Lake of the Springs - Day 6

Tuesday June 23rd – Day 6

Lake of the Springs Campground, Oregon House CA.

Today was the day that we were finally going to get the kids fishing. Except for Kristen (thanks Aunt Tonya!), none of the other girls have ever fished or caught a fish before. Patty bought them all these cute little fishing poles before we left that they are totally geeked about using. They seemed to be OK even though they were tiny so we set out to get them going.

Our morning started on the boat dock here in the campground. As the campground name implies, there is indeed a beautiful big lake here that is surrounded by dense and beautiful forest. We rented a large pontoon boat that had plenty of room and lots of shade. Perfect for our little gang of 8. We found a nice spot at the far end of the lake and dropped anchor.

The skies were clear and blue, it was warm and sunny, and the wind was calm. Great weather for a nice day on the water but could we catch fish?? This was my main concern as all these little people were so excited. I have fished too many times to know that fishing is often a lot like doing nothing, and worried that the kids would soon loose interest and be disappointed.

So with my best recollection and learned technique I began to set up all their poles with Power Bait and split shot sinkers figuring this would be our best chance for beginners to catch fish. I had just finished setting up Kelly’s pole and helped her drop her bait in the water, and turned to do the next one when Kelly squealed: DADDY! She yelled and I turned to see what was wrong. The “problem” was that her pole was bent over and wiggling with a fish-on!

For the next hour or so it was all a rapid paced blur as the kids all caught fish or got good bites almost as soon as they could put bait in the water. There was one scream after another as the fish came over the boat rail to the delight of all the girls. As luck would have it, we anchored over a school of Bluegill. We could not have written a better way to get the kids exposed to the fun sport of fishing, and today exceeded our most optimistic expectations.

After two hours our boat time was up and we made our triumphant return back to the docks. It was now very hot and everybody wanted to get wet so this time we went to the nice swimming beach not far from the docks. We all have those big blow-up rafts and spent the day floating around and having a good swim.

This is our last day here and tomorrow we leave for our end of the line destination, Gold Beach Oregon.

Tonight I finally gave up on the old laptop and ordered a new one from Dell. They are going to ship it next day air tomorrow to our campground in Gold Beach Oregon. It will be waiting for me in the office when we get there.