All right, so it isn’t exactly fishing. At least not the way we midwesterners do it. But it’s great fun. I spent last week in Florence, Oregon, visiting my dad in some of the best country in the states. Beautiful weather, too. The best part was my experience with crabbing, though. Oh, we did the standard, big box loaded with turkey leg stuff (a regular crab trap for those of you who haven’t done it before). Basically, you load the trap up with a caged turkey leg, toss it, marked by a float, into the water. Then you wait. Pretty soon, you wander around and pull up the trap, usually filled with a bunch of nice crabs. But my dad introduced me to something new that really occupies your time while waiting around.
Hook that little baby onto a heavy line, use a REALLY heavy pole, add a chicken leg and toss it as far as you can. Let it sit on the bottom for eight minutes, yank hard, reel like crazy and lo and behold, up comes a crab! Or more. Our best was four of the little buggers at once. Obviously, the gloves are optional, but I can tell you from personal experience that they can bite pretty hard if you get them just wrong.
I haven’t laughed so hard in a long time. This was the best diversion I’ve had in a long time. No, it ain’t fishing, but then, we did get to use a pole. The wait for the traps was much more fun and the weather was absolutely perfect.
The Siuslaw River is incredible, by the way. It is a narrow, mountain river that runs right down to the ocean, surrounded by incredible redwood-lined cliffs. This time of year, the salmon start to run, too, and I counted no less than 100 boats trolling a narrow stretch for legal catches. None for me yet, but Dad called from a boat yesterday. He finally got his first! Which made me happy. I’ll wait til next year and hopefully get one, too. A little more fight than a walleye, or so he tells me. Should be great fun. Anyone up for a little trip?