Kalama River Therapy

The coffee kept me awake this morning as I drove South. Jack (my Toyota) knows the way so I just listen to the radio and my ipod once I'm too far away for the tuner to work. Timing is everything and I want to be on the water at morning twilight. I'm glad to see it rained a little bit today. After a couple of warm days the clouds hold the heat in so the rain will warm up the rivers and wake the fish up a bit.

Past the Skook, running chocolate milk brown, and stop at the HW12 exit for fresh sand shrimp and eggs. Then it's back on the road to run past Kelso and Longview. I remember my Grandpa telling me about he and my Dad driving down there for work. Grandpa once verified that Dad drove it while not quite awake. I guess Dad's truck knew the way too.

The Kalama is a many storied river named after a Hawaiian who married a Nisqually woman, moved to the river and took his last name from a village there. John Kalama sounds like a real character. The pools have names here. The Beginners Hole and the Red Barn Hole. Modrow and "up in the Canyon". Take the exit and pass Mahaferty's, looking into the water at the Beginners Hole and see that it's a beautiful emerald green. Clear enough to fly fish (although I left Patience and Athena at home) but not so crystal clear as to make the fish spooky. I drive on up to the Red Barn Hole and find myself alone there. That never happens so it's with much anticipation that I tie on a fresh leader and sand shrimp.

I wade into the pool and toss my rig upstream a little and start to sing to myself...

"Make me down a pallet on your floor"
"Make me down a pallet on your floor"
"I'm going up the country, cold ice and snow"
"I'm going up the country, forty miles or more"
"No telling, how much further I may go"

I work the pool from top to bottom. A few other fishermen stop by and look but nobody gets out. The pool remains mine for a short period of time. I watched a kingfisher chatter up and down stream twice and saw a bald eagle wheel high above. I started back up at the top of the run again and let a fresh shrimp drift through and at the end of the drift. The tap tap tap of my lead bouncing against the bottom was interrupted by a solid pull and I set the hook. For a split second my hook hung on something that pulled back, but only for a split second and I reeled in the now slack line. The fish took my shrimp. I was glad to touch him at least.

Later I would work back up into the run and hook a trout. No challenge for my drift rig but it was the first wild fish I'd caught in a long long time. Later I would check in at Prichards and Mahafferty's and hear that it's been off and on with the fish spread out and not stacked up anyplace in particular. I'd drift the Beginners Hole a little bit and watch two big fish roll and hear another fisherman talk of catching and releasing a five pounder.

At home I would staple the chicken wire to the frames of our chicken coop. I'm bushed, want a beer and best of all no longer have a head full of never ending cluttered thoughts. Peace...

From Drop Box

Preparation

Tonight I finally prepared for a winter steelhead expedition. The flooding and work have made it a rough year. My favorite rivers are blown or slow so I'll drive south tomorrow. It's been a long time so there were things to do.

1. My drift rig needed new line so I spooled it up.
2. I needed fresh leaders so I tied up six of them and stored them in a new "Pip's Leader" box. All with just the right amount of orange yarn.
3. I dug up my waders and boots and threw them in the truck.
4. I found my fleece jacket.
5. I got my travel cup together next to the coffee machine.

Chelle tells me that there is nothing about which I'm more meticulous or detail oriented than fishing. That may be true. It's from fishing that I really learned the value of being prepared. Tying leaders on the river take time away from fishing. Old line breaks right before you tail a big Chinook. Boots get left behind when you are stumbling around for them at 5:00 AM and coffee keeps you off of the road if the cup isn't ready.

When you're prepared you get on the river and FISH right away. Then, even if you don't catch something you end the trip bushed and satisfied that you fished the water well. Sometimes really well. Besides, it's no surprise that every steelhead I've caught followed an evening of tying leaders, flies and putting the coffee cup out the night before.

Snowed In

Alas, no steelheading for me over the next few days. The snow has been coming down for a few hours now, on top of the snow that already fell over the last couple of days. I have however heard that the Nooch is starting to heat up a bit early this year. Athena lies resting in my garage...

