2009 Season Recap & the Gales of October

Greetings everybody,

It's been awhile since I sent out an update so I hope I can take a minute of yours to do that and recap the overall 2009 Season.

We finished up a really great season at the end of September with some more excellent catches of Salmon & Trout. What ended up being our last trip on the water at the end of September saw us catch a 20-fish limit of mostly Chinook Salmon in just a little over 2 hours for a group of folks that came from Iowa. The action was nonstop and several days before that we ran an early evening trip where we had steady action and hauled in 18 fish, again mostly Chinook. On another day, we fished as a part of a two-boat group for a bachelor party and between the two boats, we handily took the most fish home with 11 as well as biggest fish, a nice Lake Trout about 13lbs. We also had all five game fish species on that trip which doesn't happen very often. I headed to Canada for a canoe trip shortly after those excursions and was treated to some great Fall colors, a rainbow that seemingly ended right in front of our campsite, ice-covered tents, and even a little bit of snow!

October's weather has proved quite volatile back home as well so little fishing has been done since I returned. In fact just this morning I got a call from the harbor saying the ropes from the dock to my boat had snapped and I needed to come down as violent east winds (again) ripped over the lake all last night. Fearing the unimaginable had happened, I was relieved upon arrival that only minor damage was sustained and have spent the morning stabilizing the boat in the slip. No ropes actually snapped thankfully but I certainly added more and will need to check on them again shortly.

So, I'm the process of packing everything in for 2009 and am getting ready for next year. Looking back on the season, I hosted a lot of really fun crews that came from as far away as China and Ireland as well. I'm not too sure if they were actually visiting from Ireland or called the U.S. home now but I can be sure that I could understand the Chinese folks a little easier! It's always entertaining to meet new people and personalities and share stories and experiences with each other about the last time they were on the water with me or about a fishing trip to a far off, exotic destination. Of course aboard the Independence there were lots of tales of bravery and endurance while battling big fish as well as accounts of nimbleness on the back deck as 2-3-4 fish were hooked at once. We had to circle the boat back around on a couple of big fish we had on and occasionally suffered the bitter taste of defeat when a big fish got away. We had some really great catches in both numbers and size and can say that this season surpassed last season by a pretty wide margin in both regards.

A lot of customers ask me "what do you do in the offseason"? Outside of an answer that occasionally borders on being 'a little wise' if the current dialogue fosters it, the answer is that the business side of this is always on my mind while the fishing side of it receives a ton of my attention even when I'm not on the water. But I kid sometimes and while there are many things to do in order to prepare for next season, there is plenty of free time to unwind, visit a few places, and think about how we will catch more and bigger fish next year! Something else that I have also embarked on is writing Salmon & Trout fishing articles for a website called: www.learninghowtofish.com. It's a broad-based fishing website that has a lot of helpful tips on a variety of different kinds of fishing in which many other well-known fisherman have written articles for as well. When asked by the folks at this website if I would like to write for them too, I agreed and have completed several articles which can be found at http://www.learninghowtofish.com/pag...p-articles.php. I will be working on more articles as the offseason progresses.

Lastly, many people asked me towards the end of the season if I was taking bookings for next year already and yes, reservations are indeed being made. Even though it seems a long way off, if you have been thinking about coming again next year - especially for the Coho run in May - you would be well served to start narrowing down a day to be sure to get the one of your choice.

I will end this letter here but also let you know that I am going to change out a lot of photos on the website in the near future. I will send an update when that is finished as some of you will find yourself on the front pages!

Thanks for reading and thanks again to all the folks that came fishing this year. I hope to see you all next season.

Capt Rick


Capt. Rick Bentley
US Coast Guard Licensed
Windycitysalmon.com
Independence Fishing Charters
windycitysalmon@gmail.com
call or text 773.791.7990