I am not a fisherman

While I have never been firmly hooked on fishing, I do have a history of trying my luck.

I don’t own rod or reel. I have owned several but the interest of family members has made them disappear.

My first experience was when I was a kid in Palouse. The Palouse River was not far away. In fact, it flowed through the center of town.

Our family lived above the river. It was only a couple of blocks away. My first gear was a cane pole with some line tied around the end and of course a hook. At the time I could dig a few worms, grab my pole, and I was off. I have always had explorer tendencies so I looked for and found the best places.

The river produced a few small trout, legal of course, and a sucker now and then. I guess you could say there was a sucker on both ends of the pole.

Later in high school I had buddies who liked to fish and we would drive miles to fish at Rocky Point or Chatcolet. There we would rent a paddle boat and take turns manning the oars. We had to get the right speed for trolling.

We fished a lot of lakes in the Spokane area.

Later, in high school, one of my closest friends asked me to go with him to the Oregon Coast to fish. He was from there and had gear. We got on a charter boat at Depoe Bay and off on a real adventure. I caught a 10-pound salmon, and they packed it in ice for me so I could take it home. It was quite the adventure, but still not a fisherman.

When I was in college, I whittled out some afternoons from work and studies to fish for bass on the Boise River. My neighbor and I did this a number of times that produced good catches of fish.

My friend, Earl, and I went up in the hills of central Idaho where I caught a five-pound trout. Earl lives in Wenatchee and could be the world’s most serious fisherman.

After I moved to Bothell on the eastside, I fished several times on the docks at Edmonds for bottom fish.

When I moved to Electric City, my friends from over there thought I would have a blast here at the lake. I tried a time or two but never caught anything. My preference was to fish streams. My favorite was a stream north of Leavenworth.

This pretty much did for me until on one of my trips to Alaska I got on a charter boat out of Kodiak to fish for halibut.

We went out some 50 miles where the captain assured us we would catch a lot of halibut.

It was a premiere trip, and I had all the luck. I caught 13 halibut, with the limit three. I made a lot of people on the boat happy as I gave halibut away.

I caught one that weighed 176 pounds only to learn that the best halibut to eat were those about 35 pounds.

It was fun, but I am still not a fisherman.