From Winter and Xmas 08

Timing

My timing is off this year. During the best weekends of the year to catch fish in the saltwater I was off at Oshkosh with my data. July found my on the Cowlitz too high to fish with a fly rod. October found me on the Kalama hooking a dark Coho but not bringing it to hand and November found me in Hood Canal a week after the height of the chum run. So now here I sit thinking about the fact that I passed by the late winter coho run for the most part so that I could do some lake fishing (only one small trout).

My salvation this year will be in the Winter steelhead! Wynoochee in Jan and Feb and the Cowlitz in late Dec early Jan. Jigs, eggs, corkies and hopefully a sinking fly line. Lets hope my timing is a bit better this Winter...

Thanksgiving

Here are just a very few things that I am thankful for this year.

• The continued health of my wife and children, our rich opportunities and wonderful life together.
• My family and friends with whom I have had chances to grow closer this past year.
• My work, colleagues and our mission.
• The land that we live in, it's rivers, woods, fish, birds and the peace it brings.

Have a great Thanksgiving.

Pheasants

Last weekend my Grandpa, Dad, Uncle, Three Cousins and two of their kids went to Sprague WA. We pulled in late Friday night and setup campers. Saturday Morning we got up and walked 50 acres of scrub looking for pheasants.

I used to go along on hunting trips when I was a kid but was too young to take along a gun. Once in Ohio my Dad and I walked the woods on the farm we rented for squirrel to hunt with a 410 single shot shotgun but we never found anything. My Grandpa, uncles and cousins all hunted deer, pheasants, prairie chickens, grouse, deer and elk. One year one of my uncles took a black bear. I had never hunted anything.

So it was on a farm near Sprague that I found myself following my cousin and his dog Ollie with a 12 gauge in my hands. There were seven of us so we broke up into two groups. It wasn't fifteen minutes in when we heard the other group shoot twice and a pheasant came over and flew down the draw which we were walking down. We were all excited to know that the birds were around. Coming up out of the draw onto a flat table of land Ollie, my cousin's pointer, began getting excited and pointed. Curt, his proud owner smiled at how well he held even with the bird only feet away. Knowing I'd never hunted before Curt told me to come forward to take the first shot and when I was ready flushed the bird.

Shotguns are strange things after learning to shoot rifles. Most of my shooting had been done with air rifles and 22 s with which I could put out a candle if I wanted. There are those that can light a match (my mother could with a 30 06) but I never tried. With a rifle you peer with one eye down the sights and wait as your gun wobbles with each breath, beat of the heart or the slightest twitch of your arm until you pull the trigger. Borrowing my Dad's 12 gauge at a trap range I learned how to shoot a shotgun, both eyes open, swing through the target and squeeze off the shot when it leads the clay just the right amount. Repeat... My tendency is to swing slowly and catch the clay further out than most. I like a full choke that keeps the shot in a tight pattern.

So it was the the bird flew nearly straight up out of the scrub and I swung my 870 up, squeezed off the shot and caught the bird right as he was straightening out. The image, like my first fish on a fly, is etched now in my memory. The black rail on top of the gun with it's silver bead at the end, the pheasant's wings wide and tail out like an elongated spade. It's solid weight in my vest pocket afterwords and Ollie's excitement.

For my Grandpa's birthday several of us pitched in to get him a new side by side double barrel shotgun. The old man's eyes have had issues but his right eye is still clear and I got to watch him shoot straight as any of my cousins who are dead shots and fast. He bagged two birds with his new gun and Saturday night we cooked pheasant and potatoes for dinner. Before we were done walking the scrub we stood at the top of a hill.

From Pheasants 08

"I sure miss wide open country" he said. "I get so sick of seeing green trees everywhere and feeling closed in". We looked to the west where the sun was tracking down, the clouds ran in bands that alternated purple and peach. A farm sat at the bottom of a wide valley, green patches denoting crops and fenced off scrub land holding cattle. To the north more of the wide open land with it's red brambles, birch and water alder hollows, sage brush, rocky outcroppings and rolling hills and though I love my home, full of green trees, lowland lakes and wandering rivers I understood why a man from Oklahoma would long for this type of country. It was painted by god long long ago and a man might feel his rightful scale in the universe and know to be thankful.

Hunting

This weekend I embark on my first hunting trip since I was a kid. My family, cousins, Grandpa, Dad an Uncle and some nephews will embark to Sprague WA. We'll hunt pheasants but most of all we'll eat, drink and BS together for a weekend.