I was about twelve years old when this adventure took place. My cousin Jon and I launched his little twelve-foot boat in Port Angeles, Washington, planning to fish Puget Sound for salmon. Heavy morning fog forced us to abandon our original destination, so we decided to follow the shoreline toward the mouth of the Elwha River instead.

Trolling through the morning fog

The morning was uneventful, and by lunchtime we had only landed a small coho salmon. We had also managed to lose sight of land in the thick fog. We knew we were close to shore because the water was only about sixty feet deep and we could hear a distant foghorn.

While lowering my bait to the bottom, something strange happened. I had let out nearly all my line and still hadn't reached bottom. When I began reeling in, I noticed my line was moving sideways. I set the hook hard and instantly realized I had connected with something enormous.

For nearly two hours we chased the fish as it stayed deep beneath the boat. It never surfaced more than twenty or thirty feet until it finally began rising. When it came within ten feet of the surface, Jon looked over the side and immediately shouted that it was a huge halibut—at least six feet long and probably well over two hundred pounds.

The giant fish stayed beneath the boat while I continued fighting it. Eventually Jon carefully gaffed it near the tail. Instantly the halibut exploded with power, thrashing beneath the boat so violently that our little twelve-foot craft rocked back and forth like an amusement park ride.

Realizing we had no practical way to land a fish this size safely, Jon pulled the gaff free. The wounded halibut circled the boat, slammed into the hull, then dove beneath us. My fishing line wrapped underneath the boat and snapped. The giant fish slowly disappeared into the depths where it belonged.

Looking back, we realized just how extraordinary the encounter had been. Halibut that size are rarely found in water that shallow, and we remain convinced it would have exceeded the Washington state record. Landing it in such a small boat would probably have been impossible—and maybe not very smart.

Of course... fishermen never exaggerate.