A Drift Boat Conclave? Brilliant! We're in...

It was back in March on one of our trips to the NFOW (North Fork of White) that Justin of Sunburst Ranch made mention of a possible get-together at his place. There would be plenty of food, adult beverages, and a place to crash for everyone who attended. His plan was to invite as many drift boat owners as he could along with lots of anglers who normally don't have a chance or never have fished from a drifter. Distribute everyone into as many boats as possible and do some fishing. Hmmm. I liked the idea. Is there a name for this little event? Why yes there is! The 1st Annual Drift Boat Conclave. Ok, CTD is in...

Fast forward about a month, Crik, Squatch, and myself could be found piled into the Squatch's FJ with my Clacka in tow with Sunburst Ranch being our final destination. Just a little side note here, about 99.9% of the time on our trips, we drive my truck with my boat so this was the 1st trip where I had to ride shotgun. Well, actually I had to ride in the back seat because Crik doesn't seem to know the proper rules of calling "shotgun" and took the front seat. Real dick move Richardson. Needless to say, I was like a bull calf in a china closet the whole ride down there. Anyways...

We were late arrivals to the Lodge and sadly missed the night's festivities but we did find Justin, Rusty, and Kevin huddled around the kitchen table, still nursing an adult beverage. Introductions were made, BS was passed for a short time about fishing, and talks of tomorrow's fishing/boat arrangements were discussed before we found our way to our room for the weekend. We were beat so Squatch made his nest in the corner on the twin bed while Crik and I climbed into our sleeping bags on the king size bed. Night night....

Day 1

The next morning, we awoke to the sound of pots and pans being banged around in the kitchen as someone was rustling up some breakfast for the masses. We climbed out of our sleeping bags and began sorting our gear for the day's trip on the water. The plan was to float the entire blue and red ribbon sections of the river, just cover all bases since we had all day to do it. We were fired up and ready to get going. After grabbing some homemade biscuits and gravy, we finished hashing out float and shuttle plans for the day with Justin and the rest of the crew. We were gonna be joined by Jeff House of High Plains FlyFisher, Dan Forget, and Paul Port in Dan's Hyde drifter with Kevin following in his kayak for the longer float. Couldn't of asked for a better group of guys to chase down the river. Let's roll...

 View of Trout Island from our room

We piled back into the FJ and made a quick drive upriver to the Kelly access to drop the boat in and get the party started. We decided to bring streamer sticks and bobber rods on the float with us, be able to handle either condition especially once we got downstream of Patrick Bridge into the "brown trout water". I took my turn at the sticks first while Crik and Squatch dug out the 5wts for a little bobber action to start the day off. The upper section of the NFOW is a nymph fishermans dream so its pretty hard not to pick up a bobber rod to put some rainbows in the boat. Just as we made our pass down the 1st run below Kelly, Dan and the boys pulled up to launch their boats to start their day. Looks like the plan was coming together...

It didn't take the boys long to do work on a few rainbows and get the skunk off the boat. Always feels good to get that 1st fish in the boat and get the trip headed in the right direction as far as the fishing goes. We couldn't of asked for better weather too, it was an absolutely beautiful day on the river. If you have never floated the NFOW and you're an Ozark native, you really are missing out on a great float. Its an amazing river and easily my favorite trout river to float/fish from the drifter. Anyways, we had beached the boat to allow Crik to re-rig so Squatch jumped out of the boat to do some wade fishing while I took some video and photos. About that time, Dan and the boys came around the bend with streamer rods in hand and chuckin' that chicken at the opposite bank. I was taking photos when I heard some kind of hillbilly bigfoot call coming from their boat. I looked up to see Paul's rod bent pretty hard with a fish making a run downstream. I began making my way upstream to get some photos but then I got this real smart idea that I could net fish for them in the slack water so I grabbed Dan's net from and began working my way out to the fish. Then it dawned on me that I still had my DSLR camera hanging around my neck so there I was trying to get in position to net the fish and keep my camera out of the water. Yup...you guessed it, epic fail! The fish finally came in close and just as I was going for him with the net, he flopped over and the bug came out! It was a stud of a wild rainbow too, a solid 20" fish. Sorry Paul...

