Day Trip to Bonneville Dam

On June 12, 2010 mom and dad came up from Salem and we took the kids to Bonneville Dam. It was free fishing day for kids under the age of 12 and the event was held by the Department of Fish and Wildlife, which is dad's stomping grounds. He knew MANY of the people volunteering to help at the event.

This was the site from up at the visitor center. The kids wanted to know why it was steaming and why you couldn't swim in the water. So through the adults explaining in kid language, we think they got it....kind of. LOL The gist is, no you cannot swim in it and there is steam from the waves crashing together and the water moving so fast.

When you walked around you could see the channels in which the fish had to go through to get through to the river. This is them swimming up stream.

This was one of the 300 lb. + sturgeons that were in a pond at the dam. It was gigantic, and very cool.

This was from up above at an overlook bridge above the pond.

This was one of the many trout ponds. They were beautiful and Kai definitely has Rainbow Trout figured out. He loves the rainbow on their sides.

There was also a stuffed deer that the kids could learn about and pet. Kolbie was absolutely infatuated with the deer. She could have cared less about fishing or anything else at that point.

I think if she could she would have brought the deer home. She LOVED IT!

The kids then moved on to learning about water safety. Not only do you wear life jackets when swimming, but also fishing and on boats. :) They got to put on the life jackets and go to the next station. In order to fish, the kids had to go from station 1-6 in order to fish at station 7.

So we didn't get any pictures of Kolbie fishing, for two reasons. One is that the kids had to fish separately because of their ages and skill level. Two is that when Kolbie went to fish in her pond, the little boy next to us fishing caught his fish and it came out flopping - as they all do - and Kolbie FREAKED! She dropped the pole and ran and wouldn't come back to fishing. She was DONE. So we went to watch Kai.

And after much waiting for his turn to come. HE casted off his first time and caught his first fish in about 5 minutes. This is him holding his first fish! So happy and excited, he wanted to catch another fish and the limit for each child was 2.

Thankfully, volunteer dude, turned away from Kai to knock out the fish and take out the hook. Notice the smile still on Kai's face. :)

So again he casted out, but through a little bit of struggle the volunteer casted the second time for him and he caught fish 2 in about 3-5 minutes.

Here is fish 2!

And this was the look on the trip home. Kolbie was exhausted, but could not under any circumstance let go of the Cheetoh in her hand.

Kai made it home awake and very excited to tell his friends both in the neighborhood and church that he caught his first 2 fish in a real pond/river.

The very next day, Kai finished his custom built fishing pole that he made, in a fishing club at the church. Bobby, the teacher, was so happy to hear that Kai had caught two fish and is now taking Kai fishing on Saturday the 26th!