went to what follows my passion — fishing, offshore, inshore, bridges, wherever, being on the water.

Tom Rowland: You know, it's kind of become a theme of this podcast, because I'm very interested in people who follow their passion, because that's what I did. I don't think, if you'd looked at my upbringing, if you'd looked at where I grew up, if you'd looked at all of it — I don't think I was supposed to be a fishing guide, I don't think I was supposed to be a TV host. I don't have any formal training in it, no one in my family did anything like this. It's just something I really wanted to do, and I was very passionate about it, and it also saved my life, I'm sure of it. I have no idea what I'd be doing if I hadn't found fishing — I'd probably be dead or in jail, because I had no direction whatsoever, nothing excited me, I did not want to work a regular job. But once I found fishing, everything kind of lined up, and I wasn't afraid to put the work in. I've always been a hard worker, but I wasn't a hard worker if I didn't care about it — why would you want to work hard at something you don't even care about? I don't know, I think I got off track there, but it's become kind of a central theme of this podcast, because I seek out these stories about people who do something like you have — you were unhappy doing something else, and you only have one life, we're only here once, so why go through it unhappy? So you make this change, but I know, because I made a big change in my life a long time ago, it's not easy, that's a hard decision. Sometimes you just make it and you go and never look back, but other times there are all these things you're thinking about, like what if I fail — all these uncomfortable situations, millions of chances to throw your hands up and say, I knew I couldn't make it. But the people who don't do that, and actually follow through, I'm fascinated with those stories. And the central theme I see, like with your story and so many others — one comes to mind right away, Jessica Mills. I don't know if you listen to her episode, but I call her one of my favorite guests. I mean, I like every guest I've had, I really do, but I like her story a lot because it's very much like yours. She went to Auburn, became an engineer, got a great job in an oil field somewhere, and she wakes up one day and she's like, this is not what I thought it was going to be, this is terrible, I don't want to do this. I know I'm going to make a lot of money next year, but I really don't want to do this. So she goes back to something — it's very similar to what you just said, she thought about what made her happy, where her soul was, where her heart was, and she goes back to the Appalachian Trail, because one time her grandmother took her some place and she saw this sign, and she asked what that was, and her grandmother said, well, you could get on that trail right there and walk all the way to Maine. And that put this thought in her head that stayed there subconsciously for years, and then she's out in Oklahoma and thinks, what would make me happy, and she immediately goes right to the Appalachian Trail, something that happened in her youth, and gravitates toward it and actually follows through and does it. Then she did the Continental Divide Trail and the Pacific Crest Trail — she's a triple crowner. It's funny, she said she'd only been camping three times — once on each of those trails, which is like six months each — but she says she's only been camping three times. It's kind of cool how it's a similar theme, that you gravitate back to something from your youth that made you super happy, and in your case, you followed through, and you're doing it.

Deb Deyo: I am.

Tom Rowland: You wake up every morning and you're like, yes.

Deb Deyo: Happy as can be. I am doing this, and I hope I'm a good role model to women and teenage girls, to follow their childhood dreams. You only live one time, and if you're not happy with your life, change it.

Tom Rowland: Wow. Well, you did.

Deb Deyo: I did.

Tom Rowland: Congratulations.

Deb Deyo: Thank you.

Booking a Trip with Blue Water Girl Charters

Tom Rowland: It's super awesome. So if anybody wanted to go fishing with you, what would they do — how do they book you?

Deb Deyo: Yeah, they can look me up on Instagram and Facebook, Blue Water Girl Charters. I also have my own website, and they can also reach me on the company phone at (305) 896-3768.

Tom Rowland: Wow, awesome. Well, I think you'll get some people who want to go fishing with you, because —

Deb Deyo: I want to fish with you.

Tom Rowland: Well, let's do that, we should do that.

Deb Deyo: Love to do that.

Tom Rowland: I want to learn all the Islamorada secrets.

Deb Deyo: I don't know about that now.

Tom Rowland: Well, I've fished in Islamorada a lot, but I've never fished with Richard Stanczyk, and you've fished with him three hundred times, so I'm pretty sure you know something I don't. I know that for sure. So yeah, we'll go fishing, that'll be great.

Deb Deyo: Absolutely.

Tom Rowland: Well, congratulations, I'm really excited for you — it's an inspiring story, it's a story of just making something happen.

Deb Deyo: Make it happen.

Tom Rowland: It's as simple as that — you aren't happy, you make it happen.

Deb Deyo: Two feet in, full send it.

Tom Rowland: I love it, that's awesome. Well, good for you, good for you. Thanks for coming on the podcast and telling your story, I really appreciate it. And if you're looking for a good fishing trip, this is definitely one — I would definitely go with her. And you'd fish out of Islamorada, or Key Largo?

Deb Deyo: I fish the Upper Keys — anywhere from Long Key to Key Largo. I really love Lower Matecumbe, honestly, in the downtown flats — it's a special place.

Tom Rowland: Yeah, it is. Alright, Deb, I know you've got some fishing to do.

Deb Deyo: Absolutely, yeah — I'm going tonight, are you? I'm getting ready to leave now.

Tom Rowland: You're going on a tarpon trip tonight, or?

Deb Deyo: No, I'm actually going to fish the last of the tide for bonefish over at the airport flat.

Tom Rowland: Can't get off those fish.

Deb Deyo: I can't get away from them, I love them, they are so cool.

Tom Rowland: That's good, that's awesome. Alright, Deb, thank you very much, and we'll have you on again.

Deb Deyo: Alright, sounds wonderful, thank you.

Tom Rowland: See you.