Thursday evening found Rob and I heading downtown again, and this time we went straight to the area we'd hooked up the night before.
No other rowers in sight with just a couple of powerboats around, so we set up shop and started rowing, waiting for the Sun to dip below the horizon, or in this case, behind a few buildings.
Not long after 8:00 PM, during what's known as the "magic hour", we had a really good strike and were hooked up again.
The fish made an initial good run and then turned and charged back at us, Rob reeling as fast as humanly possible on a Longstone.
He tightened up as the fish neared the boat and then the fish thrashed violently on the surface before diving under the boat.
I spun the boat off the line as Rob deftly moved around to keep the fish away from the boat, but the darn thing seemed to be seeking refuge under us, as it wouldn't go away.
It was one of those short line technical close-in battles that are never popular as so much can go wrong in a short time with a short tight line.
Twice we thought the fish might be weakening, but both times it showed that it was still very strong and not ready to surrender at all.
We had a couple of looks at it and it seemed a fat fish, but we were unable to get a good look at its length so not sure if it would have made it or not.
We both agreed that we couldn't claim it as a Tyee but it sure would be close.
That was rendered moot, as the fish made a sharp turn and then dove straight down, right beside the boat.
Rob had a good bend in the rod and all looked good until the rod suddenly straightened out as he exclaimed the fish as being gone.
"Feels like something broke," he said.
I cringed at those words as I had just tied the plug on before we started and I'm pretty fastidious about taking care with my knot tying, so hoped he was wrong, and my line hadn't broken.
The plug surfaced close by so I netted it and asked Rob to reel in. As he did, I noticed the rubber bumper and the swivel that had been attached to the hook were still there and the line hadn't broken, but the hook was gone.
I still cannot fathom how everything lined up so this could happen, but there was a small gap left from when I had pinched the hook-eye closed when I attached the swivel to the hook, and even though I always give a good hard pull of the swivel at whatever tiny gap is left if the pinch doesn't completely close up against the hook shank, somehow it had lined up so when the fish made its hard dive it was strong enough to pull the hook away from the swivel through that small gap.
I still can't imagine how it got at that angle, but it obviously did, causing a one in a million situation that allowed the fish to escape.
Still shocked and annoyed here and I vow that will never happen again.
I have re-pinched the couple of set-ups I still have plus plan on using a slightly larger swivel, so it won't be easy to pull through any gap left after the pinch in the future.
So, two trips downtown, two hookups but no fish in the boat.
I'm jinxed.
Took my two favorite ladies down there last night but the ebb current was much stronger than the previous two nights and it was harder to fish the area I wanted with the result we hooked nothing.
I heard a big fish was lost in the pool last night so I might give that a whirl tonight, as downtown seems out of the picture right now.
One of these days.....................................................sigh.
Take care.