Has this ever happened to you?

[Bucknasty]

I floated the town run yesterday with 3 others in my boat, put in at day island at daylight. About 1300hrs we pass alton baker and surprise... A RIVERWIDE MAN MADE STRAINER underneath ferry street bridge!! River left to center bridge pillar was orange construction net and river center to river right was this yellow floating thing that stood up about ten inches above the surface of the river that was cabled together....WTF??? With no way around the best bet was an intentionally broach into the island in the center and thank God the current is creeping in there. I had to jump out in chest deep water with my two buddy's helping to submerge the cabled floating device as we yanked my relatively small drifter over this BS strainer! To top it off the two wise guys that put it up were sitting just downstream watching and smirking in there north river jet sled(sweet boat btw)! I calmly rowed over to them and asked if they knew who put that up.. they respond all proud saying we did.. I pointed out that there were NO signs up river and a lot of ppl use this river.. Not to mention its dangerous and a lot of work to get your boat over it.. They explained its to catch the thousands of rubber ducks they throw in the river upstream, I responded pointing out there putting lives at risk over rubber ducks...They made some more smug remarks... With an act of God and a loving hand on my back from my wife i did not resort to violence which seemed OH SO RIGHT because at this point im irrate! We continued downstream and hooked a nice chromer and lost it pretty quickly that helped change my mood : ) about ten minutes later we hooked another one... and lost it too : ( today was not my day!! In hindsight i would have just rowed to the far river left and cut there stupid construction fencing with my fillet knife and avoided any conversation because i looked just as stupid as they did for losing my cool... oh well hindsights always 20/20 Cheers, Bob

 

[Raincatcher]

How stupid,to endanger boaters over a GAME!! Unfortunately,even if you called the news stations and newspapers I doubt it would do any good,given your location. Do they do that for every game or just the televised ones? Glad you're okay.

 

[Bucknasty]

I believe its for a charity and while i fully support charity events this one needs to be thought through a bit more! Your right raincatcher!! Eugene....pfff.... I have always thought i was supposed to have been born in Northern Idaho or Montana haha just kidding! As much as i hate the city the steelhead opportunity is absolutely epic come winter steelhead season yee haw!! Cheeers, Bob

 

[TTFishon]

It's a charity event to raise money for children in need. One of those ducks was mine. If your duck is first you win a car. They have been doing this event for years and yes there should be some kind of warning for boaters.

 

[Bucknasty]

Once again, I Support the idea and the charity, the children in need didn't do this! TTFishon hopefully you won a car and i hope tons of money was made for the children in need! Cheers, Bob

 

[TTFishon]

I understand your anger. They really should post some warnings at the boat ramps up river. According to the Register Guard there were 68,308 ducks. Multiply that by $5.00 and that's how much money was raised minus the car. It's called The Great Rotary Duck Race. I know I'd try to contact them with this issue. It might save a life or two.

 

[the_intimidator03]

Well i didn't see TT's name on the list of winners. but the total is around 340,000 divided up with several charities. And i do agree with some warnings along the river at the very LEAST at the launches.

 

[JeannaJigs]

Holy crap I'd of freaked out on someone if it had been me lol. That's ridiculous that nothing was posted. I believe a couple years ago they had big signs warning boaters, but, seems like they decided to slack off on that detail.

 

[rippin fish lips]

Thats stupid! You think they would put signs for a warning, but guess not! And i officially have a new favorite river, and that it the willy! Last year i fished the mckenzie all summer, but i switched tot he willy this summer with great results! I want to go lower then alton baker but hearing about the cable floating device down there im not gunna so i dont have to deal with it =/

 

[Thuggin4Life]

That cable should be down. I would imagine it would have only been put up for the rotary duck race which must have been the other day. I can't believe that there wouldn't be a sign at every launch from dexter all the way down to day island warning boaters of the water hazzard that they had created. I know when there is bridgework going on there are all kinds of signs warning boaters and ussually the river is still open but a river wide hazzard deffinantly would need to be advertised. I would get in touch with someone even though the event is for a good cause an inexperianced boater could have ended up dead or loosing a loved one over this lack of comunication. I wouldn't have been very cival if i was in our boat that day.

 

[OnTheFly]

Wow! Highly dangerous! Warnings definitly should have been posted. Cool charity thing though. I really apologize for laughing at this but it just cracked me up that Ted's rubber duck could have been indirectly responsible for capsizing your boat.