Sunday-Tuesday trip

I started the weekend giving casting lessons at the Orvis flagship store  and guiding 18 guys from Project Healing Waters on my home river, the Battenkill. The fellow in the pic with the Softhackle license plate is a great guy and guide on the upper Connecticutt River that is their leader.  I'm now a proud member and part of the bunch. Now I'm going to try to pool my limited knowledge and resources and get some of them over to the SR. I'm looking forward to many great times with these guys. I don't deserve them, but these guys DO.
   We hit the river Sunday in the late AM in the Upper Fly and the crowds were thin, the fish not so much. We all hooked up, and I banked 2 kings and a couple of  small browns. Size 6 orange/pink bunny flies seemed to madden the males that popped out of the fast water and got agitated while holding. I did try some smaller, less bulky natural flies-hence, the small browns. Later, we went below Pineville and found them running in lowlight up shallow riffles and briefly resting in pockets,  and they were extrememly aggressive to big flies. One fish landed that was a good 40"+ , so I'll guess in the high 20's, maybe 30. I know my rod butt is 11 1/4" and it's 4 times the butt. Whatever it is, just ridiculous amounts of fun. The guys had a good laugh watching me try to beach it above a log across the river. Took me at least a dozen tries to get its head up and  skated where I could  get some control on it. If I hadn't switched to 15 lb. in the lowlight it would have been no way Jose.
The next morning was a different animal, finding kings running through a small slot in a tailout and getting them to take as they held with their backs out of the water just after they passed through. That evening we went back to Pineville and we watched Troutbum21 put on a clinic with small flies and little weight. Once again we all had some hook-ups, but Gerry had the hot hand. We took turns it seemed with who had the hot fly or spot, or technique. I may be stupid, but I do pay attention, and I learned a bunch from watching and listening to  Pafisher, Troutbum and HT.
The last day I took a walk away from  everyone  and had a field day getting males to play from behind the redds. I used smaller crayfish looking  flies with just a little flash from rootbeer estaz and  some blue comets. They were very shy and I stayed back and  made as little disturbance as possible. They would get ****ed if I kept them around the redd and didn't scatter them. One male would eventually take and I had to run out into the tail with the line slack and stomp my cleats to get them to run up away from a tree lying in the water above a flume. Instant snap-off. If I pressured fish- they went for it every time.    I ended up with 5 to the bank. I went through lots of flies, I hate snagging fish, but it was inevitable. I did the point and snap dozens of times.  In the end I banked 10 for who the hell knows, with a couple of small brownies for added bonus. I used 12 lb. tippet most of the time, and went to 15 during lowlight and rain. Getting deep was not an issue with the low water. Never felt like I needed to thin the tippet to get depth. Most of the time I used one  number 7  or bb  with unweighted flies, or a beadhead or beadchain. Orange, blue,  and rootbeer/brown worked for me. I hope to take a one day run next week-leave at 3 am- get home 9 at night for some more fun watching Pafisher put some deep bends in his new switch rod.  Thanks to HT for the driving and all around good times, as usual. It was a pleasure talking to all and getting to meet Troutbum21.  I'm not wealthy and I have a suspicion that I may never see  any of the places that qualify as world class. All I know is the SR is some freakin' fun. Who cares what it's labeled as, it's just  flat out fun. 
 
Charlie
 
 

Looks like a great trip.Thanks for helping Project Healing Waters

Charlie:
those pictures are great man.. The read even better..  Perfect !!
Thanks for sharing the memories, everyone was special..
Hope Jack is doing well and anyone on this board gets the opportunity to fish with that Man.
Some things go hand in hand but this is what brought it all together:
 

 
 
 

nice fichy 
that gets a guys juices flowing.
i might get back up again fri from first light till about noon.
that will make more salmon fishing trips than the last 20 +years combined.
wonder what it is that sparks the interest again.
well pics and stories like that for one thing.

Here's a up to date on the trip up.After you pulled out I fished from that tree down as far as I could go.Had several Kings on and got two to the bank.Along with the kings I caught two nice rainbows about 12-14 inches that fought like champions with several leaps.As I was working my way back to the car I tried for those males that you were working in the morning,Charlie.Threw a conehead brown wooly bugger into the love nest and the boss male did n.t like that so he smashed it and the pool erupted into a head shaking froth,He ran for that tree but I managed to turn him and eventually got him to shore.After that there were no takers as that pool was really disturbed.
Today I got streamside real early around 8:30 () and walked down to the honey mooners and threw some wooly buggers at them,no takers,I think they are wise to our ways.Then proceeded down to where we were yesterday and there were fish moving everywhere.Guys those fish were determined to get upsteam and they were swimming right at me,they got so close that they sprayed water on me when they bolted pass.Anyway I was having some luck with these fish but it was n't hot and heavy.I was thinking what is the color of the day?Then I remembered 2bobs post with the blue fly stuck in the jaw.why don't I try some blue estaz?Well I did and after about 25-30 hookups and ensuing battles on my new switch I could n't take anymore abuse so I called it a day as tommorow is another day

Excellent, Jack! Have a great day tomorrow. Thanks for the update, I can't wait to get back next week. I went in all-sports and bought a whole bunch of blue stuff monday night. Steel like it , too. I was pretty much out from last year.
 
Charlie 

2bob,yes I'm happy that I did n't cancel my trips but if they would have dropped the water to 100 like 2007 I would have.This level is n't great but it's not that bad,and the water is finally cooling so it should get better.
Heard from someone that was there that the DSR had a BIG push of Coho this afternoon.

They'll be filling in some more while you rest 'em. Thanks for the update. I'll be talking to you. I'm thinking Tues., but I can make it Monday if you're only up for a couple of days. Can't wait. Off to the vice.
 
Charlie