Billy Fanska’s fish story

Cap’n Billy Fanska has a big fish story and his tale starts right here in El Dorado.

Fanska was born and raised in El Dorado and graduated from EHS in 1974.

When Fanska was 11-years-old his sister, Bonnie, and her husband took him on his first fishing trip on the Walnut River.

“There was something about that first fish that flipped a switch inside of me,” said Fanska.

“I used to ride my bicycle all over the place, fishing pole in hand, to go fishing. I would ride as far as 30 miles sometimes, just to fish.”

According to Fanska, he’s been hooked ever since and now he has made his primary source of income fishing.

Fanska left El Dorado in 1974, the day after graduating from EHS.

“I always watched the fishing shows on T.V. and dreamed that it would be nice to make a living by fishing,” said Fanska.

Fanska was in the Marine Corps for 16 years and took a voluntary separation after Desert Storm.
He then began working as a contractor.

“I spent a lot of time fishing all those years, even worked part time on fishing and charter boats,” Fanska said.

Fanska decided to develop his own charter company soon after.

“I was getting people together that didn’t speak Japanese, and arranging fishing charters with Japanese skippers in order to fund my own fishing habit,” said Fanska.

“I even trained some other people as guides so we could help the people get to the ports, help them catch fish and then clean fish. I was still a contractor when I was doing this.

“After the Gulf War Part 2 began, I could see that the contract would soon come to an end because of budget cuts. I did some calculations and found out that we could make a pretty good living by doing fishing charters.”

Fanska focused on running his chartering business out of Japan because his wife did not speak English and he thought it would be best for them to remain in Japan.

Fanska speaks and reads Japanese.

Since the birth of Saltwater Fishing Okinawa, Fanska has had the opportunity to travel all over the world, visiting places in the far east and all over North America.

According to Fanska, the most interesting part of what he does is meeting all the different people from all over the world that come to Okinawa to go fishing.

Fanska’s brain-child, Saltwater Fishing Okinawa, provides Okinawa’s only full-service fishing charters and fishing tours.

Fanska’s business provides landing fish, bleeding fish, marking, icing, cleaning, taxidermy, printing and shipping fish to name a few services.

Fanska has even been featured on the Discovery Channel.

“We actually did the program for the Discovery Channel in November of 2007,” Fanska stated. “We were catching a lot of big mahi mahi, but the camera-man and the sound-man both got seasick, so we had a pretty short segment.

“The producer was from Taiwan, we became friends, and still stay in touch with each other.

“There was a super model from Taiwan that did the presentation of the program. All in all, it was a lot of fun.”

The most enjoyable thing about the profession, Fanska said, is the reward of catching a big fish.
Fanska has seen a few Kansans during his chartering.

“Most of the people we see from Kansas are in the military service,” Fanska said.
“So far, I’m the only one from El Dorado that’s been on my boat.”

Fanska’s future plans include returning to El Dorado.

“I am hoping to return to El Dorado for a visit next year,” said Fanska. “We stay pretty busy all year long, so it is difficult to break away for a vacation, this is especially true if your job is more like a vacation.”

Fanska is one of a few individuals who have accomplished goals and turned a dream into reality.

“Hang on to those dreams, because you never know when the opportunity will come for you to live the dream,” said Fanska.