Flaming Gorge, August 2015

Each summer we always try to spend some time at Flaming Gorge. There we take our boat out of storage and chase the beautiful kokanee salmon. They are the same as Alaskan Reds/sockeyes with the only difference being that they are landlocked and never make the run to the sea.

So loading up our small slide in camper we headed south where we set up the camper at our site before going to the marina to pick up the boat. There we ran into the first problem, the starter battery was dead and so I installed a backup.

It too barely worked as I tried to raise the motor, using the power trim. That too failed but luckily it was high enough up that we could pull it out of the yard. Trying to charge both the batteries also failed necessitating a trip to Rock Springs to buy a new starter battery, (forty five miles one way).

The next day I installed the new battery and then went to work on the small kicker motor. It had failed last year and I had spent the winter looking into rebuilding the carburetor and had purchased a rebuild kit from a marine store back east.

Now many would just take the boat to the nearest dealer but the closest Yamaha outboard repair shop is two hundred and fifty miles away in Salt Lake City, (the local outboard repair marina only works on Mercury and Mariner engines). At the end of the day we trailed the boat to the launch and tried to start the motors.The big engine worked fine, other than the broken power trim, but the little kicker motor, necessary for trolling just wouldn’t start.

Frustrated Renita and I decide to take the boat out, using the big motor to troll out to the spot and then the electric motor for pull our downriggers. It sounded like a good idea till I tried to set the first downrigger. True to form the front downrigger pulley failed and so I spent the first hour unsuccessfully trying to fix it. I did get the other downrigger to work and we even had a salmon on for a while before it shook rigged squid lure.

The weather begin to look threatening and so we returned to the dock, where we barely got the boat loaded and back to the campsite. After we talked with our friend Randy the consensus was that we should haul the boat to a dealer.

Of course the salmon were biting and all the boats were coming in with their limits of the tasty fish. Still we got to enjoy the beautiful sunsets and we do love the desert solitude. Anyone who has a boat knows that they are bottomless holes that you pour money into. I spent my time resewing the storage cover.

So after four days of frustration we put the boat back into storage. Next year the sockeye had better be trembling as we will bring out another thousand, (boat get it), and salmon will be on the menu.

Clear skies