Next, I read Nelson's reports on tubin' under a "Bad Moon Rising" (which I think was actually a full moon falling but his title sounded much better) and about how he hooked/surrendered to a steelhead at PB.
I had to package ebay goodies for shipment (actually been working for a change).
I got the last box boxed at 0400 hours and figured fishing made a lot more sense than sleeping.
A little voice inside my tackle pack said, "GO... look in on the stripers" (through the eyes and hooks of pencil poppers and Sporty Spooks) and round the day out with some spoon-tossin' for steelhead.
So that I did.
It was warm when I left the house. I forgot how cold it gets while wading balls-deep in 49 degree water while the wind's blowing and your hands are wet...
Spring was in the trees and on the ground
but winter was still in the water and in the air.
Also in the air was this cool 4-engine turbo prop: USAF C-130 perhaps?
I plugged away and never saw, heard nor smelled anything resembling a striped bass...
So I broke out the light-duty stick and chunked plated brass over all the likely trout holds.
I fluttered a 1/4 oz polished-silver BC Steel over a sweet riffle edge seem and on the swing I felt a spongy bite but it was REAL spongy... Could it be... a sponge? Sponge-Bob? a fish? fishing line?
Oh, of course! a Spongy-Bungie-cord...
WORD! Onward...
A few casts down the river, my spoon locks on to a submerged tree branch. I cuss, I lift, I reel, I cuss again (a HAPPY SH$#! this time...) the tree branch has LIFE!
A cute lil chromer bursts forth and tries to do the 'shake-a-sickle-siwash'
BUT FAILS!
A native, taped out at 16.5" and apparently, recently-ravaged by one of those 'hibernating' underwater pigs... (note the bloody eye and scrape marks/blood along and above the lateral line). My hook never touched either.
I released the striper nugget and walked along. I raced a couple and their dog to a beach where I was hoping to hit the water before Fido pissed and splashed in it. In my zeal, I ate crap (slipped on mud and banged up my knee real good).
Plugged away some more to no avail so retired the big stick and focused on trout. I saw a few frolicking about. They seemed hungry/playful not predated upon/scared so I kept after 'em.
At some point, I realized that it was raining, raining HARD! The 1-3 mph winds forecasted by the 'weather genies' was way off base... because it was blowin a freakin gail... and though I really wanted to fish some roe, my right hand was stupid. It couldn't light cigarettes, unzip zippers, or un-snap/snap interlock swivels... Not sure if it was cold, numb, arthritic, retarded, or merely suffering from a post-traumatic-stress disorder of some kind or another...
At any rate, I didn't feel like rigging up bottom-bouncing gear so I left the spoon attached and continued on my merry dreary way.
Complicating matters... I even had to cross a POLICE LINE to get back in the water.
No worries though... it was a short line.
Some little fish that thought he was a much bigger fish, decided to chew on my spoon.
An UN-measurement-worthy, 'hatchery brat' and probably one of the recently-released smolts from the Nimbus steelhead rearing ponds. By the way that went down last week and the salmon smolt releases are slated for 2.5 weeks from now...
I struggled for the next 2 hours... but despite that I wanted to hook an adult steelhead... I was content to just be on the river and be away from the hatchery. I never saw another fisherman between 0600 and 1400.
This is a bitchin' time of year when things are snappin' and colors are changin', birds are singin', and ticks are bitin' (well maybe not that part).
It's also cool because normally-unaccessible areas are now accessible due to the winter die-back of shrubs and grasses along the river's edge.
I walked and worked the 'flotsam/jetsam' stretch across from the golf course. This is the only place on the entire river where you can mark off every item from your scavenger hunt list in less than 100 yards and 20 minutes. NINE-WEST leopard skin handbag, really fancy Italian, signature volleyball, red christmas light flame-type bulb, panties, syringes, Jack antenna balls... were among some of the hot-ticket items I encountered during today's visit. I forgot to get back and take photos...
At some point, I had to go up a hill and around a tree to get to some good water. As I climbed, I suddenly became aware of just how jacked-up my knee actually was... I still gimped like a soldier up a flight of whorehouse stairs though and as I shuffled over the rocks, I noticed another kind of house...
Seemed to have been recently used...
SOMEbody's diggin in here at night...
The chick with the NINE WEST purse? Carlo manfort? or maybe a bobcat or coyote den...
SHIT! What's that smell?@!
One thing certain... if he did at one time... THIS GUY don' live there no' mo'
I decided to make a voodoo doll and cast a spell to permanently remove any and all 'l'essence de skunk' from my future river fishing odysseys...
I got the sticks but then was unsure how to make the voodoo work so I instead made a real live (I mean real-dead) NO-SKUNKS! sign and took a photograph.
I got back down to the river and lobbed my spoon in to the deep rolling waters. I figured I'd work the 'cast and walk down' method until reaching the bottom of the island and then call it.
When I reached the tree I ed around before, I decided to just open my bail, cough up some line and catch up to the spoon after rounding the tree. When I started reeling, the line stopped. I was going to lose my first spoon of the day. I opened the bail again and slacked some line to try and ease off the rock but it didn't work. I went to do the dirty deed (break out/off) and the rock moved. My rod was way bent and there was that spongy feeling again but it had a lot more substance to it... BIGGER bungie cord? NO, it was a fish. It felt big but don't they all when you never see or land 'em>?
It felt like a salmon and may have been. Sometimes a big buck steelhead will also hunker down on the bottom like that and not move until you're least expecting him to...
Maybe it was a log that rolled and pulled like a fish.
Whatever it was... it still is... with no recollection of me.
I walked back to the truck and stopped to snap a picture of an orchard remnant or escapee. Not sure if it's apple, cherry, or something else but it had lots of blossoms and the name TyRuS carved in its trunk.
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