Fishing Nirvana

I love to fish, I just don't have much success. My husband had a few days of vacation last week, and I prevailed on him to take us camping and fishing. The camping was a nightmare! Our littlest was running around screaming, diving head-first into people's tents. The other boys were buzzing around, high on fresh air. We hardly slept a wink, but the fishing the next morning made up for everything. We found this fabulous pool between some rapids. It was quite a hike to get there, in prime rattlesnake country. We had to follow a skinny, slidey trail cut in the side of a basalt cliff. When we got down to the river, there was no level ground, just boulders and chasms. When we finally got our family down there, my husband and I just looked at each other, exchanging a "how are we going to get everyone out of here alive?" look. We had the baby tethered with twine, and tried to keep everyone from falling to their deaths. The fish started biting right away, and each of us got to reel one in. I was so shocked when I felt the tug on my line, I started shrieking! It was just a little Sqawfish, but I was over the moon. We were reeling fish in hand over fist, so when I caught my next one, dear husband was occupied. I actually grasped the fish in my hand, got the hook out of it's lip, stuck the metal pointy thing in it's gill and out it's mouth, and secured the line to a log in the water. It was quite a triumph, but I confess, I could feel the cold slipperiness of the fish on my hand for a long time afterward.