End of fish story

"George!" a guy on the phone said, "You should have told us how big that darned fish was." He's right. Two weeks ago under the headline "Kilbella Tyee" I wrote of a salmon expedition taken with Bob Ewing 35 years ago. In the telling of that wild yarn used words like "big, submarine," huge," but neglected to actually give size details. Figured you readers could guess from the picture.

Answering the size question automatically leads into the crazy "rest of the story." The fight with the big king salmon happened early in the morning so it was mid-afternoon before we returned to our securely anchored home ship, Estero. The group caught a few more fish but nothing like my monster. Besides Bob and I, there were five other paying guests aboard and the combined catch had to be cleaned weighed, wrapped and put into freezers.

Things went well until the chief guide came to my big king and said it would have to be cut in two to fit in the ship's freezer. That thought was almost more than I could stand. Did not have a plan for bringing that trophy home to tie on the fender of the pickup and drive down the Main Street of Kalispell, but there were certainly "show off" dreams. While we were standing on the back of the ship's "cleaning deck," a large single-engine Beaver sea plane landed and pulled up alongside. Asked if we had any mail for him to pick up.

I excitedly yelled, "Where you taking the mail?" He gave the blessed answer, "Back to my base at Campbell River." With pounding heart I asked the big question, "Would you consider flying my trophy king salmon to a locker plant there? These guys here want to cut it in two." "Sure, " he said. "Just so you wrap it up real good. There is a big locker plant right there by the docks."

"How much you going to charge me?"

"Twenty bucks sound fair?"

"You got a deal my friend."

Took a few minutes to wrap and bind the salmon. Handed the pilot a twenty-dollar bill and he took off with the big fish. It did take a couple of us to balance on the plane's pontoons and relay the carcass into the storage compartment, but after my morning's balancing act on the boat seat with my pants around my ankles, that was easy.

We stayed several days more at Kilbella and I caught a female king that only weighed 38 pounds, but still big enough to win the $140 pot put up by the group. The male king weighed 48 pounds and was exactly 48 inches long. That size is not the world's record but it was the July '73 record around Kilbella until a Canadian on another ship caught one about 65 pounds.

Fast forward, Bob and I flew back to Campbell River and headed for Montana in my pickup with the solidly frozen king wrapped up in dozens of newspapers then tucked inside a goose down mummy bag. We had it laying on the bunk in the truck's small camper. That led to the next adventure.

Had to re-enter the United States through customers at Port Angeles after crossing from Vancouver Island on a big ferry. It was early morning, before sunrise. The line was very long. After an hour Bob and I were almost to the clearance gate when the van ahead of us was raided. It was full of hippies and they had all sorts of drugs. Officers came from every place and the hippies were led off in handcuffs.

Took over an hour for all this and the van was towed away for evidence. At last a custom officer motioned us to pull up to the gate. After showing my driver's license, another officer asked me to get out and go to the back of the camper with him where he asked permission to inspect the inside. I didn't ask him to get a search warrant. Figured he probably didn't need one after the way they tore into the hippy van.

He climbed up into the dark camper, turned on a flashlight and said, "You told us there were only two of you. Who's that in the bunk?"

"That's not a person sir, that's my trophy king salmon."

"Well, we've got to have a look."

"Sir, I've gone through expense and a lot of work to get that big fish back to Kalispell, Montana, frozen and in one piece. Would it be OK if we took it out of the sleeping back for a minute and let you feel it through the newspaper wrappings?"

He thumped it with his fist and said, "For some reason I believe you," and he got out of the camper. I locked the door and Ewing and I were on our way home.

And that is… the rest of the story.

G. George Ostrom is a Kalispell resident and Hungry Horse News columnist.