After this little piece of drama, Dan and the boys floated on past us while we piled back into the skiff so they could get some fresh water on the sections just above and below McKee Bridge. Crik and Squatch both hooked up on rainbows right at the bridge but couldn't put them in the boat. Then we made the inconvenient squeeze under the bridge (Someone really needs to blow up these low water bridges) and made a swap on the sticks so I could get a fly in the water. We pushed through to the next nice run just above ROLF (River of Life Farm) and dropped in. I snuck a cast into a seam on the outside of edge of the riffle just in time to see my thingamabobber dive and pulled a pretty wild rainbow in the net to get the skunk off my rod. We continued downstream and covered every inch of the river but couldn't get any love before we came to The Falls at ROLF. We shuffled around on the sticks and I shot the boat down The Falls, then swapped back around. We caught up with Dan's boat  and he let us slide in front of him for the next section of river. What a scholar and a gentleman!

We continued our way down the river, picking up rainbows here and there but nothing to brag about. Just your normal run of the mill NFOW rainbows for us minus a smaller brown that Crik picked up on the ol' rubberlegs. We made our approach on Patrick Bridge and we dug the streamer rods out to see if we could entice a big ol' brown trout into eating some meat on a hook. We started pounding the banks from there for the rest of the float for the most part. We didn't exactly have primo conditions for the streamer bug but we stuck with it. Crik stuck a fat bown at Sunburst on a smaller baitfish pattern and missed a couple other fish but then it got pretty quiet for as far as the brown trout bite goes. We kept with the streamers though in hopes of turning a big fish, but the Unicorns kept to their hiding spots on this day. I stuck another small brown on the big bug and then plucked another one out of a nice run with a bobber rod while we took a piss break. That pretty much ended the day for us after that as the bite totally died off on us.

The last highlight of the day that I HAVE to share with everyone involves some expert casting and a turtle. As we were floating, we came upon a log and on that log was a few turtles. At some point, someone said something along the lines of, "Chance, I bet you can't knock that turtle off that log." Challenge accepted! I made a quick double haul with the 8-weight and launched the VooDoo Squatch I had on at the biggest turtle on the log. It was about halfway through the cast that I realized that I was actually gonna come very close to hitting the turtle so I raised the rod to slow the bug down. In doing this, somehow I literally wrapped the fly around the turtles neck! I'm not even kidding! Indiana Jones don't have crap on me!! It was all fun and games till I got the turtle in the boat and tried to get the fly back. He was pissed! Finally, we got the big guy un-tangled and dropped him back in the water...

The following evening was filled with talks about the days fishing and great food. The typical BS of what flies were working, biggest fish caught, and the excitement from a few newbs who got their first wild NFOW rainbows. Everyone pitched in inside the kitchen to help get the dinner of fresh fried fish, beans, fried potatoes, and corn bread all put together. The food was delicious to say the least. My compliments to the chef on the fish, which I think might of had several guys helping, including Crik. It was an awesome evening with friends, some new and some old. The adult beverages started to flow pretty freely and it didn't take too long for everyone to start finding the way to their beds for the night...

What a day!

Day 2

The next morning was filled with everyone gathering up their gear and packing stuff away for the last day of fishing and then the trip home. Most of the group seemed to be heading downstream of Sunburst so we decided to go back up top to float Kelly to Sunburst. We said our goodbyes to everyone, got our shuttle lined out, and made the quick drive upstream. Once again, we launched the skiff armed with bobber rods and streamer rods so we could cover any situation. This time, Squatch started out on the sticks while Crik took the front of the boat and I piled into the back of the boat. Time to fish...

We made our way down from Kelly and came to the 1st good run of the section where we instantly started to get into rainbows once again. I can't say enough good things about these NFOW wild rainbows, they are just awesome! A 12" fish will put a deep bend into any 5wt rod and a 16" fish will make your drag sing that sweet little tune! The fish were really showing us some love this morning...

We were working our way down the run when I set the hook on a fish that instantly felt "heavy". I put some pressure on it and it didn't seem to phase it as it turned to run downstream. I cleared the fly line of my feet and the boat so I could get the fish on the reel. It hit the reel and immediately started to pull drag. Oh boy! We followed the fish a short distance in the boat and then it sulked down in the current. Squatch placed the boat in the slack water close to shore and I bailed out of the boat. Crik followed me with the boat net. We still hadn't really seen the fish yet except for a quick flash so we weren't sure just how big it was. We made our way out to edge of the current and I started to put the pressure back on the fish. It finally came out of the current and rolled over on the surface. Holy shit...

