Somewhere out on the Pacific Ocean, fisherman Ray McGillicutty sits and hopes. Chewing on his tobacco with his feet up over the edge of his old ship ‘Cadmus’, just so named after a mythological Greek dragon slayer from around 2000 B.C.

Every day he sets sail from his island shack, at a location Ray will never reveal, on the whim that today could be the day he finally hooks the legendary Harold Holt.

You see Ray has been wrestling the high seas for five decades. He has the scars and weary old hands to prove it. And only a few months ago, McGillicutty was ready to give it all away for dry land and spend the rest of his days with his high school sweetheart – if she’d still have him off course.

But then something changed everything. Paul Gallen’s Cronulla Sharks started winning and winning and winning some more. For you see, McGillicutty is no fan of modern technology. No NRL app to follow scores, no social media, no phone.

The ’73 Sharks.

On his way back to shore and what he thought would be for the final time, Ray peered out through the foggy gloom of a Sydney winter morning.

There ahead of him a faint light from a bulb swinging from the porch of a long-forgotten home.

McGillicutty turned ‘Cadmus’ around – roaring and singing a tune only he knew.

This is the tale of Ray McGillicutty, the spirit of 480 past Cronulla players.

We spoke to Ray, aboard his vessel, only last week and we began by asking him why he had spent so much of his life searching the deepest corners of the Pacific for the one they call Harold.

“Why do I hunt Harold Holt?” he fired back offering your writer a swig of his bottle of whiskey, “Because if I don’t who will?”

“I’ve been out here chasing him since 1973 – when Tommy Bishop’s boys went down to Manly at the Sydney Cricket Ground.

“I was really bloody close then. Had him hooked for three hours before he snapped my line.”

But has Ray ever actually seen Holt?

Holt.

“In ’78 I seen him – had him halfway in the boat too.

“Came back on the Tuesday and didn’t get close.

“There have been some sightings from other fishermen but by the time I’ve gotten there he’s long gone.

“1988, ’97, ’99.”

It all changed again a few months ago for McGillicutty when he overheard a pair of travellers at the Captain Cook Hotel in Botany Bay.

“I was sitting in the corner minding my own business reading Hemmingway when I heard these Kiwi fellas talking about Holt. About how these blokes named Bird, Holmes, Barba, Fifita and Graham were turning shit around and they’d seen Harold breaching off Lord Howe.

“That was it for me.

“I went back out.”

And what will Ray do if he finally snags his white whale?

On this question McGillicutty really thinks about his answer and takes a minute as he looks out over the sea.

“I’d put him back so I can catch him again.”

*Ray McGillicutty is fictitious. Do not go deep sea fishing for Harold Holt
*Feature image is a painting by Gianni Strino titled ‘The Old Fisherman’

@woodward_curtis