Fishing vacation 2003 is just a memory now. And it is quickly fading into all of my other fishing experiences. Don't get me wrong, I really enjoyed my fishing trip. Perhaps more than ever before. Sometimes it just doesn't seem like there is enough fishing time and there is too much "other" time.

Thinking back there were some great highlights.

Driving to our favorite camping spot is always filled with anxiety. It's outside of a state or federal camping area, but close enough to camping services to make it very nice and convenient. So it is also popular and I'm always afraid it won't be available. Getting to camp Sunday evening increases our odds. For the past three years we've had the same spot. This year we pulled into camp and found ourselves all along. Good start.

Early Monday we took an eight mile ride on dirt roads and walked two miles to what Mikey calls "his favorite lake..... anywhere. Mikey had been here just a couple of weeks ago and anticipated some good fishing. We weren't disappointed. By 3:00 PM we were happy fishermen and ready for our hike out. The fishing wasn't the most enjoyable part of the day. I spent a couple of hours out of the lake walking through the woods. It was very relaxing. Especially since Champ was along and followed me everywhere I walked.

This part of Idaho was part of the 80,000 acre fire of 1994. Mikey snowmobiles in this area and told me repeatedly that his friend Dean doesn't like winter in this part of Idaho. The standing, dead pine trees remind Dean and Mikey of a cemetery. Last year I ran into a forest service employee and asked about the forest habitat. He was positive about what had happened over the then eight years since the fire. In fact, the only part of the ecosystem that hadn't fully recovered were the pines. That made me feel better.

On days two, three and four we followed much the same formula. Breakfast in camp. On the road by 8:30. Pack a lunch and hike into an alpine lake. Fish until we were hungry. Drive to McCall for supper. Fish a small stream that is close to camp until dark. Drive up to Twenty Mile trail head, set up the telescope and check out the stars, moon and anything else interesting in the heavens. Get into camp about 11:30, read for a few minutes while I listened to tunes on my iPod. Fall asleep. Repeat.

The only drawback was that I had a raging headache until about noon on Tuesday. Even a heavy dose of Excedrin didn't knock it out and I suffered all Monday. The afternoon hike out was painful. I could feel my head every time my foot hit the ground. Ouch.

On Tuesday night we decided to go upstream at the river. We've fished this area for the past three years and had a blast. But we had gotten into the habit of parking at a certain spot and going down stream. That little river is filled with hundreds of small brook trout and they are eager for a dry fly. Any dry fly. It always makes us feel like great fishermen when we can catch dozens of fish in an hour or two on this little mountain stream.

Well, we got back to the truck a bit before dark on Tuesday. And we decided to go to the wide pool that is just above the stretch we usually fish. I think we tried this pool a couple of years ago and didn't have any success. Mikey was a bit reluctant to try it out but finally said what the heck, there aren't any fish but we should at least try. Mikey's first cast was rewarded with a double, two fish on at once. We fish with a main fly and a dropper. The funny thing is that both of these fish were over 12 inches long. Real giants in this stream.

I cast and had immediate success. Between us we caught over twenty fish in about 30 minutes. Many of them were under 10 inches, but more than expected were a nice size. We laughed while we were catching the fish. In fact, Mikey had some success tying on a PMD and dragging it back across the surface. I tried it and had success. It made us laugh harder. Why was this working? We didn't know. We speculated as we walked through the darkness on the way back to the truck.

The next night we made plans to fish and explore the length of the pool. Amazingly this stretch was at least a mile long with an average width of 30 feet and an average depth (a guess) of at least 3 feet. It was also filled with many good rainbows and brookies. We thought we were pretty smart because nobody else seemed to know about this place.

Just before dark a couple of campers stopped by. They asked about our success. We had caught many fish and said so. The Dad laughed and commented that the many fishermen who had been there that morning didn't catch any fish. Mikey and I looked at each other in amazement. Hmmm. We thought this was out little spot. Turns out that it is heavily fished in the mornings.

Well, I totally enjoyed my trip. It was great fun. The only thing that could have made it better was to make it about twice as long. But maybe I'm wrong. Part of the magic is that I don't get up there very often and I always go away wanting more. Perhaps that's the secret.

The fishing was a bit off because of the hot weather. Mikey and I are planning a similar trip for next year. The only difference is that we will go the first week of September. Fewer people and cooler temperatures could make that trip even better. That seems impossible.............
10:00:42 PM    comment []