It was a BIG brown, the biggest I had ever hooked from what I could tell. It wouldn't give up either, it just keep running back into the main current just when I would start to its head turned. Crik waded out pretty deep to try and net the beast out of the current when I'd get its head up and turned. No dice! It basically turned and chased Crik out of the hole. It was pretty comical and stessful at the same time. Tensions were high as the fight went on. Finally, I got the fish turned and it swam into the slack water away from the main channel. Crik swooped in below it and tried to put it in the net but missed as it swam away. He was quick on his feet and took a couple of long steps to make another stab it. It was a struggle and the fish tried to flop out but he finally made a good scoop to put in the net! Yes! I let out a "Finding Bigfoot" inspired whoop and holler than rang out down the river!

It was a beast! It had a huge head and mouth on it, almost like a Golden Dorado! I couldn't hardly get my hand around her belly to get a photo op with the piggy. We had been fishing hard for a big fish this season and it felt great to finally have a toad in our hands. It was a beautiful fish with brilliant black and red spots, blue cheeks, and a HUGE adipose fin. We took a measurement and she came out a solid 25". My personal best brown trout. We took a few photos and got some GoPro footage of the release as she swam back into the hole. Wooohooooo!!!

So after I finally came off the high of catching that brown, we did a swap on the oars and continued our float downstream. The fishing stayed steady for us through the rest of the day. We had a nice mix of browns and rainbows, no more big fish though. The fish couldn't get enough of the Pat's Rubberlegs in brown, it was THE fly of the day. We picked up a few fish on some caddis type bugs as a dropper but the fish preferred the meat fly! It was one of those days where every place a fish should, they were there and they would oblige your good drift with an eat. A lot of people hate on the bobber but when its good, its a lot of fun to fish that way. Making a good cast, getting a good drift, throwing in a mend, and then almost calling the strike before it happens. I love to throw streamers more than most guys but there ain't nothing wrong with chuckin' the ol' bobber some days.

We finally finished up our float at Sunburst Ranch around 3:00pm which worked out great for our schedule. We got the boat loaded up, all of our gear stowed into the FJ, and headed for Springfield so we could get some dinner. We made our normal stop at our favorite pizza place, Old Chicago! Whoever came up with the idea of putting pepper jack cheese on pizza at the place, deserves a huge raise! It is amazing pizza and a very cool place. Stop and eat there...

The North Fork of the White River is an amazing river and is easily our favorite place to float for trout in the Ozarks. Its a beautiful river, fun river to row, wild rainbows, and trophy brown trout....yeah, it rules! Wait, I mean, the fishing sucks and all you catch is little fish. At least thats what some people say....we will just keep letting them think that! Can't wait to get back down there...

Until next time...keep chasing the dream...

On the rise...

At the end of last week, we had a pretty impressive storm move through and dump a considerable amount of rain on the area. Within 24 hours, most of our rivers and streams were on the rise, some big enough that it warranted flash flood warnings and watches. We were really needing a serious flush of most of our river systems so this rain was welcomed with open arms. This event will probably salvage our smallie season for the summer, maybe we will actually be able to float this summer...

Here are a few pictures that JoeyC took of some of the major access points on Elk River. Quite impressive...

Its smallie time...our favorite time of the year!

Its no secret here at CTD that we are big fans of the Smallmouth Bass. They are a bad ass, pure and simple, when it comes to Ozark river bred gamefish! We love them! Honestly, the past few years, trout have just been a "filler" till smallie season kicks off! Once its here, we put away the 5wts, the tiny flies, and thingamobbers in exchange for 6wts and 7wts, big streamers, and topwater bugs. Waders are put away for the season. Its either sandals while we are wet wading or barefoot in the drift boats in the late spring and summer sun with our big palm leaf hats to keep us from getting too burnt!

