I did it once, and I will do it again

Sorry to get political on your asses again, but I just can't help myself. The wolf issue in Idaho is a real shitsandwich. Upon the wolf being de-listed Idaho, Wyoming and I believe Montana as well now have full control over their respective wolf populations. This is relatively good news but assuredly won't last long. Here are a couple money quotes from a CBS News article...

"Gov. C.L. "Butch" Otter told The Associated Press that he wants hunters to kill about 550 gray wolves. That would leave about 100 wolves, or 10 packs, according to a population estimate by state wildlife officials."

and from the Govna' himself...

"I'm prepared to bid for that first ticket to shoot a wolf myself," Otter said earlier Thursday during a rally of about 300 hunters."

I would also like a share a brief excerpt from a related article put out by a local news source in Idaho (the "He" in question is the head of the Anti-Wolf Coalition)

"He says it is ruining the ecosystem, and kills wild animals and livestock not just for food, but for sport."

So, apparently, Wolves have sports! I am sure the large number of wild animals and livestock being killed were just a side effect of this years wolf olympics. I guess they hold them on the years with the most dipshits talking about wolves in the news.

Breaking the Hex(es)

I got lucky this Monday. The first summer steelhead was hooked, landed and harvested on March, 31 this year which puts me about 2 months ahead of last years mark. Apparently, according to a friend, I was "double hexed" (trout fishing = 1 hex, nymphing = 1 hex) but still managed to catch the damn thing. The steelhead juju is on my side, hopefully to stay but I know better, so I will take it while I can. This 29" hatchery hen took a sz 8 possebugger on 4x on the business end of a floating DT6 on a 5 wt rod, definitely the lightest gear I've landed a steelhead on. She cut deep, dark orange and ate like some exquisite french dish I don't even know the name of. Her eggs were minute, about a cup of volume total, and her stomach loaded with small nymphs. She was one of only about 500 fish over Willamette falls, which if you think about it, is akin to a needle in a haystack. There are hundreds of river miles (combining all the possible tribs and the willy itself) that those 500 fish could be in, so I suppose to say I was lucky to find her would be a gross understatement, really fucking lucky would be a little closer to the truth. Anyways...porn time!

Where's Waldo?

Blood in the water = food on the table

The boat's name, forever appropriate (we hope)

You guys need to buy more bandwidths

Technical problems at buster tonight, I'm sure it has nothing to do with the overgrowth of You Tubery? Dudes, really, less you tube or more bandwidth!!! I want to see more of banknote's fish porn. Thanks.

Boatin' it

Had the boat on it's first camping trip (with me, sort of) this weekend. Kari hooked her first winter on the swung fly, a most serious accomplishment, with the fishkiller striking again...or the fishkiller getting striked again? The fishkiller is a fly I will have to tell you about later...I digress, again. Anyways, it was a badass weekend on some badass water. I rowed a couple nice drops but not the one in the photo, it looks so quaint in 2 dimensions. The drop pictured was a chew you up and spit you out piece of water that had the potential for serious punishment if the oars were not stroked just right. Given my greenhorness on the sticks, I figured the easy wade down the river right side was a much more life friendly option. Additionally, my dumbass hung us on a rock on some relatively simple looking shit later in the day, if it wasn't for Kari's quick witedness and weight shift we may well have lost a lot of shit...or maybe more. I haven't been as scared in a long time as I was when I felt that tube hang up, needless to say I have a serious newfound respect for the power of water.

In related news, towards the end of the day yesterday I was stripping in my shooting line rather fast and lifted the rod to set my anchor for the double spey, when the fly left the water a fish sharked the shit out of it, but missed, the whole back was out of the water dorsal, tail and all. The fucker would not come back, but it was certainly a moment of awesomeness.

Verpa beotchica

Damn the man who invented morels that aren't really morels. Thought I found a truly early bird but nature got my goat.

