Three friends and I hit up Brant's landing today for our annual spring get together and Beer festival. I don’t drink so of course I was the driver. We cast our lines into a steady head wind and all four hooks hit the water simultaneously at 11:00 am to insure that no one had an unfair advantage when it came down to the three dollar bet. After the first cast I pulled out my secret weapon…The dreaded and deadly two pole endorsement. Surprisingly, I was the only one to read the regulations prior to buying a fishing license and found out that Rufus Woods was two pole body of water. The others put up a slight argument as too the legality of my using two poles in regards to the three dollar bet but when I explained to them that they had the same opportunity as I did and that they just didn’t take advantage of it and that they were drinking beer and therefore had a slight advantage over me because of their relaxed state. We all eventually agreed that it was a level playing field and set in for some serious fishing. We fished the Brant’s landing area using Power Baits in various and sundry forms to include Power Night Crawlers, Power Worms, Power Eggs in various colors, Power Nuggets and Power Bait in almost every color available to include Green, Red, Purple, Chartreuse, Flo Orange and my personal favorite Rainbow. I switched over to more natural bait for a short period of time and used worms…both of the night crawler and red wiggler varieties. After fishing the Brant’s landing area for about four hours today and receiving not so much as a nibble for the four of us I suggested that we move down river and fish the rocks. All agreed and I poured my now three very happy buddies into the back of the pick up for the short trip down to the next fishing spot. We had made the first cast of the day earlier so there was no need for the formality and pageantry of the first cast ceremony. I was first back to the water and made several great casts prior to the party boys return to the water. As Paul made his first cast at out new location I and the others thoroughly enjoyed his rendition of Swan Lake as he made several very beautiful pirouettes prior to entering the river thus ending our day of fishing at Rufus Woods. As Paul was removing himself from the icy grips of the Columbia River I was able to catch and retain to only fish of the day. A small by Rufus Woods standards native Rainbow in the 12” range caught on two orange Power Eggs thereby cementing my position as the greatest fisherman of the day and I walked away with nine extra bucks to boot. All in all it was great day on the water with great lifelong friends. It just doesn’t get any better than this.

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