Friday, June 25, 2010

Update and a quick trip to the Stanislaus

Fishing trips have been few and far between for me this past year or so. With a two year old daughter, a pregnant wife (due 10/10/10 - wouldn't that be cool?), a demanding job and a new house, time has been somewhat of a scarce commodity for me of late. Two weeks ago life served up a new obstacle: two torn tendons, a talar dome injury and what my doctor referred to as "the worst cartilage she'd ever seen". Long story short: I'm in a cast for a while. This injury was a result of training for the SF Half Marathon. I'd been running quite a bit (in the wee hours before everyone else wakes up) and really enjoying it, but I think I might have pushed up the mileage a little too fast. After a 10 miler two weeks ago I found myself barely able to walk. It took a week to get in to see the doctor and in the intervening time I went fishing, bad ankle and all!

The trip was with my brother in law and it was a late afternoon strike on the Stanislaus. We hiked into a canyon spot that I had been to a few years back and to a particular pool where I once saw the largest trout of my life chase a 12 incher that my buddy Mike had hooked. This fish was big and moved like a blacktip shark on the hunt. It was really a sight to see and something none of us who saw it will likely forget. It reminded me of the stories you hear of big bull trout coming up and whacking cutthroats in Montana. Only this one was either a big bow or brown. Unfortunately we couldn't raise that fish again two years ago and we couldn't raise it a week ago either.

Even though we couldn't raise Big Mo, we did manage to catch over two dozen trout. Roger actually caught a trout on each of hist first two casts while I was still rigging up. When I saw that I knew the fish would be eating well that day.

Nearly all the fish I caught were swinging a soft hackle. A technique I've been trying to use more and more. I also got a few to come up for caddis dries. It was nice to not have to bother rigging up a two-fly indicator set up.

The hike into the canyon.



The only fish pic I took. Most were in the 12-16 inch range.



Big Mo lives down there.