Is This Seriously How I'm Spending My 4th of July?

To me, the 4th of July is both the best and the worst time to be at the Oregon Coast. On one end of the scale, coming here for the 4th of July is a tradition that my entire family has been undergoing for decades long before I was born. There are certain things I look forward to each year, such as setting off fireworks, having the annual barbecue, or getting skunked while surfperch fishing. It's a fun time to be at the beach for sure. Unfortunately, I am not the only one who thinks this way. Nearly every town on the coast turns into a complete zoo, with thousands and thousands of people flooding into even the most destitute coastal villages. The worst by far, in terms of crowds, is Seaside. Not only is it the largest and closest beach town to Portland, but it has a much wider array of tourist attractions and carnival rides. Although parts of the town are  nice during most of the year, all the patriotism seems to draw people to this place like flies. It once took me an hour to drive three blocks. 

Sure, the business is important for these ramshackle towns whose beguiling cotton candy stands and carnival rides provide the only source of income in a year. However, this is the last thing I think about when a group of flag-waving college students decides to have a wet T-shirt contest right where I'm fishing. Fortunately, my family has spent the last few years staying in the much quieter town of Cannon Beach. It's a more artsy village separated from Seaside by Tillamook Head, a large mountain jutting out into the ocean.

It still isn't enough to block the noise of the fireworks and police sirens coming from Seaside.

Cannon Beach is a quiet, sensible town whose tourist attractions consist of antique shopping, wine tasting, and watching rabbits scamper across well-maintained lawns. As you might guess, I don't spend my time engaging in those activities, and the same can be said for the carnival rides, fried butter, and general drunkenness of Seaside. Instead, I spent the first morning of my stay (July 3rd) getting up at some ungodly hour and hopping in my car to head over to Garibaldi.

Not that kind of Garibaldi.

Although I have associated the word "Garibaldi" with a bright orange fish that's achieved the permanent "no no" status among California game officials, it also is a small town nestled along Tillamook Bay. It took about an hour's drive to reach, but I didn't mind it. I have always loved driving along the Oregon Coast early in the morning, as the subtle beauty of the coast is better appreciated without gobs of tourists buying saltwater taffy and throwing up in garbage cans. However, I wasn't here to drive around aimlessly. I pulled up to the 12th street pier and grabbed my clamming equipment. It was low tide and I had three hours to spend up to my armpits in muck.

Although I was planning on going razor clamming, some recent closures banished me to the mudflats of Tillamook Bay. Despite all the muck, bay clamming is in many ways more productive and fun than razor clamming. Not only are there more species of clam, but the limits are more generous than those set for razor clam retention. In addition, it's fascinating to poke around the eelgrass to see what kinds of critters you can find and  which ones you can eat.

A Pacific Staghorn Sculpin caught nearby, Please don't ever try to eat one of these things.

The worst part is that my biggest flounder was only about twice this size.

When you aren't exactly sure what's going on in the sex identification department.

The seaweed is a garnish.

Aside from fighting with an old Chinese guy over a red rock crab and digging a sculpin spine out of my hand, clamming was a calming and successful endeavor. Although there were lots of people clamming as well, they tended to all be like-minded individuals who refrained from engaging in "wet T-shirt contests." By the time the clam carnage was over and the tide began to creep back in, I had limited out on cockles and even found a few keeper Dungeness and Red Rock Crabs.

The crabs ended up kicking the bucket on the way home, but that isn't part of the story. 

After leaving the suckers to soak in a bucket of saltwater and expel their sandy guts, I rigged up my rod and prepared myself for the annual torture of trying to catch a surfperch. I baited up with a Gulp! 2 inch camo colored sandworm and trudged out to the beach. The conditions looked perfect; calm surf, an incoming tide, and it was fairly late in the evening. In addition, the spot I picked had numerous troughs and depressions in the sand that were ideal for perch fishing. I discovered these by taking a wrong step and ending up in frigid chin deep water, but it was good that I did so nonetheless. After a few casts, I began catching a few small Silver Surfperch, a different species from the Redtails I had normally been targeting up until this point. I didn't even consider that there might be other species of these frustrating fish.

Well, would you look at that. 