Well, I think its safe to say that smallie season is here. The spawn has been delayed with these recent random cold fronts and rain events that we keep getting but thats OK because the rain has caused all of our major smallie streams to get a nice rise in flows, totally rejuvenating the fishery for the upcoming summer. JoeyC and The Professor have been out a few times already this spring to one of our local favorite smallie streams (that will be left un-named) and was able to stir up a few really nice fish. I can't wait to get the boat on the water and get after them! Its been a long winter and spring but warmer weather and longer days are finally here. It won't be long and we will be throwing poppers to these brutes full time...then it will really be GAME ON! I'm so over 5X tippet and copper johns...give me some Maxima 15lb and a deer hair popper!

Yup, to hell with trout...let's go bass fishing....

Until next time, keep chasing the dream...

Hillbilly Cohos, Sand Bass, White Bass...whatever...

All over the Ozarks, the word on the street for every tributary to our major area lakes are that the white bass are making their annual spawning runs. No matter what you call them white bass, sand bass, sandies, whites, or hillbilly cohos....everyone can appreciate how awesome of a game fish they are, especially on a fly rod! Take a 6wt, a box of Clousers, and go have a blast. Sometimes its a fish on every cast once you actually find them. They aren't too bad to eat either.

The Professor got out on James River a couple weeks back in his drifter and finally found them just above the take out right at dark. Clousers did the trick...like they always do! He kept himself a nice mess of them to toss in the deep fryer. Not a bad way to go catch your dinner. Lucky dog...

They are everywhere! So get out there and do a little searching. Once you find them, just stake your claim and hang on! You might have to rub elbows with some grumpy locals from time to time that think you're trespassing on "their" river but mostly they are harmless. They are usually just pissed cuz you aren't keeping everyone of them that you catch. Let them set a bucket next to you and throw some in for them. They won't bother you too much....

Until next time...keep chasing the dream....

The F3T Road Trip, Day #3

Day #3

The next morning, we all piled into the trucks for our final day on the water for our little road trip. We jogged south to Norfork, Arkansas to eat breakfast at our 2nd favorite greasy spoon breakfast spot in the Ozarks...the good ol' Norfork Cafe. Make sure and check it out. Its not bad! After we filled our bellies with pancakes, omelets, and biscuits n' gravy (Oh My!), we ran up to Norfork dam to dump the boats in while the COE was pumping out some good water for us. Shuttles were ran, boat spots were picked, and we were off....

To stick with the weekends on-going theme, we kept with the big sticks and chuckin' the big bugs in hopes of finding a unicorn. I don't know what it is about fly fishing and all the variables that go into making a presentation that will entice a fish to eat but on certain days, some guys have what I call the "touch". Doesn't seem to matter what bug they tie on, the fish are just gonna eat it. This day, that guy (or SOB if you're in the boat with him) was DonnyB. The dude was straight up being fishy and was dialed in. He was sticking rainbows and browns off all of the good banks and missed a ton of fish along the way. Cole and I just couldn't hang with him that day. It was pretty stupid, to be honest, but DonnyB is known to have days like this from time to time...

While DonnyB was having a grand ol' time sticking trout faces all morning, the rest of us weren't having the same kinda luck. Sometimes, you just have 1 of those days where nothing can go right on the river. Personally, while I was trying to clear out the line at my feet while fishing, my full sink SA line got hung up on a rock in the middle of the river. Before we could get the boat slowed down and headed back upstream, the rock it was on sliced the line in half. Just freaking great! I was able to retrieve all of my line but it was done. Gotta love it. In the other boat, JoeyC was having a few problems on his own. While tossing a big nasty double deceiver, he finally made contact with a unicorn (BFBT or big freaking brown trout). This wasn't your normal 2 footer either, it was bigger. According to The Professor, he fought the fish as well as anyone could and they chased the fish down with the boat but before they could get it in the net.....the fish just came off? Heartbreak...

We finished out the float and called it a day. We had plans to leave early enough to head back to Fayetteville in time to make a pit stop at McLellans Fly Shop and grab some dinner before heading to the F3T show. After squeezing 2 trucks and 2 drift boats into the cluttered parking lot where the fly shop was, we did some loitering in McLellans and BSed with Brock to kill some time. I picked up another spare spool for my Hatch Monsoon that I had ordered and bought a new SA Streamer Express full sink fly line to replace the broken line, brilliant! After some more loitering and BSin', we decided to go grab some grub and then head to F3T. Corey picked the establishment for which we would dine that afternoon and it was a dandy. It was a chain restaurant that's basically a spin off of Hooters and Twin Peaks, except the local talent wears kilts instead. Well, the food was alright and you could tell we had the Monday afternoon "talent" shift if you catch my drift. Yes, I'm still a prick...

