Salmon River

Like I promised, some updates about my father in-law and myself fishing the Salmon River. To start our trip we headed up to Pulaski on a Thursday night so we can prepare ourselves for the day and a half of fishing.

We got down to the SR at 5:30 am to get a spot. There were hundreds of people finagling their way up and down the stream finding spots. At first light we started fishing and fished all day with nothing to show for it, but everyone around us was catching them. All you heard was "Fish-On!!!", "Going Up Stream!!!", "Going Down Stream!!!". Even though we weren't catching them, it was pretty exciting. All I wanted to do was have the chance to yell FISH ON like everyone else. It was a huge learning experience for us both. Figuring out how to fish for them and what to fish with was a challenge. We met a lot of nice people on the river that gave us some good advice for the following day. Some of them gave us some of the flies they were using to help us out.

After fishing all day we headed back to our hotel with the flies and we decided to tie some of our own. Rick, my father in-law, has tied a lot of his own flies before so he was prepared with material. We whipped together some flies and tried to mimic the ones that were given to us. In all they turned out pretty well and we were prepared to go for the next day.

The morning started at 5:30 again so we could get to the water and get a spot. Daylight came and we started fishing. In about 20 minutes of fishing I got my wish. I was yelling FISH ON! I fought him for a couple of minutes then he jumped and spit the fly out. I was bummed but the fight made it worthwhile. Next I hear Rick say "fish on, going up stream, going down stream". I drop my rod and get the net. He fights for a while and eventually he brings it close enough and swoop! - he's in the net. First fish of the day and it was a nice King.

A little later in the day two of my fellow coaches met up with us, Tyler Baier and Travis Lee. Within a matter of minutes of them being there, they got to witness me yelling fish on. I'm hooked into another salmon. This one was big. I fought him and kept him close for a while. It was pretty amazing watching him jump and thrash around the water. Now all I wanted to do was get him in the net. As soon as Rick got down there with the net and the salmon got one look at it, he took off heading back down stream. Everything was still ok because he was hooked well. All of a sudden I look down and he already went through my fly line which is about 25yrds worth and now he's into my backing and not stopping. He's ripping through my backing and almost taking it all off my reel and then it happens, he's gone. Bummer.

I hooked into one more and guess what? - that one got off too. So I got skunked for the day. Rick, on the other hand, caught 6 but we are only allowed to 3. He had fish on all day and got the trifecta. We kept 1 king 20+lbs, 1 coho 12lbs and 1 skamania steelhead 16lbs.

I didn't do that well on the fishing side but I was one hell of a netter. It was a great trip and we plan on making it a yearly venture. I'll post the pics on the site so check them out.