Good Ol' Trask,Ol'Boys,Ol'Days

[HOGTIDE]

As a young man, I cut my teeth on chinook fishin', watching a bobber go down on a cow pasture stream at a hole called 2 bit. The fishing was a secret heaven. The best part was the Ol' boys next to me. Loy Clark, Barney, Lester and the Montana boys ... all gentlemen, patient, quiet and willing to share tactics and stories. I was a flatlander, but they treated me like family. We sat in the dark, the frost and the rain together many years ago. A good launch meant pushing your boat over the grassy bank by the big fir. A great boat was one with all the leaks patched. A fantastic day was 30 or more hookups for our tiny stick-tied fleet. The 'best' day was laughing ourselves sick at someone elses mistake. No giant sleds. No flatfish bigger than a jack salmon. No covetess landowner signs or threats, Just a mind soothing,often spine tingling fishing experience.
This past decade I have repeatedly tried to return to that spot,that action, those people, that state of mind. ... I have found that I cannot. I still know 'primetime' as the surface film runs out and the flood pushes back under....but there are no fish. I still know the location, but long ramp lines, and the city's masses detour me. I still recall my friends faces but marching time worries me as to their condition.

It must be close to October...I will try again.

[First Bite]

HOGTIDE
I hope you get one more "bobber down" on your next trip to your favorite fishing hole. Good luck.

[rhansme]

Hey Hogtide. Very nicely put. It sure would be nice to return to those kinds of days again, but alas I believe you are correct in your assumption. I hope that your friends are well and feeling the same as you. Give them a call...!
I remember my first couple of years after I moved to the Oregon Coast. Fishing a local river with little pressure. Learning holes so you knew where not to cast and where the Big ones were. I miss those days. The river is still there of course, but now no planted fish and the returns of wild fish has been small. Let us hope for recovery and I wish you and your friends the best....

[Pilar]

Wow, you took me back to my old days dude. Thanx. I grew up to the smells of diesel fuel on the old boat, Ballyhoo baitfish, and saltwater marshes in S. Fla. My Dad ran a dive charter and fishing charter out of Port Everglades and later out of Islamorada in the Keys. I started out as his deck hand at 8 years old. Those were the days of clothes baskets full of Spiny Lobsters, 60 lb grouper and all the Mahi Mahi you could troll up.

We would cruise the strip in Ft. Lauderdale after everry trip and sell lobster at all the bars. My dad or his partner would run into each bar with a 'bug' (lobster) and a minute later come back out with a dozen guys digging for thier wallets. I'd drop the tailgate on the old mercury station wagon and dig more bugs out of the cooler. We'd sell the whole lot by the third or fourth bar.

Now it's all dead coral on the once pristine reefs and spanish speaking immigrants. All I find when diving is short lobsters heads on the bottom. The divers tear off the tail on every lobster they find and toss the heads back in the water. The development in S. Florida is silting up the once clear waters and killing the coral.

The people are still OK in the keys, but they are clicqish and keep the immigrants out. We go back for a week every year but man has it changed. A famous man once said 'you can never go home' and I believe him.

The bend is your friend!!

[Deleted User]

Great stories that trigger good memories, and sadness of loss. In most cases you "can't go back home". But in some you still can. For me, that is some of the more remote and less crowded trout streams of Montana. I still love to go back home there, and wish I could more often. My wife and I will have a tough decision someday on where to retire; the coast, central Oregon, or back to Montana. If it's Oregon, my wife has agreed to at least live over "back home" for a couple years first. http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/smile.gif - I think I may have fished in that 2 bit hole, and others near it, many times a quarter of a century ago if it's in Trask R. tidewater you're refering to Hogtide. You have to head up north to find fishing like that for the most part nowdays. Lots of secluded places full of big fish up there for the visiting! Go for it! - RT

[Steve]

Yes, I remember those days, my grandfather took me down to 2 bit hole and we drowned shrimp...when shrimp was just starting to be a salmon bait...40 years + ...went down last year...with sled, only used the kicker...got lots of dirty looks and snide remarks..but after seeing the garbage dumped over the sides of the banks and the filthy mess it cured me of wanting to go back...I started picking up trash as I went upstream that floated by and was so ****** at the locals for their behavior and the ticket at the boat ramp that I unloaded the trash in the dumpster and vowed no more.......Trash River..

[White Willie]

Thank you ive been in the 2-bit when it was like that now its get up yesterday to get a spot and get yelled at if you do anything wrong or casting into someone elses water and god help you if you say anything about the snaggers thanks again you brought back mememorys of old

[Nanook]

Hogtide,

Netted many a fish for Loy Clark and I
agree that we need to bring back the
good ole days in that spot! Fished
right in there with you dude in those
days. Charlie yellin' at the belly
rippers, included! See you soon.

******

[Fishmaster]

Then there were the morons about 15 years ago who said this is my f------ hole, get out of here now, as they pulled back their jacket to show us their piece. Funny, it didn't impress my fishing buddy, who pulled back his jacket to show him his piece and his badge. You could have landed a 30 pounder in dudes mouth when he saw that. He left and we had no problem with anybody else the rest of the morning.