The West End

We left the Willamette valley on Friday afternoon after an uncountable number of phone calls were placed, primarily dealing with the acquisition of dry wood, brats and PBR. We made the 205-I5 junction north of Vancouver in under 2 hours, the steelhead gods clearly on our side. And when we finally got through Aberdeen and made the turn north on 101 the rain stopped and we thought the unbelievable may be true, that we could put up the tents without them becoming just another sponge for March rains on the olympic peninsula. When we arrived in camp, it was moonlit and the fourth of our party already had the living area tarp up and secured. It was at this point that I realized things were going too well, and I mentally prepared for three days of three good rods on the water with no chrome to show for it. Steve, the fourth member in question, sombered out of the truck after four hours of front seat sleep and gave us the run down. The river had been dropping into shape since he arrived on Wednesday, was clearing up and looked good. He fished the big water for a day and a half and put one full day in on some smaller, clearer water about twenty minutes north, and did it all without even a grab.

The next morning camp water was on my immediate agenda. We fished it hard all morning, talked to a couple boats that had caught fish and then moved upriver for the afternoon. We saw one big trout and one possible steelhead but touched nothing. Sunday started out the same, more camp water in the morning and then we headed to a smaller river for the afternoon fish. Here we found some good, relatively untouched water but it was crystal clear and I was only packing the big gaudy shit, so it felt wrong and the steelhead confirmed.

Back in camp Sunday night we were down to three, the five days of grablessness finally finishing off Steve. We were supposed to leave at 2 Monday, but in camp on Sunday night we decided to leave that decision up in the air. We abandoned the camp water Monday morning and got on a new program, which was flies in the water all day, only in the prime shit, even if it means going through it two or three times. We had found two superb pieces of water in the previous days and stuck with them. Starting off one run in the morning and moving to the next around noon. When we got to the car for the move, the decision was made to send our obligations to hell and fish until dark. This paid off. When we got to the second piece of water it was a little after noon. By 1:30 it was too late to go back on our decision to stay. Right at this moment John had a momentary hook-up and our decision to stay was confirmed. We each worked throught the run once more and felt nothing.

We left to breakdown camp and had about 2 hours to fish. We all agreed on one piece of water, not where John felt the fish but a bigger, even juicier run. I went through the gut first and by the time I got to the end I was sure that we were going home fishless. I barely had the mental energy to reel up and wade to shore, I was defeated. I had a sit on the bank and watched Nate and John fish for a bit and realized that I was fulfilling my prophecy of fishlessness.

The top of the run is narrow, with only about ten feet of soft inside seam that is fishable. I was looking at it with distaste, but knew fishing there gave me a hell of a lot better chance at a hook-up then sitting on the gravel. I started fishing it with little motivation, but quickly fell into a rhythm. I kept glancing at the far side, there was a sharp seam and a couple good sweepers and logjams within a few feet of the seam. It was going to be really ugly to fish it, make a 60-70 foot cast, heave a mend to put the head on the far side of the main current and feed a shitload of line. As luck would have it, I had popped a guide off of my 13' 7/8 St. Criox avid the day before, leaving my whooping stick out of commision. Nate had brought a backup though, a 9149 Burkheimer, by far the biggest rod I have fished with, but a perfect rod to have in hand when attempting to fish previously described seam. So I heaved that shit over there and made a big mend, the feeding line was ripped out by the main current but I was still able to get about 4 seconds of good broadside "swing" at the very end of it all. On my fourth or fifth cast working the seam the last 20 feet of shooting line that I was feeding had a loop knotted into it. I always stop the swing and pull the knot out, but for some reason this time I didn't, I said "fuck it", and watched the loop rip through the guides and out the end of the rod. The loop got about ten feet out of the rod and stopped as there was no more line to feed. The line came tight and I felt it, a soft tug. I thought, no fucking way, then dropped the rod and turned it slightly towards the bank, and the fish was there. We never actually got this fish in hand, but we all got a good look at it and it's big floppy adipose before the hook popped out next to the bank. I took my seat on the bank and let it all sink in, somewhere in the background I heard John say "Well, what should we do?", without hesitation Nate answered "Keep fishing." About twenty minutes later I was awaken from my daze by a hoot downstream. I looked downstream, John's rod was corked and right then I saw a silver bullet launch out of the water. Another nice native, this one landed, a buck of around 10 pounds that took in the soft stuff on the inside in about 3 feet of water. Nate hauled ass back upstream and continued to fish. John and I were sitting behind him on the bank letting the memories of those fish sear deeply into our minds. We were both watching Nate's rod when it bounced two or three times after coming tight to the swing. He swept the rod toward the bank and nothing was there. After running the fly through a couple times, I yelled over the water "Nate, did you check the hook?", as the fly he was fishing had a little sz 6 trailing egg hook. When he got the fly in his hand I watched his head drop and knew the hook had fouled around the front of the fly. A tragedy indeed. He fished out the next twenty minutes and ended up empty handed.

