As a last minute decision bassplayer17 and I decided to fish the All South Sound Derby” (previously Hoodsport Derby?) scheduled for Saturday August 15. Although not concerned, without any networking intel I hatched a plan where we would launch at Swantown way early and run to Johnson Point for the last hour of the flood and then as required fish a number of other areas until we had the job done. Well that was the plan anyway… Although I had decided to take Friday off and prep for the event as it turned out work and kid stuff had me getting ready late Friday evening. In bed by 11:30-11:45 when after about 45 minutes of sleep Johnny Cash was telling me that it was time to get up. Up all sleepy-eyed and fuzzy-tailed the boat was hooked up and ready to go by midnight. I had to stop and get gas on the way so figured that I would hit AM/PM on the way to the freeway. As it turned out there was some sort of ATM system failure and I had to hit 4 gas stations before I was able to get gas. I don’t know if I out ran the problem or if Fred’s uses a different ATM server but I was gassed up and rolling.

Tony and I arrived at the Swantown Launch around 3:00 am and were underway shortly thereafter. Being dark the run up to Johnson Point was slow. Arriving around 5:15 we got things ready and were gear down at 5:30 for the official start of the derby. Although somewhat sheepishly I will admit that I had high hopes of a solid finish, as it turned out…

My plan was to start the hunt for suspended fish at Johnson Point. We would be running a green and red 11” flasher/green and white hoochie combo off one side of the boat with a black UV purple haze 11” flasher/Irish cream 4” spoon combo off the other side. A sound plan but we were not seeing any Chinook on the FF. My plan was dependent on fish holding in various spots waiting for a shot of rain. Unfortunately, the rain hit the day before and every spot we hit was a chinook desert. After striking out on JP we made the short run to Fishtrap and fished jigs on the ebb. We made a couple drifts with no meter marks or action and moved on. We went back to JP but fished the east side of the point looking for meter marks or any signs of life. We were also cycling through gear looking for the magic combo. A green UV Flasher/cop-car tube fly combo running at 48’ sparked the first real interest of the day and we were fish on. Although we did get a visual I ended up losing the fish, a 6-8# chinook. We worked both sides of the point up until the tide change and headed back to Fishtrap. Back at Fishtrap we fished the jigs for one drift and then broke out the trolling gear again. We ran the gear fishing at various depths in 40-120 feet of water with the intent of targeting suspended fish but again nothing. From there we fished a few additional spots on the way back into Olympia with no takers.

A strange day, starting out I thought that we would end up in the money but we ended up with just scratching our heads. I think that Saturday was one of the very few days where I did not have to clean the fish box at the end of the day. Although the fishing was less than stellar for us the day was not boring. While still dark and heading north from Olympia Saturday morning I think that we got a shot of the shifting Aurora Borealis curtains. That or some sort of unusual weather phenomenon, either way it was pretty awesome. Later in the day we noticed a growing plume of black smoke down off of Fishtrap and turned the VHF on. It turned out that somebody had just refueled and something went drastically wrong. Someone’s boat caught fire and sank. Everyone onboard was rescued but the boat burned to the waterline and slid under the surface to a watery grave. The whole thing was a strong reminder to religiously follow safe refueling procedures and assure that your ventilation system is in good repair. On that note we have a second boat now; it is an older fiberglass boat with an IO. In our restoration activity triage plan it will not be floating until I completely update the vent/blower system. On the way back in Saturday afternoon we ran across a huge mass of jellyfish that I assume were spawning, it was amazing! Good company and lots of fish stories, fish or no fish made for a great day on the water. Interesting factoid; with 14 hours of run time split between trolling and approximately 31 miles on plane my Yammy burned less than 7 gallons of fuel!

---