go west from CA about 10,000 miles, land at Cam Rahn Bay, then take a helicopter 27 miles due west and there is a great trout stream/small river in that valley in the picture. I was with the Korean 9th Inf Div the last 8 months of my senior trip. the hill top where this was taken was our OP. on a patrol thru the valley we had to cross said stream on a log bridge. as we crossed I noticed something dart under the log. we made camp just across the stream and while the ROK's were setting up defensive positions, I broke out my fishing line and dug up some grubs. I then crawled out on the log and dropped one over the edge. BOOM, pulled up a 15" brown trout. in 5 minutes I had caught 8(1 for each of us). when the ROL's saw what I was doing they started digging a pit and gathering dry wood(not an easy task). we wrapped them up in elephant ears and laid them on a stick rack over the coals for a while. I think it was the best meal I had in that country. just ramblings of an old man thinking back in time. the second pic is of me(middle), a ROK radio operator, and an Army Pathfinder. Lee
Lee: I never would have thought about brown trout in Vietnam! Only fishing I ever did was at Marble Mountain, near Da Nang. At low tide the adjoining bay was enclosed by a coral reef so any fish there were stuck until the tide returned. Grenades worked good on schools of various fish, and the occasional shark was taken with M60 machinegun fire. Big fish fries on the beach!
I was one of those Army Pathfinders. Didn't see very many Air Force folks unless I went to the 15th Aerial Port, Da Nang, home of the "big PX" and air conditioned movie theaters! Went out once to secure a downed F4 and get the pilot extracted, and another time for the crew of a OV-10 ("Birddog" sounds right?) FAC plane. Thermite grenades work really well for destroying comm gear, and C4 takes care of the rest of an airplane stuck in the ground. The F4 pilot had ejected and was pretty messed up, but still breathing. The OV-10 crew rode the bird into the trees and got banged up pretty good in the process.
Only USAF guy I really remember was the pilot of a F4 Phantom that managed to wound every member of my team while performing "close air support" (strong emphasis on "close", I guess). On his third "gun run" I figured he wasn't paying enough attention to smoke markers, so I demonstrated our position for him using a magazine of tracer ammo, while screaming at him over the radio. His complaints about "friendly fire" received my response about 6 WIA from "friendly" rocket fire, then the incident was filed away without any further action. As far as I know my rifle fire was no more accurate than his rocket fire, the F4 is a pretty big airplane but difficult to hit with a rifle while smoking in low at 200-plus MPH.
By 1971 our Pathfinder unit was doing very little of our primary function, which was going in ahead of air assaults to scout and secure insertion sites and manage air traffic during the missions. We always had a team on ready status, so we were tasked with rescue missions for downed air crews as needed. Rappel in from a helicopter, secure the crews and planes, get the Medevac done, and either secure the plane for airlift out or destroy it on the ground.
No fishing poles in our gear! How was that overlooked?
Young mens' games, orchestrated by old politicians.
