Where does the horses going?

cast right behind that big dark spot...
they don't grow em like that back home eh
i used super close up mode
went to a rainforest and forgot my raincoat
how did these trees get here?
elwha thataway
see em? big ones
tell me how big it is
caught em all already
love ya

Fishing with Terry from Yakima

As a follow up to Fishing with Bob from Texas, I present the next installment of "Fishing With": Today I went fishing with Terry from Yakima.

I rolled east after work on Friday evening, across the Sound, through Seattle and onto I-90. My destination was a campground on Canyon Road, the road that winds its way along the Yakima River through the canyon stretch between the towns of Ellensburg and Yakima. After investigating several websites, I had a good idea where the campground was and what to expect as far as the fishing was. After three weeks of pounding beaches for sea run cuttys, I was jonesing for a trout river. So the Yakima it would be.

Half way through my drive it was dark. It's always exciting to wake up in a place you've never seen, especially when there's a trout stream there. The Yakima canyon is gorgeous. A high desert setting with a good looking, good sized river running right through the middle of it. Sometime in September each year, the "flip flop" occurs, as flows in the Yak drop from ~4000 to ~1000CFS and the river is suitable for wade fishing. I was told the river hasn't been stocked since the early '80s, which is pretty cool, but the drastic change in flows makes it tough for fish to get real big. Average fish were 8 - 12". What it is.

I got to the campground around 10 pm and was very surprised to see that most of the campsites were full, taken up by RVs and small tent communities. Most sites had fires roaring with anywhere from one to a dozen people around them. I set my tent up, strung the rods up and moseyed my way over to a fire nearby with a couple older guys sitting around. I heard some fishing phrases coming from their direction earlier, so I figured I'd at least get a recent river report.

At this fire I met Jim and Terry. They had known each other only a week or so, as they both had been on extended camping trips. The site was Terry's and he had four tents set up, a half dozen camp chairs around the fire, a slew of miscellaneous river rafts in various sizes stacked up, a trailer made from an old truck bed, a generator powering a light, stoves, pots, pans, tarps, coolers and other random "camp" articles. I introduced myself and asked how the fishing has been. Terry had a lengthy report.

Terry has floated the Yakima River "over five hundred times." He was born and raised in Yakima and has hunted and fished his whole life. He does not fly fish, but fishes the Yak with a roostertail spinner which he cuts off two of the treble hooks and pinches the barb on, because "that's legal." Two days ago he caught 25, two were 20"+. He was a talker, a Mahoney type character, and full of fishing information for anyone who will listen. These types of folks are interesting. It's pretty safe to say that everything that comes out of their mouths isn't true, but exactly which parts are false or how much the truth is stretched is tough to say. So I listened. I doubt he's floated that river five hundred times, but he's definitely spent some time on it. That night Terry told me the goal of fishing is to catch as many fish as possible. He talked some shit about fly fishing. Jim defended and looked to me for support but I stayed fairly quiet, avoiding argument. It was tough to say if Terry was drunk or stoned or both, but he was a local redneck so I tried to stay neutral on any disputes between the two, angling or otherwise.

I chatted with the two for a little while and then Terry offered to take me on a float the next day in his raft. This was an intriguing offer! A float down a new river with a veteran angler. I pondered thoughts of catching three fish to his one with flies, or worse - 25 to 0 with his roostertails. I declined on the offer, saying I wanted to wade the next day but maybe Sunday. I bid the men a goodnight and retired, planning to be on the water early.

I was standing knee deep in it at 6:45 the next morning. I fished the whole day, landing a dozen or fifteen and losing several others. Sizes ranged from 3 to 15", mostly on Pat's Rubberlegs stonefly, various small baetis nymphs and one on a SJW (just for you Keith). The river was big and it was sometimes a good fifteen minute walk between water I felt inclined to fish. Long, shallow, slick water separated riffles, structure and faster water and all the fish I caught were in pretty obvious places. It was a good day on the water, but I was curious if I could've caught more, what I should've been doing, etc.