On the walk back to the car John said something to the effect of "Yeah, man, but you touched a fish. I was just as happy getting that grab earlier as I was to catch that fish!" Nate responds "Easy for you to say." I think that this exchange sums up steelheading well. You have to be happy about touching a fish, but at the same time, when you put in nearly 30 hours of fishing in three days, don't touch a fish until the end and that fish doesn't stick because of a fouled hook, it rocks you to your steelheading core. There is no avoiding it.

I've tried to resist....but

I wanted to stick with cool shit like steelhead and tasty shroomage on this blog, but I can no longer resist the temptation.

This shit is hot off the press.

The headline from the AP:

Tainted drinking water kept under wraps
Many researchers fear public would misunderstand, overreact to disclosure

When water providers find pharmaceuticals in drinking water, they rarely tell the public. When researchers make the same discoveries, they usually don’t identify the cities involved.
There are plenty of reasons offered for the secrecy: concerns about national security, fears of panic, a feeling that the public will not understand — even confidentiality agreements.

“That’s a really sensitive subject,” said Elaine Archibald, executive director of California Urban Water Agencies, an 11-member organization comprised of the largest water providers in California.

She said many customers “don’t know how to interpret the information. They hear something has been detected in source water and drinking water, and that’s cause for alarm — just because it’s there.”

As The Associated Press documented in a five-month investigation, drinking water provided to at least 41 million people living in 24 major metropolitan areas has tested positive for trace amounts of pharmaceuticals.

All that I can say is THANK YOU WATER TESTING PEOPLE! You have really saved me a lot of heartache and stress by not telling me there are detectable levels of pharmaceuticals in my drinking water. I probably wouldn't have known "how to interpret the information" had you told me sooner. I might have even thought it was "cause for alarm"! My word, that would have been a real tragedy. But now I know for sure, since you didn't just come out and say it, that it must be completely safe. It's a good thing too, cause if it wasn't safe those big multi-billion dollar pharmy companies might have tried to cover it up. Its good that you didn't make them do that...errrrr? Wait, you didn't take money from the drug companies to keep this quiet, did you? No, you mustn't have, cause it's safe, right? It's probably really good for fish and other aquatic life too, they probably never get sick cause they are all being treated for everything already! What a great plan. Maybe we should put more drugs in the water, then people won't ever get cancer or disease of any kind, and if you just threw in a little amphetamine and THC it would take care of the illegal drug problem, just like that! All you would have to do is get a glass of water!

Thanks again water testers, for knowing what is best for me. DOUCHEBAGS!

Photo Re-cap

Well, I always say I am going to put up pictures but never do. Here is a little bonus porn from the past two months. The first pic and the obvious one taken on gear, the rest on the swung fly! I tripled the number of winters I've caught on the swung fly in just two months (I had two total for the last two winters)...all I notice that is much different is that I purposely cast like shit and feed lotsa line to get REAL! deep.

Also, a bonus pic from last year at the end, cause it's pretty much that time again.

I told ya so....

So I am doing a little reading tonight on the Native Fish Society web page. I was scrolling through a document detailing exactly how bad hatchery fish suck at being fish, and how much there fucking up the lives of real fish everywhere. Then I found the gem I have been looking for.....

Marchetti, Michael, P. and Gabrielle A. Nevitt. 2003. Effects of hatchery rearing on brain structure of rainbow trout. Environmental Biology of Fishes 66: 9-14.

