Good place to launch a boat and fish on the Columbia river?

[wiperhunter2]

I know a lot of you guys fish all over so I've got a question. [font "Verdana,Arial,Helvetica"][black][size 1]A friend of mine has a 30 plus foot boat and is looking for a place to launch it and fish on the Columbia river, anyone have an idea? Thanks for any input. WH2
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[TubeDude]

[cool]That's a pretty long river. Any specific area? If he is going for the spring salmon run, he can launch several places around Portland and then run up to where the Willamette comes in at Oregon City. If he is going for Sturgeon, same thing. The river around the Portland/Vancouver area is good for large numbers of small to medium sized white sturgeon. Farther upstream, there are facilities around the Dalles, and you start getting into some prime big walleye area...anywhere below the Umatilla Dam.

I'm just getting ready to head out for a weekend of fishing in the White Mountains of Arizona, but I might suggest that you checkout some websites on Oregon Fishing, Columbia River Boat Launching, etc. Here's one:

[url "http://www.oregon.com/fishing.cfm"]http://www.oregon.com/fishing.cfm[/url]

TubeDude
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[Lundman]

Check out the forum at www.ifish.net - these guys really give out some great info - use the search key to go through past postings of prime fishing areas.

I go up to the Columbia yearly and fishing with a 30' boat will be a bit large for most popular areas because of the boat traffic. The mouth of the Deschutes is a great place for trolling for salmon and steelhead. Launch at Celilo Falls park.

Sturgeon fishing is good from a large boat but anchoring in swift current needs some expertise. Most sturgeon waters will be 30' to 120' ft deep. Check to see if you can keep a keeper 4' to 5 1/2' - quotes can cause a catch and release to kick in anytime now.

The more I think of a nice place for the newbee to go and have a good and safe time - I think of the mouth of the John Day river. You can troll above the dam for salmon and steelhead, anchor up for sturgeon, and fish for walleye and bass in the columbia and John day rivers. Also, there is a great boating park 4 miles up the John Day that has minimal traffic and is "out of the way".

I you have anymore question about the Columbia - I grew up in The Dalles and have fished mainly the CR Gorge and it tributraies.

One of the highlites of the past few fishing trips has been hiring a great guide to go up the Deschutes River for steelhead. You are going up class 3 & 4 rapids and it's a trip everyone should do once. We use a great guy, Jack LaFond from Young's Quide service.

site: http://www.fishyfs.com/

You can PM me for a specifics about the fishing in the Gorge area. I don't really know the Portland to Astoria fishing that well.

If you are going out to Buoy 10 - please do your homework. This is a dangerous place for even the experienced angler.
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[wiperhunter2]

Thanks guys I'll let my friend know. I've driven by Dalles before but my friend didn't say where he wanted to go on the Columbia, the next time I talk to him I'll tell him about the site so maybe he will ask the questions. WH2
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