I collected some wood for my own fire that evening and sat around it, sipping a cold Kokanee while my dinner cooked. Terry appeared, his own dinner in hand. He observed my stack of hand sawed firewood, campstove and remarked, "You're pretty self-sufficient, kid. Just like me." And over a few beers and an hour or so we conversed on fishing, life, women and the like. As I said, Terry's a character, but for every couple statements or opinions that would make me shake my head, he'd offer one that I respected. Terry was once regarded as a "top snagger" for salmon and steelhead. He told me a story about how once, from a bridge twenty feet above a river, he spotted a steelhead, snagged it, fought it to its death and then hoisted it up, hand over hand to his perch. He took out his spotlight and showed me a couple owls in a tree. I showed him some flies and he said, "I can tell you know how to fish, looking at your flies. I haven't tied any in a while..." When he told me about some sort of freshwater shrimp in a lake and fish hiding under weeds, I offered that the fish might have been feeding on scuds living in the weeds. He liked this thesis and decided I was "pretty damn smart." So over the evening's fire I agreed to float the next day with Terry in his "two man raft."

We combined supplies for a big breakfast the next morning and while we ate, he showed me some fishing pictures on his digital camera. It was then that I began to have second thoughts about the day's float. His "raft" looked something like this:
It was also at this time that I began to notice the quality of Terry's gear. All his tents had holes in them, two had doors with broken zippers. He then told me how he found all his gear in dumpsters. He was very pleased with these finds. I also realized that his stacks of floating noodles and other rafts had been found abandoned along the river or in dumpsters. I wasn't too hot on the idea of spending four to five hours in a small raft with this man at this point. I had a feeling at the least a decent story would come out of it, so long as I did myself. So after discussion, and some attempts to get out of the whole thing, I agreed to do a shorter float than planned, five miles, ending at our campsite. I'd get to look at some water anyway.

So we drove upstream, pumped up his raft and were off. Shortly into the trip, Terry spied a beer can on shore. He rowed hard to make it to the shore to investigate. I thought he might be collecting cans to return for supplementary income (Terry does not work due to recently dislocated shoulder), but Terry was more interested in the contents of this can. Specifically, whether or not there were any contents. This can was empty, but Terry assured me that rafters (the Yak is a popular spot for college kids and others to float and drink) loose full beers all the time. Five minutes later we were on shore again looking at the next beer can. Then we were on shore looking at a deflated raft lodged between two trees. Then we were looking at an empty Mountain Dew bottle. By the end of the float, Terry was 1 for 27 on beer cans and the one full one he did find he promptly drank.
Terry showed me his roostertail spinner. Three hooks, all barbed. I stayed quiet. Between investigations of beer cans 4 and 5 Terry lands the first fish of the day a 12" rainbow. 'Oh shit,' I thought to myself. But Terry wasn't about competition, he was about having a good time. Despite the high frequencies of swears coming out of his mouth, he was in great spirits the whole float. I reckon he talked pretty much nonstop for most of the trip, ten of his words to one of mine.

Terry also brought a bag of Tootsie Rolls on board for our trip. "I love these!" he said as he popped the first of fifty into his mouth and then I watched as the Tootsie Roll wrapper went straight into the river. I looked wide eyed at it, then at Terry, who was preparing for his next cast while chomping down on the roll. Fifty Tootsie Rolls consumed, fifty wrappers into the drink. I stayed quiet.

A while into the float, Terry had caught three and I got my first. He was ecstatic, asking what the fish ate, where it did, etc. He congratulated me on the fish. "I knew we'd both catch fish man!" When Terry had to take a leak he rowed us over to the bank. I stayed in the boat in an attempt of not increasing the length of time in the raft. As he stepped onto shore he remarked, "Dammit! I've got to take a shit now! You got any toilet paper?" I did not. I roll casted while Terry took care of his business. A few moments later I could see Terry through my peripheral vision and realized that he had not gone into the bushes like I expected. 'He can't be,' I thought to myself and then I took a quick glance. Terry was twenty feet upstream, a few feet from the river's edge, squatting, his pants around his ankles. I looked away and stayed quiet, hoping that the drift boat we had recently passed did not come around the bend. Back in the boat and floating again, he offered me a Tootsie Roll in his hand. I declined.
Terry's stance on rowing was fairly lackadaisical. We spun three-sixties countless times, drifted through the middle prime runs, cut off drift boats, floated three feet from banks and rock walls and zig-zagged our way downstream investigating beer cans and miscellaneous trash on the river's edges. At some point we approached some good looking water and we were a good distance for me to get a good drift through it. "Get ready, I always get one in there," Terry said. A few seconds later I was tight to my biggest fish of the weekend. Terry skillfully rowed us into slack water where I played the fish and landed a gorgeous 18" male rainbow. I obliged Terry's request for a picture on his camera. I smiled as the fish swam off and Terry hollered. I suggested Terry take up guiding.