I had a much nicer photo planned for the fish pictured above, but had to settle for the mugshot above after spending several minutes deleting useless apps and photos of my family and friends to make room for this one. As you can see, the fish hit a Gulp! sandworm, one of the most effective baits to use for just about any saltwater fish. This is rather unfortunate, as these things are borderline alive and come in a leaky bag with some strange secret fluid that they need to prevent themselves from shriveling up. The fluid actually doesn't smell that bad, and has a sweet, vinegary taste. Try it!

I call fish this small "audience fish" because I only catch them with an audience present. Fortunately, if viewed from the back, you can't even tell I'm holding a fish.

The next day, it was the 4th of July. Tradition would normally dictate that I would head into Seaside to visit our relatives and their small, dusty cabin. This dusty cabin has been in the family for generations, and has undergone endless renovations and fix-me-ups throughout the years. I barely remember the way it first looked, although I distinctly remember a garish orange sofa bed and a bathroom that would spray septic fluid from every available opening periodically. Since then, the place has gone through more than a few changes (including the torching of the orange couch) but I still didn't trust the bathroom. Instead, everyone came to my place for breakfast. The whole time, I kept trying to talk everyone into going on an adventure with me. However, as I should have learned by now, nobody in the Walsh household has ever or will ever be interested in anything that has to do with fishing, crabbing, clamming, or direct eye contact with the ocean. Once again, I gathered up my things and headed off on my own to do some fishing on the Barview Jetty.

Jetty fishing in Oregon is essentially a "pathway to the deep," so to speak. The numerous jetties that dot the Oregon coastline are the everyman's best shot at catching Lingcod, Rockfish, Greenling, Cabezon, and the ridiculous other ugly SOB's that normally reside in water only accessible via boat. Of course, fishing these jetties has numerous financial drawbacks that make buying your own boat seem like an investment.

Me tying on another sinker for the umpteenth time.

The snags. The stupid, godforsaken snags. Of all the places I have ever fished in my entire life, Oregon's very own Barview Jetty has by far the most ensnaring, rocky, inhospitable habitat I have ever seen in my life. I hung up at least once on nearly every cast, and had to break my entire rig off every two or three. Even the lures I tried ended up snagging, and it isn't like I can go swim down and free them like I do in most other places. Every time I hooked a fish, my sinker would snag on the way in and I'd either have to break off or end up losing the fish anyways. I am positive that if someone went down there and collected all the tackle they could find off the rocks, they could open their own chain of tackle stores. At one point, I wanted to just throw the rest of my sinkers in the water and get it over with. Somewhere along the line, I somehow managed to catch a very small, very ordinary Kelp Greenling. This is by far the hardest I've ever had to work for this species.

Caught on a good ol' chunk of sand shrimp.

When I got back, I was able to find one remaining sinker and used it to give surfperch fishing another shot. I wanted to prove to myself that the previous night hadn't been a fluke, and headed out late in the evening while fireworks were still illegally being set off everywhere. I made a few casts and began catching some more surfperch, bigger ones than the night before.

I said bigger, not big. 

Over the years, I've always tried to explain my fascination and obsession with the surfperch. Sure, they're beautiful fish who look more delicate and graceful than the ugly SOB's that I routinely catch from the jetties and piers. However, that doesn't explain it, as I have no problems with catching grotesque fish that look like they've been turned inside out by mother nature. I think my fascination with surfperch has largely to do with their environment. The surf zone seems barren and lifeless, and thousands of people walk by it without even considering that there might be fish swimming among the waves. And yet, there are several species of unique fish adapted to live in this turbulent environment that can be caught by the angler. I've also loved surf fishing in general, as there's something about standing along a desolate beach, rod in hand, as the waves crash ashore. There's also no risk of snagging, although I've still somehow managed to do it a few times.

Yes, it was really that dark outside. 

Eventually it got too dark for me to see, so I headed back while being guided by the police lights. They were busy fining the people who were setting off fireworks, and didn't notice me walking by with my chest waders and surf rod. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't it pretty ironic for fireworks to be illegal on the 4th of July? The biggest and most explosive symbol of our freedom being repressed due to the imminent and pressing risk of a forest fire somehow occurring on a beach is what makes absolutely no sense to me. It's honestly not a big deal to me, as I'm not one of those juveniles who have an alarming affinity for explosives. Just as long as they don't ban fishing.

If you go to Sunset High School, please stop reading this blog immediately. Thank you.