"We find…that the brains of hatchery reared fish are relatively smaller in several critical measures than their wild counterparts. Our work may suggest a mechanistic basis for the observed vulnerability of hatchery fish to predation and their general low survival upon release into the wild. Our results are the first to highlight the effects of hatchery rearing on changes in brain development in fishes."

Well fuck a duck. Hey Kevin, remember that hatchery fish you caught with a wood chip in it's stomach? If I were a steelhead I would definitely want the wood biter to be my mommy.

To sum, let this serve as a reminder, if not an order given by nature, to Kill Hatchery Steelhead.

Check out the rest of the document here:

http://www.nativefishsociety.org/documents/HATCHERIESWILDSALMONRECOVERY.pdf

Unforcing it -or- reinforcing it

All is right with the world again. After two full days with 4 good rods plying the water (including more than a few drifts with a bobber and jig), saturday afternoon bent over and gave it up. We were supposed to be pulling the boats out right about the time I stepped into one of the best runs in the stretch. I was following through, but grabs were had on the first pass, so the confidence was flowing. I stepped into the head of the run and made my first cast with about 10 feet of skagit head still in the rod. I was fishing a heavy tip and a plastic tube fly, so a small pullback mend was key to get some sink. I made one of those and the instant the line came tight (maybe 2 seconds) I was ticking the bottom, but this didn't really make any sense with the plastic tube and all so I thought I must of started too high in the run and it was really shallow. Then the fish took the fuck off. My drag was loose since I don't carry a loop and on her first run she made quite the tidy nest of shooting line coming out of my reel. Luckily all the backlash came out clean on her second run. She did a little ass shake dance on the surface a few times and all in all put up a good tug, had me thinking she was wild. But it was a dirty little hatchery girl, chrome as hell and cut like complete ass, day old ass even. She did give up a lotta eggs, which now will be catching springers in a couple months instead of polluting the gene pool with garbage, hoo rah bitches.

As an aside, this was the most fucked up winter fish I have witnessed. The fly could not have been more than a foot and a half down, probably closer to a foot, and the line was almost perfectly perpendicular to the flow and the fish fucking schmeared that thing...I will also happily admit that it was one of the ugliest flies I have ever fished for steelhead, but it did look pretty good in the water.

if the any of the photos are decent i'll put em up tonight. until then, GO FISHING, fools.

Forcing it

So, I have been pretty sleepy around here lately. I am attributing most of this to life. As in, I have been too busy with life to post. By "busy" I certainly don't mean busy!, in fact the meaning is much closer to lazy than busy. But busy sounds better than lazy so I will stick with it. The fishing in fly department has been damned slow of late, high and cold water is a cocktail suited to the dirty mcdirts of the world and I spent too much time drinking that drink early in the winter. Two weekends in a row now I have tried to force it with the fly and while its great to be out (especially in little coastal old growth valleys), its a bit of a bitch to make things happen that don't want to. But things are warming and wanting to change for the better so I got that going for me, which is nice. Nonetheless its gettin kinda bad. I measure my distaste for the steelheading conditions in desire to fish trout, and I am really close to making some plans on that front...this is a fucking tragedy for mid February. I am not supposed to think about trout until at least April 1st, and then its really easy to just pretend its a joke. But now? I must be sick.

Soon enough the shit is gonna line up and get real good and I plan on being there for it. Til then, busy it will be.

Hooky

I left work yesterday at 11:45. See, N^2 came over two nights ago and lived up to his reputation by making sure to tell me how he was going to fish the following day (yesterday), when he knows damn well I have to work...he is really good at this. Anyways, when I got to work yesterday I got this feeling that I wasn't supposed to be there. So, I called the N^2 and he was damned kind enough to get my gear together (payback for all the times he rubbed all the midweek fishing in my face). Leaving work early to fish when you left home thinking you were gonna work all day is like walking into a high class strip club when you were expecting a low class gay bar (you know like bikers and leather low-class) and you don't realize it until the last second. Fucking excellent. A fine day was had by all and the fine-ness was thoroughly in place prior to landing two steelhead on the swung fly between three guys in just over 3 hours of fishing, that shit was a bonus.