When it dawned on me that I should probably take a picture of this human, Terry was agreeable and then I noticed his sunglasses. No doubt found in a trash can or in the river, they were ladies designer shades, probably bought at a gas station for ten dollars. He wore them well. We finished the day with ten fish - Terry 6, me 4 - one rescued raft and one frisbee.

I don't think I'd float in Terry's raft again but I might sit around a campfire with him if I ran into him. My guess is he'll be camped out in the same spot for a while longer.

open gym

went to Bainbridge High to check out the open gym. i haven't played competitive basketball since april. i had no idea where the gym was. i wandered around campus, sketchily looked in on the girls' volleyball practice and then found the gym, where a few guys who looked like high schoolers were suiting up. i walked in and went up to one kid. "is this the open gym?" i asked. he looked at me and said, "uh, yea, this is the high school open gym... the old man open gym is downstairs."

huh

Coastal Cutthroat Trout

I have been fishing the beaches a fair amount since moving to Bainbridge Island exactly two weeks ago. While I have had minimal success to date, I understand that part of the nature of this beach fishing game is just finding the fish. My collection of fishing spots is small, but growing, and I'm trying to learn which spots fish well at different tides, different times of day, etc. I've caught a handfull of cutthroat and silver salmon in the 4 - 6" class, which was fun the first two, maybe three times.

A day or two after I arrived on the Island, I received a message from an old friend from my hometown, Silas. He would be in Seattle for a conference and was staying through the weekend to fish and wondered if I would like to join him. Yes, I would, I told him and the plans were made. We rendez-vous-ed at perhaps the most unlikely place for two anglers to meet, a mall, and caught up while we made our way to one spot I know of that I had caught some small fish at before. No fish were caught that evening, but we knew we had an early morning outgoing tide waiting for us the next day.
We reached the beach the next morning before sunrise and made our way to a spot I found where a lagoon drains on the outgoing and a good flow of water passes by a little spit. I had caught a few nicer fish here earlier in the week but hadn't quite hit the tide right. This morning we timed it perfectly and we also had a huge tide that would drain most of the lagoon, giving us a solid two and a half hours of outgoing current.
With any foreign water or species, there are many questions and doubts that cross an angler's mind, especially when not catching fish. In this case, I was fairly confident that we were in a decent spot and that if the fish were around, they'd eat our flies - clousers in some combination of white, chartreuse, pink, olive and green. That said, I hadn't really gotten into them yet, so any theory I had to that point could be thrown out the window. We could philosophize about it all day, but in the end, fish certainly won't eat flies that aren't in the water so we started fishing.

Fifteen minutes or so into it, a strike.

The fish were there and they would eat our flies.

Between the two of us we landed a dozen or so before 9:00. It was the best luck I'd had since I arrived on the Island.

These coastal cutthroat are an awesome fish! Consider: a 14" coastal cutthroat will absolutely hammer a size 1 clouser minnow and fight hard enough to put a solid bend in an 8 weight, jump and spit your fly, take line off the reel and speed away when released! As Boone would say, I'll fuck with that! Finally getting into these fish let me get to know them a lot better and I'm thoroughly impressed.

When the tide finally slowed and the bite turned off, Silas and I began the walk back toward the car and breakfast. Walking and talking about the morning's great fishing we were suddenly stopped in our tracks by a huge splash and then a large cutthroat leaping two feet completely out of the air, directly in front of us, 60 feet away. Silas might have uttered "Dude...", but we looked at each other and in an instant ran into the water stripping line off our reels and false casting like madmen. I got one cast out pretty quick and the fly landed in the still-disappearing rings from the fish's splash. Nothing. I made another cast and started stripping when a yell from Silas came. I looked over and Silas was tight. His two casts were 10 or so feet to the left of the fish's jump and the fish had headed that way. It was quite a scene as we both couldn't contain ourselves and he battled the fish. It turned out to be the nicest fish we'd land that day.


