woke up at 6:30 this morning to get ready to fish with 2 of my "older" friends out on the sound. Had to quickly run out and get gas for the boat, which involved unloading my truck bed of the firewood i had stacked in there and a quick trip to the gas station. Sweating and tired, i boarded the boat at 745 and was picking up Bill and Fred at their dock a little after eight.
Fred is 85 years old (still walks 3 miles every day and tries to fish as much as possible) and i first met him through my late friend when we used to fish the returning silvers in agate pass. We had seen each other from time to time over the years since Doc died and finally Bill was able to arrange this trip that we had often talked about.
Bill is also an avid fly fisherman but had never caught a cutt, where as Fred has fished them for over 50 years in the local waters, he has caught a few in his time.
After a short boat run from the dock we started to fish. I ran the boat while Bill and Fred cast. Bill quickly hooked and landed his first cuttie of about 12 inches. we were off to a quick start but the real goal of this day was to get Fred into the fish. Well no sooner do i release fish number one when Bill is again into another cutthroat, this time a big one. Taped out at 20" and fat! just a beautiful fish to catch. Fred then got on the board with a nice 14 or so inch fish. Bill and I traded off fishing as we continued to work the area and took 3 more fish over 16 inches and numerous smaller fish before we decided that that pocket of fish had been plenty kind to us so we headed off again in search of fish.
After 2 short and unsuccessful stops(i dont stay long if i dont see action) we started to fish a little bar that was alive with trout. Our poppers were being hit on every cast and not just by small fish either. Fred got a 17 incher, Bill another in the same size and I got one pushing 20. We worked down the shoreline continuing to find and catch fish until about 1:00. Our poppers tattered and arms weary we headed for Bremerton to get some lunch.
We figured we had landed 30 fish by lunch with 3 around 20, 10 over 16" and many more lost. At one point, Bill and I doubled up on cutties, both big fish, I lost mine(the bigger one) while netting Bill's and his went 18". Just amazing fishing.
After lunch we headed back towards home, fishing along the way, not seeing as many as before, but still landing 10 or so before we ended up back at the dock around 3:30.
An amazing day on the water and almost all of our fish came on poppers as well. Lots of fun and it was great to have both Bill and Fred out on the boat. We all caught fish over 17" on poppers!
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