I want to report a really bad experience I had with Christian Witt of the Columbia River Fishing Guide.

I called in early September 2010 and booked a trip for a few days later. I spoke with the proprietor Christian Witt and paid him $100 over Paypal as a deposit. He claimed they were catching king salmon up to the limit every day and he was booked up and could only take us out on a weekday, so we agreed to do a Friday even though we'd have to take a day off work. We were to meet him at 5:30 am on the 10th at an Arco AM/PM in Woodland, where I believe lots of fishing charters meet clients. I live a couple hours from Woodland so not wanting to drive at 2am I booked a hotel room there the previous night, stayed in Woodland and was at the AM/PM at 5:35. No one showed. I waited until 7am and finally left. I tried calling the phone number he gave me the whole time while waiting, I got his voicemail. I left one message and when I called again I got a new message saying his voice mailbox was full (after my one message).

While waiting we saw some cars pull up with boats from other charters, we went to ask if any of them were his and they said no, but said they knew him and he was usually there. I finally reached him later in the day and he claimed he had been "out of town" for 3 days but his partner Justin had had been meeting people at the AM/PM every da. He described the car/boat Justin was using, but the description didn't match the one on his web site and didn't have the company's name on it - so how were we supposed to know who Justin was? We did approach some cars with boats, btut none of them was his.

I pointed out that he had my phone number and could have given it to this Justin guy, and that we approached quite a few people with boats while waiting and none of them was with this charter. He then said "You need to go up to the people who are pulling up with boats, you can't just sit in your car". I said we had done that none of them was with his company and he said, and I quote "Alls I know is Justin was there, he has been there every day". How could he know that if he has been out of town? He refused to refund my money and said he would call this Justin and call me back. He never called, and when I called again he didn't answer.

All I can say is DO NOT use this guy! He's a cheat and a fraud, I am going to file a police report and a complaint with the better business bureau as well.