Machinist,
I read your article and it brought back lots of memorys of fishing with my dad when he had a "Kelpers" Licence.
We had a 28' Tolleycraft Sportsfisher with twin 233 hp mercs.
We fished out of Neah Bay in the mid seventys, I was 17 or 18 years old and got quite an education on fishing.
I remember having to get up before daylight run out and fish all day and then Clean up the fish scales and slime off the boat boat every evening. (while the skipper My Dad went back to the trailer popped a cold one and started dinner.)It was always dark before I got back to our 5th wheel where we stayed.
I remember our best day was close to 100 silvers We couldn't keep them off the girdies, we would drop one side run over to the other side Net the fish, rebait, drop down, run over to the other side and start the Process again.
Dad also had a Charter Licence and on the weekends we would take people out, with me and my brother playing the bait boys.
It was a fun couple of summers but one thing does stand out in my mind. One evening we heard on the radio that an older gentleman who was disabled had taken his grandkids out fishing and was over due. I believe they found the capsized boat the next day I don,t recall if there were any survivors but we found a huge oil slick a couple of days later with some debris and a dead puppy floating on top. Very sobering experience and something I will never forget.
I guess what I learned is you can get into trouble anywhere not just the bar so safety first.
Ramprat