From what I'm told, these fish push 18" and a 20" fish is a monster. So this healthy 16" fish was solid and put up a good fight.
The rest of the day was spent in search of new waters. Private Property and No Trespassing signs frustrated us as we made our way around the Sound. We found a few more places to fish and got into a few more fish, but nothing quite as productive as the morning. At any rate, I'm in. I've been used to frequent fishing for a while now so I think this will fit right in.
The day was also a great reunion with an old friend. Exploring new waters and new territory can be frustrating business sometimes and it definitely helps to have a positive face in the passenger seat and next to you on the water. Sometimes all you need is for someone else to tell you to take a right or a left. There are so many roads...
I've also heard there are salmon around.

th'OP, take one

with three days off in a row (!) i make my first trip to the Olympic Peninsula.
water levels were quite low. one river is currently running at 80 CFS. a fishy co-worker likes to fish this same river at 3,000. so the fish were spread out pretty good. the bite was not consistent on any one fly, but ol' jess is an angler. i was able to entice strkes on a black sculpzilla, a skated caddis fly and also trusty patrick rubberleg.

it was a great feeling to know that these waters would be filled with steelhead and salmon soon. i got the feeling i was standing in something important and famous.
and new. i think this was my first solo fishing/camping trip since i left new zealand. it had been a while. while it's awesome and great to fish and camp with friends, it's also nice to be on your own. the only schedule is yours and you can do whatever you want; fish where and how long you want to, eat when you want, go to bed and get up when you want.
on monday morning, after two days of fishing, i drove out to the coast, Rialto beach, to look around and get my first glimpse of the Pacific Northwest coast. as i've said before, in anyone's travels, you'll inevitably come across places that look like, or remind you of, other places. and inevitably, you'll come to places that don't look like anything you've seen yet. this beach had a touch of new zealand in it, the offshore rocks specifically, but the whole scene was something i had not taken in before.
i will be back to the OP soon.

caught the outgoing and low tide at the beach when i got back to the Island. bird "activity" was fairly low:
and so was fish activity. at least in my casting range.

White Lightning was my steed

and so i drove. no surprises, the destination was made.
so was the journey.
lots of long, flat, flat. thought of explorers, of lewises and clarks, crossing the land. i knew there were mountains ahead, and beyond that a sea. they knew neither. how did they keep going? White Lightning was my steed and she rode true.

not far into it i wish i had more time. to explore, to look at that and that. will come back to do that.

first stop, Jackson Hole. in a meadow there runs a creek. in the creek in the meadow there are trout. i had stepped into this creek before and when i left it i had not had the pleasure of catching success. the last time i stepped into this creek, i knew it would be hard, and i knew not much else. this time i knew the game better, knew the opponent and his ways, his lair. i had a game plan. a parachute hopper was my bait. and he would eat it. and he did. we danced until he was tired and i netted him, admired him and let him go. a fish called redemption and/or unfinished business finally finished. good feeling.

great friends awaited, two a bit older, two a lot younger. good evening! hugs from the big ones and goodnight hugs from the little ones. water and fish awaited early anglers. went there, no fish. went there, no fish. went there, fish. Boss spots. thanks Boss.
missed fish, bad casts, tangles. laughs. love fishin with ya Boss. brain saucin'.
Boss asks, 'what did i do wrong?' thanks for asking, but you know more than i do.
drive. a lot. fourteen hours White Lightning flies. a friend awaits. talk fish, fishing, life.

fish. arrive by dark, when the steelers are active. for our flies they are not, on this day. no matter. laughs. fishing.
drive. more friends. four older, one younger, one negative.

ahh, campfire. i see you wherever i go and you are always welcoming, intoxicating, full of wonder. and laughs.
fish. want to catch for the little one badly. the little one in her fishing headband, sweats and sandals. fickle fish!
would like to have seen this thing blow up:
drive. destination in sight. arrive by dusk. road fatigue.

the back yard:
some birthday fish! enjoyed the flies i tied for them:
many, many thanks for all the birthday wishes! still love my friends and family. always will. will see you soon.