We finally made it to the theater for F3T. The guys were pretty excited as Donny and Corey didn't attend last year and this year's film lineup looked to be pretty freaking awesome. We grabbed our seats and settled in. This year's film tour lineup was geared more to the freshwater crowd with quite a bit of "trout" related films as well as the normal exotic locales and exotic fish that probably 90% of us will never see or fish but they were still good films. Intermission was entertaining as always as the F3T crew do a great job and give away plenty of swag for the audience. Also, CTD as a group has been pretty lucky at these events. Last year, I won a free SA fly line of my choice but we doubled up on the swag this year. The Professor got a fly assortment from Montana Fly Company as well as a few other things and then Joey won a Montana Fly Company F3T Edition Boat Box! It is freaking awesome. We all hate him for it...

As far as the best films go, I would have to say that my favorites were "The Brothers Brown" and "Reel: A Day on the River". Both were geared towards the trout audience and had a really great story to go along with each film. "The Brothers Brown" really hit home with all of us as its about 3 brothers who go to the Lower Au Sable to chase the monster browns that live there with streamers out of drift boats. Sound familiar? It was an amazing film. that I think we all identified with. I will buy it when it hits DVD, no doubt. "Reel: A Day on the River" revolves around a handful of guides  and their daily lives up in the NorthEast that fish the Delaware River system which is kinda where modern American fly fishing was basically born. It's a great film as well. The F3T Tour is a great event, if you have a venue close by then you really should go. I think its an essential part of the future of our sport and where its heading. I think it helps to attract a younger generation of fisherman and to push current fisherman to enrich themselves deeper into the sport.

 

My Personal Favorite Film from F3T...

I don't really know what else to say about this trip that I haven't expressed in the previous blog posts. I guess all I can say is....it was a really damn good fishing trip!

 Until next time, keep chasing the dream...

 

The F3T Road Trip, Day #2

Day #2

On Sunday morning, I think the post-traumatic stress caused from consuming the Alaskan Burger at the Three Legged Mule kept all of us in the rack a little longer than we woulda liked. Plus it was raining off and on early that morning which is like a lullaby to me, I dont know about anyone else. Anyways, it didn't help that it wasn't our typical Sunday morning on a fishing trip where we are all hurrying around to pack gear up, breaking camp, and hitting the river before heading home. We didn't have any kind of schedule to keep since we still had Monday off to fish and go to F3T. It was freaking awesome to be honest...

We all finally crawled out of our bunks after Billiam got the coffee pot perculating and the smell of fresh hot coffee started to fill the house. It was a very relaxed morning as we drank coffee, sorted out gear, and discussed floats for the day. We decided to float the lower section together since the shuttle would be quick and easy with the 3rd vehicle plus we had some overcast skies and patchy rain so the plan was to chuck that chicken for some brown trout. It was beginning to feel like one of those days where things were gonna be....dare I say...epic?

After the normal chore of launching the boats and running the shuttles, we jumped in the drifters and pointed them downstream. Once again, we were armed with our 8wts and big nasty bugs with high hopes of sticking some trout faces. We even left the 5wts at the cabin, no excuses this time. It was hero or zero today! I had JoeyC and DonnyB in my boat while Cole and Billiam was in The Professors Hyde for the day. The guys went to work with the 8wts and didn't take long for the fish to turn the feedbag on. The 1st few fish in the boat was kind of a comical situation. We were anchored up while one of the guys was doing a fly change. Donny was in the front of the boat just casting to the bank and letting his bug swing out below the boat when he got a tug! Hooked up on the other end was a good ol' NFOW brown trout. The skunk was off the boat, time to do work! As I was doing a little film work with Donny and his brown, Joey had re-rigged, made a cast to the bank, and then hooked up on another brown trout!! Brilliant! Wait...the ridiculousness doesn't stop there! Donny went right back to swinging his streamer below the boat and hooked again!! Always a good sign of things to come when you hook up 3 times while anchored up in the river. We finally hauled anchor and proceeded on down river...

