Sorry about not adding any comments to the picture....I was busy packaging salmon.
I surprised GW today with a fishing trip on the Columbia River with a guide. I booked the day on the Columbia with Bruce Hewitt of
Going Fishing Guide Service. It was just Bruce, GW and I on the boat and we had a ball. We pulled out of the dock in Richland at 0630 and headed up the Columbia. We ended up going upstream about 30 miles, but fished several areas between Richland and where GW caught this Chinook Salmon.
Bruce runs a 24'
Northwest Jet Boat, powered by a 6.0L Chev engine.
We would run upstream to a spot where Bruce thought we might have some luck, cut the motor and fire up the 9.9HP Yamaha. That kept the bow pointed up stream and slowed our drift in the ~4kt current.
During the day we got rained on a bit, but the boat was covered so no problem there. The wind blue and created a little chop, but again no problem.
We didn't get any hits all day until we ran further up the river. By then the rain had stopped and the sun was trying to peak through. About 1:45 in the afternoon one of the three fishing rods got a good solid hit. My plan was to let GW land the first fish so she took the rod and did it all by herself.
After about 15 minutes of fighting the salmon she was able to muscle it alongside the boat. Bruce handled the net perfectly and we got it in the boat. We weighed it on a hand held fishing scale and it came out between 22 and 23 pounds, and near as we can figure it was probably about 30" long. (GW is 5' tall and the fish is more than half her size).
Here's the area of the Columbia we fished in. The place we launched from in Richland is only about 10 miles from home.
Needless to say, a good time was had by all. GW's arms and shoulders are a bit sore and tomorrow she's probably going to be a lot sorer, but I bet it takes weeks to wipe the grin off her face.
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