August 29th, 2014: Lewiston
I woke early, and headed down to the river around 6:30. Over the lake, I see a bald eagle swoop down upon the water. I'm on the river by 7am. Niiice... working my way down the stretch by the drainage pipe. Hazel rod, and the scandi line, fast sinking 10' polyleader and that big purple and green intruder fly. No, I started with a little wetfly, had one small fish on, but changed it, hoping for bigger game. The scandi line plays really well with this rod, and I'm finding it easier to cast consistently, than the skagit. Perhaps because it is a little longer. No wading staff, but the wading is not hard. Somewhere around the drainage pipe I get a grab, and it is a really good one. Much stronger than the others I've felt. I get the fish close, but don't get a good look at it. I'm very excited about this, then.. the line goes dead. It threw the hook somehow. Frustration, mingled with adrenaline. After a brief pause, I keep going.. what else to do? It is really beautiful out. I have 2 more fish on, but none the size of the first, which both pop off before I can see them. A fine morning, but I wish I had gotten a fish to hand.
So I go back to be with the boys, around 8am. We breakfast and clean up. Then, we drive to the flyshop, and ask for advice, as well as buy more flies, Barge cement, and other oddities. Patty there (I think) gave us directions to a few places, but the most interesting was Steel Bridge, which is on the river a bit down stream, and has a campsite, and a swimming hole. As she said, it is out to the 299, hand a right, and about 3 miles make a right at Steel Bridge rd. Through a bunch of houses, and we see a day use area to the left, a nice river spot, and a pretty neat campground (at $5/day, cheap camping, looks like no reservations, only we wouldn't have a lake to swim in).
Steel bridge was great; we made lunch then headed for the water, which of course was very cold, but with the warm day, it was fun to get in, gettin back out pretty quickly, and doing it all again. Eventually, we could dive in, buck the current a little, and head back. Oh, but before that, Linus and I got the tenkara rod out, for a little casting. We didn't have the 10' line, so it was the short line again, but good practice for him. Anyway, the bathing was great, and afterwards I tried a little fishing from the bank (TCX 6119 6wt, skagit line -- works great), but aside from a small fish grab at the first cast, nothing doing. Beautiful spot. When not swimming, Domi read his book most of the time, in the car. He had finally gotten to the good part!
Back to town, cellphone spot, then to our campsite. Linus went in the water with the board, Domi back to his book, and I down to the river for some continued fishing.
5:30 - 7pm: same setup as in the morning, but tried a beadhead woolly bugger, got a small hit, then nothing.. switched to a smaller intruder I had just bought, nothing, lost confidence and switched to my small peacock wetfly, which had a hit and a bit later a solid grab and I finally was able to bring one nice (smallish, but whatever) hatchery steelhead to hand. Photo in camera!