As you can tell from the pics, yellow was the flavor of the day for us. The browns were just eating it up. They were holding in the shoals, chasing down sculpin and baitfish was our guess. They would crash the fly almost as soon as it hit the water, it was bad ass. A few fish even hit the fly so hard that they knocked it out of the water and totally missed it! The boys were getting tugs on just about every nice bank with a good current or in the shallow fast water on the shoals. We hadn't stuck a big brown yet, mostly just your stocker browns and slightly larger holdover fish from previous stockings but when they are eating streamers like that, who cares! I wanted a piece of the action so we swapped out on the sticks above a nice shoal and run that has been fishy for us in the past. Just a side note here, due to the rain that was in the forecast, I had left my Nikon camera that we were using to film and take pictures with at the cabin so it wouldn't get wet. If it had gotten wet, my wife probably woulda murdered me and you wouldn't hear from The Cajun anymore. Anyways, we were just using the GoPro plus our cell phones for pictures and video. I had forgotten to give a tutorial on how to use the GoPro with the guys in the boat so someone else could film if I was fishing. This bit me in the butt on my 3rd cast when I hooked up with a really nice brown, easily over 20", and was trying to tell Donny how to turn the GoPro on. He was having technical difficulties. The fish was struggling below us in the fast water. I was trying to tell him how to do it. Then the line just went slack....fish off. FML....

The lower section float on the NFOW is only a few miles so it didn't take us long to knock it out since we were streamer fishing and covering water pretty fast. It had fished really well and it was still early in the day so we decided to run back upstream to float it again. I mean, why not? We jumped in the trucks and ran the shuttle again before Billiam had to leave to head home. He was gonna have to miss out on the F3T activities the next day sadly. The responsibilities of being a parent, I know them all too well. Anyways, we piled back into the boats and headed back downstream. This time around, The Professor and Cole lead the way since we kinda hogged all the fresh water on the first float while they had to deal with our sloppy seconds...sorry guys! The 2nd float wasn't near as productive for us as you might of expected but we still were able to put a few good brown trout in the boats before we finished up. The elusive 2 footer had eluded us on this day but when you have a numbers day on streamers....you can't gripe too much about the fishing. No sir...not at all....

After we finished the 2nd float, we headed back to Sunburst to break camp at the cabin. We took our time getting everything sorted and loaded back up into the trucks for our trip back south. I think everyone was a little hesitant to leave the NFOW and our riverside cabin after it treated us so well the past 2 days. Once again, we'd like to thank Justin and Amy Spencer at Sunburst Ranch for their hospitality. You guys are the best!

We were headed south back to Arkansas. Destination? Mountain Home and the CTD preferred place of accommodation, The River Rock Inn.  Our plan? Fish the Norfork tailwater the next morning in hopes of finding a unicorn before we headed back to Fayetteville for the F3T show...

Stay tuned for Day #3...

The F3T Road Trip, Day #1

Last year, we attended the F3T event put on by McLellan's Fly Shop in Fayetteville, Arkansas and it was an absolute awesome experience. The next day was a total kick in the face though, that tends to happen when you don't get home till 4:30 am and then get up for work at 5:30 am. It was totally worth it. This year, the F3T event was scheduled to be on a Monday instead of a Thursday. The light bulb went off in my head almost instantly when I saw the date...3-day weekend fishing trip? You betcha! It didn't take me long to work out the logistics for the trip as we were feeling a little burnt out on the White River and we had a hankering to go north to Missouri. We were bound for the North Fork of the White River...

Day #1

The conditions on the NFOW (North Fork Of the White) for the trip couldn't of been any better for us. I would like to think that this drought is trying to come to an end as we have been getting some nice rains this spring which has a lot of our rivers and creeks on the rise with some nice flows. When we woke up on Saturday morning, we walked out onto the deck of our riverside cabin at Sunburst Ranch to find the river flowing just a fuzz under 1000cfs. Primo conditions. We all got in late the night before so we had the normal routine of getting gear sorted in the boats and getting rods rigged up for the day. The objective for the day was simple....throw streamers till our shoulders were shot or our hands were bleeding. So the 8wts and sinking lines were strung up with big, nasty bugs attached to the end. Now, I have to be honest, we stuck the 5wts in my boat because we were floating the upper section of the NFOW which is more rainbow fishy than brown fishy so we were cheating just a little bit. Float plans were laid out for the day and shuttles were set up. Time to quit screwing around, it's go time...

