The One That Did Not Get Away

A couple of weeks ago, My buddy Alex text me.  “You ready to go fishing yet?”  If you know me, that is a rhetorical question.  Any of my fishing readers out there need a reliable fishing partner, hit me up.  I am kind of a spur of the moment kind of person and fishing usually trumps all other activities.  So, I respond to Alex when and where and he replies tomorrow.  I am good to go.  🙂

It is kind of late for fall Chinook and a little early for winter Steelhead, so we are not trying to get on the water that hour before sunrise.  I always hope for fish, but this day, I was not expecting much.  Alex picks me up about 6am and we drive out to the Wilson river, about an hour and a half to two hours away.  We launch the Pavati and are fishing by 8:30am.  I have to say, I love being chauffeured in the front of that boat.  Drift fishing luxury.

The water is low and not so clear.  It has a slight green tint to it.  The day starts out raining, but by mid day, it is just cloudy with a few sun breaks.  We float bobber and eggs through every hole and pull plugs where we can.  We are leap frogging with three or four other drift boats and there are a few bank anglers that we pass.  At least we are not the only fools on the water.  We anchored in a couple of spots to relax here and there.  After about five hours of not even a nibble and only seeing one other fish caught, I am ready to accept that this is just not the day.  We are anchored up in a hole about two or three turns from the take out.  Letting our plugs run, eating lunch and drinking a “beverage”.  At least six boats come through and work the hole with eggs and plugs as they pass.  Nothing is caught.  It is time to pull anchor and work our way to the finish the run.  I decided that nothing has worked so far and I was not feeling wrapping another plug.  I pulled out a wiggle wart and hooked it up fresh out of the box.  100′ off the anchor, my rod gets nailed.  This fish jumps a few times, but it is not your typical steelhead fight.  It pulls line and makes a run a couple times and I am getting nervous that I am about to lose this fish.  It has been a while since my last tug.  We do manage to get it netted and we are blessed with a hatchery.  We are both super excited at this time.  It turns out, the treble hook had the fishes mouth pinned shut and I guess it is hard for a fish to breath with its mouth closed.  This is probably why I did not get the typical acrobatics.

It measured out to about 30″.

Because of that fish, we ended up working the last couple of holes for a few more hours and could not find another.  It was a long day, but it was a great day.

I cooked up that fish the following night using my default butter, lemon pepper, garlic salt recipe for Monday Night Football dinner.  It was so good.  I cannot wait till the next one.