Salmon Fishing!

Neil has a friend named Sam that he met here in Colorado. Sam in originally from Ucluelet, British Columbia (which is on Vancouver Island). He owns his own charter fishing company. So we took a ferry from Washington over to Vancouver Island. Then we drove 4 hours to the small fishing town of Ucluelet, right on the Pacific Ocean. Sam took us out on his fishing boat for about 4 hours. We had a great time!

Here we are walking down the pier to the boat.

Neil in front of Sam's fishing boat.

All the fishing boats. Notice how nice and sunny it is here in town???

This is a pole covered with starfish, barnacles and other gross stuff.

Some pretty big starfish at the bottom of the water. We also saw a few sea lions swimming around, but I didn't get any pictures of those fast little swimmers.

Here is Sam....our fishing guide.

Neil was real happy with this catch. Just a baby so we had to let him go.

But the next one was a big one! Notice how foggy it is out on the ocean? Good thing Sam had a GPS in his boat because we couldn't see land in any direction!


Here it is! When the fish got close to the boat Sam would whack it in the head several times to kill it. Very interesting to watch.

The poor fish bleeding out.

We caught a total of 7 fish...5 chinook salmon and 2 sockeye.

As we were driving the boat back to the dock, we saw a bald eagle sitting on this post. Actually, I was the one who first spotted it. I was so happy...the only thing I was the first one to see the whole trip!! Neil was usually the one who would spot things first...even if he was driving!


We got close enough to get a good picture. I was just hoping he didn't swoop down and attack us. The bald eagle soaring away. We saw another one nesting in a tree. They are pretty easy to spot in the trees because of their white heads.

Neil had the biggest catch of the day! Almost 30 pounds and 30 inches long. I think this was the highlight of the trip for him!

Here are all the fish! Now what are we going to do with them? Our original plan was to catch and release. Then Sam told us you really can't do that. So we figured out a way to take them home with us.


Sam cleaned them for us.



Then we took the fish to a place that would vacuum pack them and freeze them overnight for us. We bought a 50 pound cooler and packed them in. We put it in the trunk of the car and continued on our journey. We stayed at a hotel the next night that let us put them in their freezer. Then the next night we stayed with a friend in Salt Lake City and he let us use his freezer. The fish made it home safe and sound! Neil and I cooked one up for dinner the next day and it was very tasty!