Friday morning kicked off with packing the truck—quick and easy. Before long, we were rolling out on a familiar route I hadn't traveled in over a decade. Eleven years, to be exact.
We made time for good coffee and browsed a few tackle shops en route, soaking in the slow pace since we didn't need to meet our guide until noon. He had a court appearance earlier that morning—just part of the rhythm of life on the Rez.
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We stopped at Lake Crescent to a beautiful scene. Karry was telling me the Beardslee Trout have been crushing the dying Kokanee this time of year and we should see some big explosions.
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Holy smokes we did! I wish I brought my Lake gear, but I had Salmon in my mind. We saw some huge trout crush some Kokanee up top! It was quite amazing to see!
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Tons of eagles this trip. I've always seen a few, but they seemed to be everywhere on this trip!
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We pass through Forks so I had to take a few pics for my "Twilight" wife and daughters.
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Unfortunately we had to pass 15 culvert constructions which took up to a 5-minute wait on before moving forward but it's for dam removals and opening up the culverts for wild strains I guess.
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We stopped at the Oxbow for a quick piss break and to stretch the legs. Soon this area will be filled with Salmon.
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We get back on the road and it's still another 1.5 hours to get there. It still gets me seeing the trees cleared from logging, but I know we need our wood.
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More of Karry's nemesis along the way. I think 15 in total.
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We stop at the Inn to get a room before fishing since we were going to spend the next 2 days fishing.
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To our surprise, it was booked and everything in the area was apparently booked also. Karry was perplexed, but we found a place at the Notel-Motel... Basically a rundown motel in the middle of the woods.
We meet up with our guide and follow him to the river. Squatch knows this path since we took it with Frank 14 years ago at 70 MPH in a tiny truck. Same road and just as scary when trucks were coming from the other direction.
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We get to the launch and get the jet boat in the water. Jet boats are only allowed on the Rez, so it made things easy for us.
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First Fish Karry strikes first as usual!
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I get bites, but it's back to back Sculpin! The second one was huge, but I only took pics of the first. I could feel the pressure to get a salmon! (Potentially a new species for my Life List)
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Karry was rubbing it in as I missed my last two salmon bites on the berries.
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Beautiful King!
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I did the "Hero Drift" which is similar to the "Way Way Back" method and got slammed! This one was a real one and my first real King Salmon!
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We catch some Jacks up to 24" which didn't qualify to even want to keep I guess, so we just released them right away.
The water was low, so we had a tough time finding deep holes and it gets dark up there really fast so we made a final move.
Salmon were jumping everywhere, but the didn't want anything we threw at them. We were twitching feather jigs, spinners and floating berries.
I finally get another good one on the berries! These things are awesome and fight to the death!
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The fish were now going crazy 30 yards downstream so we lifter anchor and drifted back. Karry get a Coho on the jigging rod and I get walloped on the berries again! Another toad King! This one was definitely long and skinny though.
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We kept 4 from the dozen and decided to call it the day since we still had a 45 minute ride back to the notel and it was getting dark quick.
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We get back in time to watch the long ass baseball game (Karry is a die hard Mariners fan). They finally won it in 15 innings, so I could finally get some sleep. Hahaha
We prepped for the next morning's float trip with Charle's on the Queet's river, so a different river all together.
I'll try to get the next day's trip up later today.
Until then, I hope you are enjoying the read!
Awesome views. Nice salmon, nice seeing that you didn't suffer too long without a bite. Not sure about that sculpin, definitely not the Paiute I caught while I was up that way. Looking forward to more.
Next day was the doozy!
Going to get the third and fourth installment up tomorrow. Too tired right now.
I remember that road. And the lake.