MOREHEAD CITY, N.C. — It takes a minute or two for a 61-foot boat to back into a slip with only feet to spare on either side, so there's plenty of time to bask in the admiration of the hundreds gathered around the scales at Big Rock Landing.

They want to know what's hidden in the fish box at the back of the Pelagic, and they applaud generously as the 5-foot wahoo is hauled out and handed up to the dock.

The crowd is there to see blue marlin, the prize fish of the Big Rock Blue Marlin Tournament, but there are category awards for lesser fish as well, so angler Allen Wells gets to have his picture taken to another round of applause as his fish hangs from the scales.

Pelagic captain Mike Webb brought the fish to the scales hoping to capture the $7,000 or so that goes to the day's biggest wahoo. It's not a winner, but it's better than nothing. That's what the Pelagic caught the day before.

Tournament marlin fishing is not for the faint of stomach, patience or wallet. Marlin don't exactly jump into boats. They're finicky in diet and surroundings. The entry fee for the top boats is $17,000, with another $1,000 per day for diesel fuel to get out into the deep water.

Every day, it's 2 hours out to the fishing grounds pounding through 6-foot swells, 6 hours of trolling, 2 hours back to the dock, all without any guarantee anything will happen. For every boat that hooks a trophy marlin, there are tens of others that get nothing.

To catch a big blue marlin, you have to use lures no smaller fish would touch, narrowing the possibility for action. It's like fishing roulette. Trying to catch gamefish wahoo or dolphin is putting your money on red or black—modest risk, modest return. Going after a marlin is putting your entire bankroll on one number. You either win big -- the purse this year is $1.8 million -- or you strike out completely.

Boats can fish four of the six days of the Big Rock, which began on June 9. Of the 177 boats entered, only 118 fished on June 10, including the Pelagic. Sometimes, the only reward is an afternoon on the water with friends.

Safe to say I'm an unlikely trophy fisherman. Every fish I've ever caught has come with my feet on a dock, and everything I know about open-water fishing has been learned by watching "Deadliest Catch" from a couch safely moored to my living-room floor.

I'm also a last-minute, surprise addition to the Pelagic after my previously arranged ride decided not to fish that Tuesday. The frantic phone calls of a few Big Rock officials late the previous night found Webb and his passengers willing to take me aboard at the last minute.

The Pelagic is Webb's year-old charter boat, and five of his friends have chartered it for the Big Rock, including three from the Triangle (North Carolina's Raleigh-Durham-Chapel Hill area). Its named for the open-ocean zone where the big fish, like marlin, live.

My goal, while taking advantage of their generosity and hospitality: stay out of the way (a challenge considering I will be serving as my own photographer) and avoid seasickness (which I don't think will be a problem, but I'm wearing a scopolamine patch behind my left ear nonetheless).

When I arrive at the boat a little after 6 a.m., Webb's two mates are already aboard and working -- Robbie Clark, a Morehead City (N.C.) native who has been fishing since he was 15, and Chris Daniels, a Jacksonville lawyer and friend of Webb's who helps out with the boat.

Daniels helps me stow my gear and gives me a brief tour before the fishermen start arriving at the dock around 6:15 a.m., carrying bags of groceries, cases of beer and water and a few Bojangles' bags.

All the talk is about the 640-pound blue marlin that arrived at the scales around 11 p.m. the night before, a potential million-dollar marlin.

"That fish last night was looooong," Webb says.

After studying satellite images of water temperature, Webb decides to head southeast, charting a course 44 miles out into the Atlantic, south of the rock formation that gives the tournament its name.

The boat pushes off a little after 6:30 a.m. for the 2-hour-plus run to the fishing grounds, the twin Caterpillar diesels awakening with an angry rumble as the boat clears the inlet and enters open water.

It's a long, bumpy trip. Webb and two of the fishermen ride on the bridge; others watch CMT on the television or sleep in the cabin below as spray splashes up against the windows.