We departed from our home base at Sunburst, The Professor, Billiam, and DonnyB went south to put in at Patrick Bridge for their 1st of 2 floats for the day while JoeyC, Cole, and myself went north for the Kelly access to put in for our float. We were gonna run the gauntlet to fish damn near all the Blue Ribbon and Red Ribbon trout water on the NFOW, which is just short of a 14 mile float. That's legit.

We dropped the WolfSkiff into the river and the guys grabbed the streamer rods to go to work on hopefully dredging up a Unicorn. Just a little side note here, when we put in there was a couple of fisherman that floated by on pontoons and made sure to get downstream of us. Sure whatever, didn't bother us to fish behind them...for the time being. Remember this little piece of info for later. Anyways, the boys went to work on slinging half a chicken to the banks and bringing them back to the boat in every conceived way that you could possibly strip a streamer. We hit some good banks for a while but wasn't getting any love from the streamer bug. On top of that, the sun was out high and bright which doesn't typically make for good streamer conditions. Joey was the 1st one to bite the bullet and dig the bobber stick out and start fishing the fishy seams as we made our way down to the 1st "landmark" of the float, McKee Bridge.

Now, if you haven't floated the NFOW before, there are 2 low-water bridges that cross the river and can become a pain in the posterior if the flows are high on the river. Everyone has their magic number as far as CFS goes on if they can get their boat under these bridges. I was well within my comfort zone on my Clacka so we made a quick pit stop to set up cameras to get some footage of us going under the bridge. After setting up, we jumped back in the boat and made our run under the bridge. Its still a "think skinny" kinda ordeal as we all had to lay down in the boat but it was no problem. We beached the boat and made our way back to the bridge to retrieve our camera gear when we saw a drifter coming down. Not any drifter either, a big ol' aluminum Hyde high side drifter with Dan Forget at the sticks. Hmmm, this could get interesting. As he made his approach, he made the comment that he had measured wrong and wasn't gonna fit under the bridge. Indeed sir. CTD to the rescue.

I apologize for the crappy pictures here. Took them with my 

iPhone from the footage of us going under the bridges. 

Anyways, we got under McKee Bridge without any major issues, got some good footage, and helped a buddy out. Mission accomplished! Time to fish. The guys were back to throwing streamers again, hard to pass up some of the sexy banks that this river has to offer. We floated downstream with a few tugs here and there but couldn't stick a hook in a fish face yet. This time, both Cole and JoeyC put the big sticks down in exchange for the bobber rods. Now, remember the guys in the pontoons I was telling you about? Well we finally caught up to them just above The Falls as they were posted up in a run. Ok. No big deal. Give them plenty of room and we will go around them. Nope...soon as they seen us, they hoped into the pontoons and pushed downstream to stay out in front of us. Pricks. Anyways, back to fishing. We did some swapping around on the sticks and I got my turn at the front of the boat. Due to the section we were in, I went straight for  the bobber rod and wanted to get some fish in the boat as the section we were in is usually really good for dredging a nymph of some sort. It didn't take long and we started picking up a few rainbows here and there. No big ones but just your normal NFOW wild rainbows. The stank was finally off the boat....

We kept pushing downstream, going back and forth from the bobber rigs to back to the streamer rods in certain sections. Still no love on the big bug. Hmmm. We stopped here and there to nymph out some good runs and do some filming. Nothing too exciting. Just a few wild rainbows again. As we started to approach Blair Bridge, what did we find? Its our friends in the pontoons again. At this point, the language coming from my pie-hole was far from G-Rated as I was a touch aggravated with these guys. So, I tucked the boat into the inside bank where they couldn't totally see us coming : ) As luck would have it, when we got to them, one of them hooked up with a fish and they couldn't bail off in their pontoons to push downstream ahead of us. Ahhh, the sweet smell of Karma. Yes, I'm a prick sometimes. Do I care? Nope.