[Nanook]

Better than a bobber down no doubt!! I
remember when the blue coats came over
the bank and got em' one day too. Remember
when all the cover on both sides was still
there? If everyone used bobber eggs and
shrimp everyone would catch fish without
the BS. Alas....as with the story that
started this subject...days gone bye.
The good news is hole has almost washed
out to it's original depths again.

Rain and then not too much rain in
October would be sweet!

[Big Willie]

Hogtide, I remember those days as well, everythings different now. It really is sad. What I do remember is about 12 years ago going down with a buddy who would wear his OSP ball cap just above his eyes...shoulda seen'em scatter! It got the most attention up around mile marker 10 on the Trask. Tight lines everyone...fall is in the air!
Gary

[OneLastCast]

In the late 70's a buddy and I were eyeballin bobbers from a boat in the twobit hole, about seven or eight boats were anchored or tied to trees nearby with one old guy on the bank with his english setter sitting calmly by his side. For some reason a mallard hen decided to slalom through all the boats. This was a little to much for the setter who despite all the pleadings and hollering from the old guy launched himself after the mallard and proceeded to chase it through all the boats. Damn good dog. Missed all the boats, missed all the bobbers, and brought that duck back to his master without a scratch to either animal. A healthy cheer went up through all the fisherman while the old guy moaned that duck season didn't start for two days.

[Nanook]

Of course there was the day Steve went
swimming, the fat lady blasted across
the hole at full throttle in a circle,
Ed breaks yet another rod, Sheriff Doug
and Charlie humilate the snaggers, Jack
and "Daugters" place an address on the
tree, Barb puts her bobber in right
behind someone that just airballed and
hooks up, Bigfoot endangers the buzzbomber
in the pink hat, Walt and Barney just grin
at it all, Tim and his giant 10 foot "sled"
has more fish than room, the dock and
bank fishing club that never happens, the
hole fills in and ruins it all....BUT ALAS
the anticipation of another Fall!

[HOGTIDE]

Did you watch Lester land his mint bright 66 pounder on a pole made from two different rods stuck together at the metal ferrul(sp.?}..and an old rusty spin reel that screeched?! Graphite?? Stainless ballbearings???

Two kids in a rubber raft row in, tie up to the 3 sticks on the deep side and immediately proceed to set the hook into their own boat. The hook setter just kept rippin', convinced he had a fish on, as they slowly submerged. We were laughing so hard we almost couldn't rescue them.

...hey, I boated a 62 pounder that day... my EagleClaw rod and a lil' green driftboat. My fancy graphite and highpowered tintanic hasn't seen anything close.

[Nanook]

Let's keep going Hogtide! How bout the standing ovation in the hole when a dead
seal floated through, belly up on the outgoing, the drift boat high centered
on the two pilings on the south side,
Doug constantly crackling like Woody
Woodpecker, the signs owner and landowner
coming down and telling us all to move
out of his hole, then he brings he 24
footer in and on the way out, rips the
entire pump off and stops dead on the
huge snag leaving the hole towards 5th
at full RPM, (maybe if we keep going,
everyone will avoid it andwe will have it all to ourselves, you figure - grin), Loy
Clark, millionaire, joining us like a
local sodbuster in his does this boat
really float boat, the two real hookers
under the tree and the ONLY ones hooking
fish! (Can't wait till this weekend!)

Rick

[HOGTIDE]

My all- time favorite line comes from Loy, in reference to all of his relatives coming down to fish the weekends, " They show up with nothin' but the urge."

Most humbling personal experience: watching my wife hook 5 fish in a row on super large globs of eggs under a bobber. I was the bait boy, so on the 6th reload, I only gave her a thin string of white dried up skein attached to a single egg...put the rig out for her so she couldn't see what I had done. She immediately hooked and quickly boated a bright 30 pounder. I should've known. This was our honeymoon; she was simply setting a precedent for the following 25 years!

[Deleted User]

Man I love your stories guys! Still laughing at the guys setting the hook into the fish raft http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/smile.gif http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/frown.gif http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/smile.gif . It also brings back so many memories. One was when I was young and a friend and I loaded 2 of his homemade experiemental wooden one man boats into the pickup and headed for Trask tidewater. Keith generously gave me the bigger one (I thought because I was bigger). Turns out that boat had a little balance problem. I had to stay within a few inches of deadcenter or that dam little thing would roll way over! We rowed up into the north side of a good hole and just tied off within a line of boats. It was a little shallower than the 2 bit hole, but still a deep fish holder. As I was intently watching my bobber it finally went down and I leaned back into a mean hookset; and yes, the boat rolled clean upside down on me faster than I could shout "fish on"! My hat floated but I didn't. As Pilar would say "This ain't no sh*t", I did a combo of underwater walk and one arm paddle toward shore and popped up with the fish still on with the other arm. I then shouted fish on, as everyone was cracking up at this wet sop. Thanks Keith. I lost the fish soon after too. My payback stories may follow http://www.ifish.net/forum/images/graemlins/wink.gif . - RT