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Thursday, 26 January 2012

Fishing on the Salton Sea

By Marcy Belson

We bought a new gold-colored car with a rear engine. It was the first new car for us. It had fake leather seats and it snaked down the road like an out of control toy. I remember driving on the freeway, the gas pedal would stick and I would work my shoe under the pedal and pull it up. I never considered getting it fixed.

Shortly thereafter, my father gave us his old wooden fishing boat.

The Salton Sea was about 40 miles away and the Corvina fishing was good. In fact, the fishing was so good our freezer was full. I asked my husband to bury the fish as fertilizer under the backyard fruit trees.

The next morning, I looked out the window, every cat in the neighborhood was in our backyard. He had buried the fish in rows, with their tails sticking out of the ground. He thought it was a great joke.

On Memorial Day, we hooked that big boat up to the little, gold-colored car and away we went. We caught a few fish but it was very warm and about noon, we gave it up and headed into the ramp area.

My husband gave me instructions to back the car down the ramp until the trailer was submerged.  He would then gun the boat and get it in position on the trailer.  At that point, I was to wait for his signal of "Hit it!" I would then hit the gas and pull the trailer and boat out of the water.

He did a good job of moving the boat into place and he yelled "Hit it!" So I did.  Except for one error, this would have been a simple maneuver.

Instead of the boat and trailer coming out of the water, I had the gear in reverse and backed my little car with the rear motor into the salty water. By the time I could get out of the car, the water was seeping into the back seat floor board area.

Gordon jumped out of the boat and asked the nearest men where the closest tow vehicle might be. Well, those men were enjoying their fishing day, their cold beer on a hot day and now they were enjoying the spectacle of a tiny, gold-colored car, slowing sinking, attached to a big boat and trailer.

They were laughing so hard, they couldn't tell us where we could find some help.

Finally, someone attached a rope to the car and pulled it out with a big truck. The motor was completely submerged. That was the end of my little, gold-colored car. We sold the boat.

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Posted by Ronni Bennett at 05:30 AM | Permalink | Email this post