fishingbuddha

For years, a few of us have been going on a week long adventure up to the Cariboo for some dry fly river fishing. Throughout the years, the river we go to has been closed or other obstacles have hit us that have either resulted in cancelling the trip or making alternate plans. One year we hit the Columbia River which was a great experience. This year, with the Cariboo closing we decided to try several places over the course of 6 days.

Day one consisted of dry fly fishing the Thompson River from Lytton to Juniper Beach between Ashcroft and Kamloops. On day one fish were caught and I personally lost a couple of nice fish that unbuttoned themselves as these fish swam right for shore and then followed with a jump which ended up spitting the hook out. These fish were around 14-18 inches but surprisingly, the water was very warm causing these fish to be a little less feisty than the trout we usually catch on this system when it is steelhead time. Regardless, still exciting to catch something on a dry fly on moving water.At the end of the day, we hooked fish in almost every hole we hit (this includes some non trout species), mostly on dries with the odd stonefly. It was a bit interesting driving through Ashcroft since it looked like another planet due to the fires that hit that area.

Day two we hit Kamloops lake as reports came in that some big fish were being hooked in Cooney Bay. Great spot but no trout action. One angler was there and reported that lately he had hooked some small fish in the 5 lb range which gave us some hope but didn’t get a sniff from our group. Even the guys fishing the shoreline with bait got skunked.

After hitting Kamloops lake the plan was to hit a Thompson/Nicola lake to meet up with a buddy. Upon arriving  at the lake, we found our buddy tying flies in the campsite having some refreshments. Immediately, I wondered why a guy on the fishing trip, on day one,  is sitting tying flies and not fishing but shortly after that “thought”, our buddy proceeds to tell us the story of two big fish he landed but in the excitement, losing his fly rod to the fishing gods. Aside from the bad news of the rod, this got us very excited for the prospect of getting into some big fish in the dead, hot summer, which is not ideal for stillwater fishing.

The next morning we hit the lake full of hope and excitement. Immediately cruising from the shoreline, I ended up hooking into a fish right away and by the feel and look it seemed to be around the 15 -17 inch range. I lost it close to the boat but thought that this was going to be an outstanding day. Unfortunately by lunch, I had hooked into a few fish but as a group not many were landed. Although numbers were not great, the fish hooked were in nice shape and big. By the end of the day, I hooked into some trout with the others hooking into some fish as well. Although fishing was slow, this first day we just trolled around the lake with some leech patterns trying to figure out where the fish were hanging out.

The next day was a little better. Some big fish were landed but still our numbers were not that great. Two other guys showed up and started trolling some pumpkin head leeches around and like our fishing, not much was landed but the two fish these guys did land ended up being a 6/7lber and a 8-10lber.Unfortunately, as I was snapping pics of this beauty of a rainbow, my camera died. However, if you zoom into the pic, you will get a glimpse of a beauty. For this trophy trout, I offered to go back to the campsite (even though i was close to the middle of the lake) and get my camera which i forgot at the campsite, so that I could take a picture for the guy with this trophy trout. Fortunately after all that work, even though my camera died after one shot, his buddy was able to get closer and take a pic for him. The karma of this story resulted in these guys sharing some intel on the lake since they were obviously regulars.

The next day, we started off doing the same routine. Cruising around the lake hoping to get a hit from one of these big bruisers. Tired from the previous days, one of the guys rented a boat instead of belly boating which resulted in moving to a spot the “regulars” said to check out. Positioning himself in the shallows amongst some structure, our buddy anchored up and starting casting and striping some micro leeches close to shore. Being on the other side of the lake, I immediately notice that his rod is bent right over landing, what I can tell from afar, a beauty of a fish. Cast three and buddy is hooked into another one with another buddy close by also getting into a fish. After fishing as long as I have you can immediately tell whether a fish a small, decent or large and the two fish being played at the moment were, no doubt, trophy fish. I immediately flippered over to where one buddy was just landing his fish and sure enough it was a trophy. Not only that but buddy in the boat also landed a trophy fish. After re-cooping from the hamstring cramps I got from the excitement and over excercise, I was now in the zone and starting casting and stripping my fly and immediately….bam….fish on. Not just a fish but another trophy fish.

What happens next is absolutely nothing short of an epic two hours. Although fishing in a heavily weeded and structured area, the three of us start to hook into fish after fish with many time double headers happening frequently. After a few more fish were caught our fourth buddy made it over to join in the catching mayhem and not only were we experiencing double headers, we had a few triple headers. As well I am now looking back and for the short time period someone was always on to a wild slab.

Now I have been involved in some double headers in the past, but what made this unique was that all these fish were between 3-8 lbs (although now looking at the pictures it seems like they might have been more like 2-7 lbs). In the end, I had my best day of fishing ever (almost equivalent to the day we hooked into ten steelhead in a few hours)with landing around a dozen fish in morning/afternoon (celebrating with a few drinks and a nap) and then landing a few more in the evening. Overall, we figure that at the end of the day, over thirty plus large rainbows were landed between the four of us. The only negative part of this story is that my camera was dead and I didn’t have my go pro with me during the period We landed most of our fish. 

Aside from the fact that we were into a lot of big fish in the dead heat of summer on a lake with only two other guys, these fish were also wild and feisty. It would not be uncommon for these brutes to jump anywhere between 5-8 times and take you to your backing during a run. At the end of the day, we were all in shock of the epic day of fishing and pumped to get at it again the next day, especially since we thought we figured out where the fish were holding.

In true fishing fashion, the next day did not play out like we thought. Wind had picked up and fish turned off. We got into the odd one as a group but nothing like the day before. As we searched a little further away from where we were fishing from the day before, I hook into one. Once again all big. In fact my biggest fish were caught all on this day. Almost immediately after landing a decent fish I end up hooking into a half a dozen brutes cast after cast. Although not even close to the fishing day we had the day before, overall, the day was great. So great we as a group actually felt we didn’t need to fish the next morning because we felt fulfilled (hard to believe but this is how we actually felt).

In the end, it was a good reminder about a few fishing buddha philosophy points when it comes to fishing.

1. always go out of your way to help others as good fishing karma will come your way.
2. although fishing days are limited and regular routine fishing trips are amazing, one can’t experience these epic fishing days if you don’t try new areas.
3. work a lake/river hard and good things will happen. Timing, location, and line in water can result in epic days.

A trip like this makes you think about all the great opportunities that are out there just hours away from the house. You got to love BC! Now back to work, I am thinking about fall salmon fishing on the fly, fall indicator fishing, steelheading and sturgeon! All I got to say is that work gets in the way of my fishing!