I for one am sick of all the negative conversations and posts directed at this particular tournament.
For the record, I had a very enjoyable experience fishing this event. Most of the participants I spoke with enjoyed it as well. The only complaints that I heard repeated by the participants were directed at the camping facilities. those of us who stayed in a motel had no problems.
Fishing a river with current brings many anglers a new challenge. Throw in a tidal factor and a contestant has to think in yet another dimension.
"Oh but the water is dangerous and the ocean going freighter waves will sink you." These were the most commonly echoed complaints prior to the tournament. Yet folks in very small boats had little difficulty in navigating away from the problem areas and finding a few scrappy smallmouth to tangle with.
A few months ago someone stated that we needed to fish bodies of water where main events and larger "Ts" were held in order to gain experience. Well here we were in Portland on the Columbia and where were those of you who voiced that opinion?
Fifteen boats did show up and I'll bet some of them did not vote for this venue. but they showed up never the less and did not sit back, fail to participate and then whine about it. Despite poor camping facilities the fishing experience was good.
Yes I voted for this particular tournament and I would vote again for it despite the fact that I did not weigh a large bag. To the club members that did weigh a winning bag and had never been on this body of water before, my respectful congratulations. To the members that fished it and didn't fare well, I think we all need to learn a little bit more about this type of fishing. To the ones who did not participate and yet continue to snipe about it. Where is the validity in your sniveling?
Smitty