Every year around Father’s Day, the US Forest Service organizes a fishing derby at a park in Trout Lake, WA. The creek that flows through the park is screened off and stocked with rainbow trout, after which the community is invited to catch and cook fish, participate in various kid-centric activities and learn about the forest service and fishing in general. This was an excellent opportunity for a family adventure and our second year attending this event. Unfortunately we were unable to arrive until most of the families had left the event. The forest service had closed their displays and the finger-painting tent and bouncy house had both been taken down. But this didn’t disappoint us since we were there to fish. We arrived at the creek and discovered that most of the fish still remained, along with the make-shift fishing poles constructed out of tree branches. We grabbed a fishing pole, baited our hook and made our first cast. I stood behind my daughter and patiently instructed her on how to strategically cast the line upstream, allowing the current to bring the worm to the fish. She was more focused on asserting her desire to hold the fishing-stick herself since she was a big girl. This continued until we hooked our first fish, but he got away. This cycle repeated a few more times until we landed our first trout. She immediately wanted to pick it up and hold it just before she asked when we were going to eat it. By the end of the day we caught our limit and I cleaned our catch while Siena jumped on our friend’s trampoline. The fish are currently in our freezer and I’m sure they’ll make a delicious dinner Sunday evening.
Fishing with a three-year-old requires a great deal of patience.
Here we are displaying our first catch. I love her reaction when the fish starts squirming.