This is out of order from Laura's vacation recap, but good stories have to be told.
First of all, let me tell you all that I don't fish, not at all. Growing up the only time that we'd catch fish is if we went to a fish farm outside of Kamas that kept an excessively stocked stream of trout through their property.
Well, while at Lake Powell on our trip Laura's cousins all brought their fishing stuff because unlike me, they do fish and are good at it.
One evening while they were all fishing I decided to observe. Everyone was pulling up fish after fish using leftover breakfast sausage as bait. Nothing worth keeping, but the fish just kept on biting. I kept my distance as not to possibly rub off my lifetime of bad fishing luck onto them, but being the inclusive and non-superstitious people they are, it wasn't very long before I was reeling in a well cast out line.
I kept on slowly reeling in the line thinking that it was a darn near guarantee that just about everyone that night was going to catch a fish except for me. All of the sudden, not even 40 seconds after being given the poll, I felt that little pull on the line that Laura's cousin Jay had told me to feel for, but that I didn't think was possible. I immediately did what I'd been told and pulled up on the pull so as to set the hook, but in my mind I was sure that all I was going to do was lose the bait and pull the hook away from the fish.
It was apparent immediately that that was not what happened, suddenly I felt a huge pull on the line as the poll gave a strong yank. I yelled for help and everyone started coaching me on reeling and pulling, and so on. At that moment I started wondering something, either I'm worse at fishing than even I thought, or something different was happening. You see, everyone else, as soon as catching a fish reeled it in with little effort, I on the other hand was having a really hard time. I wouldn't let myself think too long about that fact until Laura's cousin Jay said, "dude, your pulling in a big one."
At that moment I was ready to hand off the reel to anyone else. I didn't know what I was doing, I was sure my bad history with fishing meant that this was sure to end with the fish escaping, and quite frankly, the fish was pulling really hard.
Finally, after a great deal of reeling in we started to see the fish fighting on the surface, and it was BIG. We pulled up next to the shore, and Jay reached down to pull it out of the water and right at that moment, the line snapped . . .
. . .
. . .
. . .
Now surely with all that setup, I wouldn't simply end the story there.
. . .
OK, so at the moment the line snapped a remarkable thing happened. Jay jumped into the water and tried to grab the fish. It was a one in a million shot, but as he came back up out of the water and turned around, there caught in his grip, and held firm into his chest was the fish.
Two of us had to go into the water with him and push him back out of the lake since we were on a small shelf and he would have needed his hands otherwise, but we brought the fish ashore.
For those of you wondering, of course we kept it. We prepped it that night in hopes of catching a few more good sized ones so that we'd have enough to feed everyone, but we never got that lucky again. In the end we froze it and sent it home with Jay. If you want to know how it tasted you'll have to ask him.
Anyway, the moral of the story is that even 29 year curses can be brought to an end.
First of all, let me tell you all that I don't fish, not at all. Growing up the only time that we'd catch fish is if we went to a fish farm outside of Kamas that kept an excessively stocked stream of trout through their property.
Well, while at Lake Powell on our trip Laura's cousins all brought their fishing stuff because unlike me, they do fish and are good at it.
One evening while they were all fishing I decided to observe. Everyone was pulling up fish after fish using leftover breakfast sausage as bait. Nothing worth keeping, but the fish just kept on biting. I kept my distance as not to possibly rub off my lifetime of bad fishing luck onto them, but being the inclusive and non-superstitious people they are, it wasn't very long before I was reeling in a well cast out line.
I kept on slowly reeling in the line thinking that it was a darn near guarantee that just about everyone that night was going to catch a fish except for me. All of the sudden, not even 40 seconds after being given the poll, I felt that little pull on the line that Laura's cousin Jay had told me to feel for, but that I didn't think was possible. I immediately did what I'd been told and pulled up on the pull so as to set the hook, but in my mind I was sure that all I was going to do was lose the bait and pull the hook away from the fish.
It was apparent immediately that that was not what happened, suddenly I felt a huge pull on the line as the poll gave a strong yank. I yelled for help and everyone started coaching me on reeling and pulling, and so on. At that moment I started wondering something, either I'm worse at fishing than even I thought, or something different was happening. You see, everyone else, as soon as catching a fish reeled it in with little effort, I on the other hand was having a really hard time. I wouldn't let myself think too long about that fact until Laura's cousin Jay said, "dude, your pulling in a big one."
At that moment I was ready to hand off the reel to anyone else. I didn't know what I was doing, I was sure my bad history with fishing meant that this was sure to end with the fish escaping, and quite frankly, the fish was pulling really hard.
Finally, after a great deal of reeling in we started to see the fish fighting on the surface, and it was BIG. We pulled up next to the shore, and Jay reached down to pull it out of the water and right at that moment, the line snapped . . .
. . .
. . .
. . .
Now surely with all that setup, I wouldn't simply end the story there.
. . .
OK, so at the moment the line snapped a remarkable thing happened. Jay jumped into the water and tried to grab the fish. It was a one in a million shot, but as he came back up out of the water and turned around, there caught in his grip, and held firm into his chest was the fish.
Two of us had to go into the water with him and push him back out of the lake since we were on a small shelf and he would have needed his hands otherwise, but we brought the fish ashore.
For those of you wondering, of course we kept it. We prepped it that night in hopes of catching a few more good sized ones so that we'd have enough to feed everyone, but we never got that lucky again. In the end we froze it and sent it home with Jay. If you want to know how it tasted you'll have to ask him.
Anyway, the moral of the story is that even 29 year curses can be brought to an end.
2 comments:
what a great catch kyle. so impressive. glad the curse is over.
I know what you are saying, Kyle. I'm awful at fishing...until I married into a fishing family. My father-in-law is the head fishery biologist for Lake Powell. I've never caught a fish until I went fishing with him. It's actually quite fun!
Post a Comment