Dawn broke as the day began, arrival at Doug Jung’s house was very cold. We were off in minutes to fish the Napa River for the famous striped bass. The wind can be fierce there, the ocean fog gets sucked in by the higher temperatures in the central valley. This day was not typical for the lowlands of the marshes of Solano and Napa counties. It was warm, still and beautiful on the brackish water. Doug started getting bites right away, lots of ‘schoolies’, fun to catch but under the 18-inch minimum to keep. He is very careful to remove the hook and gently put the fish back in the water with as little stress as possible. He hooked a slightly bigger striper that was just over the minimum, and the first fish was in the bag.
We both dropped a layer as the sun made us happy to have a wide brim hat. I started to catch a few schoolies, fun to wrestle in. Doug took them into the boat and removed the hook without taking them out of the landing net. A slight swish in the water and they were gone like a shot. We moved on to other legs of the river and plied our lures, first casting into the shallows then trolling. Other fishermen say the trolling rate needs to be very fast and a hundred feet of line or more behind the boat. The little motor was going full throttle and still below the recommended troll speed. The lure, a small funny looking thing that kind of skipped on the surface, was a waste of time unless the fish were right on the surface and very fast swimmers.
I was ready to give up when POW! I hooked a fish. It felt like a monster. The fish would pull against the line as I worked it closer to the boat, then a burst to speed, as my reel sang out more line. It felt like a very mad fish, bigger than the schoolies. It passed near the boat as Doug tried to net it, “It’s a keeper, Bill.” Finally, it was all over, the fish was the biggest of the day at 24” and seven pounds and my personal best. We made it back to Cuttings Wharf and unloaded at the boat ramp. Doug had two over the minimum and only one for me. People at the boat ramp helped load the boat into the back of the pick-up and engaged in friendly banter. One guy, ‘Alex’ from Sweeny’s Sports in Napa, an important element of local fishing for the area. Doug also met a friend, Frank Grant, who said he tries to get out most days unless the weather or flood waters get in the way…