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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (May 26, 2016)
4 // COASTWEEKEND.COM Books, gardening, hiking, hobbies, recreation, personalities, travel & more CLOSE TO HOME PHOTO BY DAVID CAMPICHE Rainbow trout from Black Lake. THE OLD MAN AND THE BLACK LAKE I PHOTO BY DAVID CAMPICHE Black Lake, the old reservoir for the city of Ilwaco, is stocked with rainbow trout. By DAVID CAMPICHE It’s 5:30 in the morning, and the phone rings. I stir from bed, fumbling with my footsteps and the black plastic receiver. The synapses between brain and body seems lost in shadowland. Coor- dination has fl own south. “Mornin’ champ. Up to some clammin’?” Phil’s voice races through the back roads of my brain. My mouth is dry. I can’t yet spit out my words succinctly. “Wha…? Oh, yeah. Now?” “Not tomorrow, cowboy. Perfect tide, perfect day. Looked out the window yet?” I admit that I haven’t. “Well,” says Phil, “time’s a wastin’.” Fifteen minutes later we’re on the beach, and Phil is dead-on right. The beach is as close to perfect as landscapes can be. The sun is rising, caressing the soft, white-hatted surf. A spangled mirror refl ects the robin-egg sky back on the still salt water that has settled behind the sand bars on the east side of the ocean as the tide pulls out. Blue sky on blue water. Blue velvet. Sleep has evaporated from my eyes. As I walk toward the clam beds, an eagle of huge size fl oats effortlessly over my head, no higher than a fl ag pole. I think of this as a good omen. Around us, the clam holes are scattered like pol- ka dots on a party dress. Many a day we have grubbed and drubbed for the bivalves. We have stomped and thumped and worked the surf like prisoners on a chain gang. Not today. This is a turkey shoot. In 10 minutes we are washing the clams and circling the truck. The clams are big and fat, the best dig almondine. Soon we have six. of the year. Across the lake, a giant trout is skirting the placid water, an acrobat dressed in a quicksilver “Still time to go fi shin’,” says Phil. I argue pants. I watch it admiringly. It jumps again, and but not for long. Already, it is 60 degrees on the I realize — suddenly, shockingly — that it is beach. attached to my hook, and running toward me. I Off we go to Black Lake, the old reservoir tighten the 6-pound test line, and the battle is on. for the city of Ilwaco, recently stocked with The fi sh looks too big for the gear. We — all the lovely rainbow trout. I’ll be honest, I never men on the dock — coax it in, offering advice bothered to fi sh it before, preferring the wilder like a ticker-tape moment. The fi sh jumps, runs, steelhead streams that abound in Pacifi c and tugs and pulls, demonstrating a Clatsop County, and of course, all boatload of trout trickery. The line that ocean and the silver-backed ‘STILL TIME holds. Minutes blur by. salmon. But rumor has it that TO GO Finally, one of my new-found Nancy Allen, Phil’s wife, has just FISHIN’,’ friends goes below the dock to net landed a 4-pound trout. There was SAYS PHIL. the beast. Another offers a plastic no denying the excitement. ice chest before the trout is even A group of retirees has gathered I ARGUE landed. Photos on a half-dozen on the small wooden dock that the BUT NOT phones (man’s new best city built: Norm and Dan and Arlie, FOR LONG. cell friend) click away like a train seniors for sure. On the surface, it ALREADY, thumping on the rails. I’m smiling, appears that this fi shing event has IT IS 60 12 years old again. Everyone is more social implications than gam- ing for meat. Stories stumble out DEGREES ON smiling. A car pulls over and a man like the tide rising: fi shing in Idaho, THE BEACH. jumps out and greets the boys with Montana, on the Deschutes and an enthusiastic, “Wow! Are there on the Salmon. Steelhead fi shing, fi sh in this lake really this big?” No need to an- bass, salmon, pike and trout — if it swims they caught it. But the prize was in the telling: talking, swer that question. In the grass the trout glistens like a newly minted coin. At 6 pounds, it looks smoking, exaggerating and, yes, bending the like a lost salmon. truth, if only a little bit. Fudging, so to speak. It’s The air is warm and annealing. A golden orb okay, apparently, in fi shing. rises, higher and higher in the sky. Shadow and Phil brings out a jar of PowerBait. I twist it light mingle, ancient friends. This lake and all onto the hook and cast away. Quickly enough, those trout, big and small, are but a fi ve-minute the pole begins to twitch. Gently, I seize up on the line. This is no salmon, just a small trout per- drive from Long Beach. They are waiting for you. As is this magical day, and so close to home. fect for pan-frying. I salivate thinking of trout