A little after 9 a.m., eight lines are out behind the boat in a web of fluorescent green strands and the waiting game starts. Only the captain faces forward; everyone else is watching the lures for signs of an interested marlin.

"Marlin fishing is hours of boredom followed by moments of chaos," Clark is the second person to tell me, plopping down next to me on the rear-facing bench on the back deck of the boat.

With no sea legs to speak of, I've found it difficult to move around the boat with a camera dangling from my neck, so I'm staying where the action will be, if there is any. As a bonus, I'm in the shade on a hundred-degree day.

The first beer is cracked a little before 10 a.m., sandwiches are prepared and consumed, and still the sun beats down and the boat wallows in the swells. The only break in the monotony comes when Clark or Daniels reel in a line to clear it of seaweed.

After the June 9 shutout, a sense of inevitability is starting to build aboard the Pelagic. Wherever the marlins are today, the Pelagic isn't there.

"We've been hiding from the fish for two days," says Wells, who has been nominated to fight the first fish hooked today. "I'm ready to be found."

Less than an hour before fishing closes, at 2:03 p.m., one of the lines being trailed from the bridge, with a smaller lure, starts spooling out. "Fish on!" comes the cry from above, and Clark and Daniels leap into action on the back deck, reeling in the other lines.

It is chaos. Wells tries to get out of the way, then is almost pushed into the chair as the rod is handed down to Clark, who delicately weaves it under another line and jams it in the socket between Wells' knees.

He starts fighting the fish, pulling the rod toward him, then pushing it forward as he frantically reels in the slack. Clark coaches him as Webb maneuvers the boat toward the fish. Only moments before, that line had trailed out hundreds of feet behind the boat. Now, it takes an acute angle down into the water, as the fish goes deep in a futile attempt to escape.

As Wells hauls on the line, Clark readies the gaff, a long pole with an evil-looking hook on the end, to pull the fish into the boat. After a six-minute fight, a silvery wahoo is within reach, an ambitious gamefish greedy enough to take a marlin lure.

Clark snags it with the gaff and heaves it over the stern onto the deck to Wells' right. A wahoo's head and mouth are all sharp edges—a fish built by Schick—so Clark commands others to get back (and Wells to move his right foot out of the danger zone) as he wrestles it into the fish box in the stern, where it's iced down for the trip home.

Calm returns quickly, along with slaps on the back and high fives. It's not a marlin, but it's a big fish, at least 40 pounds. Landing it has changed the mood of the boat completely, particularly one with an outside chance to win some money as the day's biggest wahoo.

The tedium has been washed away along with the blood on the deck. The final minutes of fishing fly by. At 3 p.m., the lines come out of the water and the Pelagic settles in for the long run back to Morehead City.

For some, it's time for a nap. Webb discusses options for the rest of the week and makes the decision to "lay" on June 11 and June 12. They'll be back on the water on the morning of the 13th to fish the final two days of the tournament, betting conditions will improve.

Webb also decides to head for the scales and see if Wells' wahoo is a winner, but just as the boat pulls into the no-wake zone that marks the entrance to the harbor, word comes over the radio of a 73-pound wahoo. Nevertheless, they press ahead for the scales and the cheers, the weighing and the iconic picture of man and conquered fish.

Before Wells and Webb are done talking to the media, a motorboat pulls up to the dock next to the Pelagic, carrying two fish from another boat. Even from the deck of the Pelagic, it's clear that one of them is a wahoo almost twice the size of their 46.3-pounder.

They pulled into the harbor thinking they were in first place. They'll leave the scales in third.

"That was short-lived," Clark moans.

Still, it's a fish and a trip to the scales. They weren't the only boat to strike out on June 10. Only 10 blue marlin were caught, none big enough to keep. On the June 9, only five blue marlins made it to the scales.

My fishing days are over. But the Pelagic crew will be back on the open water in search of the big marlin that hides beneath the waves, hoping their next visit to the scales will be worth thousands, if not a million.