This was also about the time that my phone started going crazy as we musta hit a spot of service on the river. I dug into the boat bag to fetch my phone and found a few text messages from Billiam. Questions of whether or not they could get under McKee Bridge was the 1st order of business followed by a few pictures of some browns that were caught in the lower section. Plus a bonus fish with DonnyB putting a smallie in the boat as well. Indeed. The whole crew is on fish...

We made our way downstream and the guys were back to throwing the big bugs again. Good streamer water can't be wasted with a piddly 5wts, 5X, and eggs....half a chicken is the only way to go! Another positive was the sun had finally sunk back behind the hills and put a nice dark shadow on the right bank for us to cast to. It got hot for a little while for us on the streamer bug. JoeyC had a legit 2-footer follow his Double Deceiver to the boat but wouldn't commit to eat and also had a couple of eats from other fish but couldn't make the hook stick! Cole finally put us on the board with streamers by sticking a nice chubby brown. Beautiful fish. He followed that up shortly with a smaller stocker brown that also was digging the streamer bug. We missed a few more fish but then things got quiet on us again and we hit a pretty long section of frog water. We pushed on downstream to make up some time as it was getting late and there was some good fishy water in the lower section I wanted to fish hard with streamers before it got dark. 

Just above Patrick Bridge, we floated through the section known as Trout Island which is a super fishy, pocket water kinda place that is packed full of fish. The guys decided to dig the 5wts back out and chuck a bobber before we got below Patrick Bridge. Cole immediately hooked up with a decent brown. At this point, I'm fumbling around trying to get the camera out to film and at some point I had unknowingly put my foot on the anchor release which in turn dropped the anchor. Not that big of a deal except the fish took a run upstream on us and decided to get tangled in the anchor rope. FML. This was quite the debacle for a few minutes as we tried to get the fish out. I resorted to lifting the anchor up till we could see the fish and JoeyC tried to put him in the net. Epic fail. The fish finally broke off. Gotta love it when the guy on the sticks has LOFT (Lack Of F*cking Talent) issues. Well, after the appropriate amount of crap was given to me for that head in rectum moment, we pushed on....

We switched back to the streamer rods for the rest of the float and just hammered all the good banks. There is some super sweet streamer water in the lower sections on this river. It just screams big brown trout and big nasty streamers. Well, for today, the bite was so-so. We put a few stocker browns in the boat and I continued having LOFT issues as I missed or lost several browns on the streamer bug. By several, I mean like....10-12 fish? It was stupid. Amateur hour the whole way down to the take out for me. The only high point for me was I caught a smallmouth just above the take out. Very cool. We got our 1st smallies of the year and we weren't even smallie fishing. Indeed. 

We finally arrived at the take-out just before dark to end a pretty damn good day. We got to fish some awesome water and put some fish in the boat. Not too shabby. We got the boat loaded up and our gear stowed away as we knew the other guys were waiting on us. Hunger had set in and they were all starving cuz supposedly I didn't allow time to stop to get some deli meat or anything to have in the boat for lunch and made the guys live off of beer, muffins, and granola for the day. BS if you ask me. I wasn't even that hungry. Anyways, we hauled butt back to the cabin and met up with the rest of the crew. The normal round of "Whatcha catch?" "Any big fish?" "Yeah, it sucked and we ran outta beer." was covered on the porch as everyone got out of their waders and got ready to head into town. 

We piled into the Billiam's Hondoo Doo Pilot, turned on the kiddie DVDs for those of us in the back, and headed for a little hole in the wall burger joint I had heard about from Sean from OKC and Justin at Sunburst called The Three Legged Mule. Yes, you heard me. The Three Legged Mule. Now this is the kinda local eatery that when you walk in, all the locals give you the stink eye because you're taking up space in their place. Well, funny looks aside, the food was pretty damn good. We all got some burger called "The Alaskan Burger". I will just let the picture speak for itself...

With our bellies full, we headed back to the cabin to go lay down into a food induced coma for the night in preparation for tomorrow. Forecast was for overcast skies and chances of rain for the whole day on Sunday. Hopes were high for a good streamer bite. After we all sorted our gear out and re-rigged a few things, we climbed into our sleeping bags and crashed out. Well all of us except The Professor, the ol' fart passed out in the chair next to the wood stove. We had to wake him up and send him to bed...

Stay tuned for Day #2...