Oregon Trip 2008

Okay so I've finally gotten around to posting about our Oregon trip. We went back in June, lol. It was great. We left on a thursday and stayed overnight in Boise, then went on up to Portland and stayed with my aunt and uncle. Saturday we fished on the Columbia river with my uncle Buck, for sturgeon. It was the funnest fishing trip I have ever been on. We first fished for shad. Shad were the biggest fish we (my brother Jeff, Mitch, and I) had ever caught. Jeff caught two, Mitch caught one, and I caught three! I laughed at them cause I caught my three in the last half hour of fishing after they had already got theirs.

So after we get six shad, thats how many we need, we move the boat downstream a bit and my uncle hooks one of these huge shad to a hook and ties the string around it and throws it in! Mitch was astonished. He thought my uncle was going to cut these fish up and use a peice of them for bait, lol. So I have my pole and I've been in for about 10 min when I get a bite. My dad steps in to help me set the hook and then I began my fight with the monster. I reeled every little bit of that fish in to the boat. It took half an hour and mitch helped me lift the pole every few seconds so that I could reel again as I let the pole drop. This fish would let me reel him in a little, mind you, I had to do it very quickly, before he took a bunch of line with him. I probably lost a little more than I gained there for a little while. It was honestly one of THE most EXHAUSTING things I have ever done in my life!!! I finally brought it up to the boat and Buck stuck his hand into its mouth (It has no teeth) and pulled it a little up out of the water so we could get pictures of it. He said it was between 7-8 feet long and weighed about 200-300 pounds. Can you imagine how that hurt my poor little arms?!? Haha. It did. Alot.

After I caught mine and we set it back into the water (It has to be between 4 to 6 feet to take home) my dad used my pole and hooked another. This one was really big! Mitch and Jeff stepped in to help after a few minutes and the three of them fought that sucker for an hour and fifteen minutes, in which they got it close twice and it surfaced (after surfacing it dove and took line with a hell like fury). My uncle estimated it to be 9-10 feet and 400-500 pounds. They gave up the fight and layed around completely wasted from the exertion. Ha, it was A LOT of fun!

After that day we (Dad&Mom, Jeff, and Mitch and I) rented a van and drove up to Seaside, which is in Northern Oregon on the coast. We did alot of stuff in our week there, including visiting a small aquarium with seals, hiking and finding some sea lions in the wild, beachcombing, visiting the cheese factory, and eating at Mos famous seafood.

Here are some pics