About a Year Late, but...

Heading West.

I've finally had a moment to put up some pics from my trip to Oregon. I went for nine days and it was absolutely amazing. I hooked a fish my first hour of fishing, but that was it for steelhead.

I started on the Deschutes and stopped in Maupin at the Deschutes Angler. John and Amy Hazel, as well as Bruce Berry, the Oregon rep for Montana Fly and Beulah Fly Rods, were absolutely wonderful to me and gave me more detailed information than I would have ever expected. Bruce said I should burn that map that John made for me, but I kinda wanted him to autograph it! I fished up and down the Deschutes for three days. There were a few people out, but it was easy to get in wherever I wanted. The weather was pretty pleasant--about 50 with some rain, but the water temperature was about a million degrees warmer than at home.

First afternoon on the Deschutes.

The road goes down river right and the railroad on river left. Supposedly, two competing railraods built on opposite sides of the river and the one who lost had theirs turned into the BLM road. I'm not used to Double Speys, so I had to work pretty hard on my casting, but that was really a good thing. I had never fished without a sink tip either--it's a whole new game with a floating line.

Dinner for one.

A beautiful Deschutes run. Lots of deer, but no tugs.

The river was so beautiful and there were so many colors--it was a nice change from Hailey, which is already pretty wintery. At the run above, I saw about ten whitetails swim across the river--I've never seen that in my life. I would have bet money I was going to catch a fish here, but I only lost a fly on a rock. I guess that's steelheading.

Can't beat a first cast trout.

One afternoon, I was swinging through a run and there were trout going crazy everywhere. I finally had to stop and pull out a trout rod and caught a fish on my first cast. I had to beat the trout and whiteys off my standard ParaWullf with Zebra Midge dropper. It's amazing how a few trout can lift your spirits on a slow day.

Part Two is coming soon...