Ode to the Beatdown

I am sure all of you that have found your way here have also found your way there, but just in case you haven't, go now for it is closing time at the Beatdown. It's too bad that it must shutdown, but it's quite fitting really as it echoes reality and only makes sense. I mean, seriously, how much can one voluntarily beat oneself down before one must stop? Likewise, with all things, you gotta change it up sometimes. As much as I love to swing flies for winter steelhead, there has got to be something dynamic about it from my end (I know the river and the fish are constantly changing), I need to be changing too. Whether I change technique, location or my gear all together, somethings got to give. I would go fucking crazy if all I did was swing the same flies on the same stretch of river, with the same rod, line and tips, week in and week out, year in and year out. I can think of a lot of flies and a lot of rivers, so I am sure I can stay busy for awhile, but like I said somethings gotta give. For example, this year I am not nymphing, not because I think its not fly fishing or some other bullshit reason like that, but because the sight of the yarndicator makes my arm hurt and gives me immediate stress, remembering all those times I looked at a greasy seam on the farside knowing damned well that the monstrous fucking yarn gob on my leader would only allow me to get halway there at best and halfway only if I rollcasted my shoulder out of socket, on my tiptoes no less. So, fuck the nymphing. Instead, I fish gear or swing when fishing for hatchery rats and swing when targeting natives and its turned out very well so far, my best of three winters by leaps and bounds already and its just underway. I guess the point is, the beatdown is calling it quits and its sad and happy all at once. It couldn't go on forever and it was damned good while it lasted, with no shortage of insight, humor and stupidiforia...along with some words about the damned greasy fishing we have out here in the PNW. Props and thanks to you bacon, it was most thoroughly enjoyed!

The Beatdown will remain linked on this page, I will also add a link to Buster, where we will hopefully be able to find the continued ramblings of the bacon_to_fry.

will hoist a few tonight in rememberance

It's about time

Well, as I hinted at in an earlier post I was sort of waiting for something profound to happen before I started writing about Belize...the permit in particular. That something isn't happening and I am not exactly sure why I expected it to in the first place, wishful thinking I guess. Conveniently, I just wrote an email to a friend who has been asking for a story and pictures of the fish, I will take advantage and paste it in here. enjoy.



This is right after I hooked the fish, at this point the guide was screaming "GOT HIM!! GOT HIM!! GOT HIM!!" (sounding like got eem got eem etc.), clapping his hands and running down the flat trying to cut the permit off from the left side of the flat and push him over to the right where there is less coral, he was not fast enough.


At this point I had just ran to the edge of the flat and in chest deep water with no where to go I jumped up on a coral head and backed all the pressure off the fish so he wouldn't wrap me around the coral per the guides instructions. I was very doubtful when he first started yelling at me to give him slack. I couldn't figure out after 20 or 30 some shots at fish and finally hooking one why I would ever want to "give him slack", but I obliged...well partly obliged, I didn't really ever give him slack until the guide started speeding away from the flat in the boat once I jumped in, he went about twice as fast as I could recover line and I had zero tension on the fish for about 10 seconds or so, this was undoubtedly the longest 10 seconds of my life, except maybe for that time I crashed my car...ahhh I digress.

Here the fish is directly below the boat, at one point my backing was up to my stripping guide with the fish straight down, it was deep and I was apparently extremely lucky I didn't lose the fish to a shark or a 'cuda.
Victory. Notice the sweet battle wound on my left shin. I acquired this little gem while getting on top of the coral. I am not exactly sure how I got up there out of chest deep water, I thought I levitated but the wound clearly proves otherwise.

PERMIT.....ME

In addition, I am not one for gratuitous promotion, self or otherwise. Pick your own poison, I usually stick to. Nonetheless, if you ever find yourself in Placencia and looking for a guide I would quite highly suggest Benji Eiley. I don't think it is possible to find a guide who will work harder to get you into a fish.

Make your own stuff

I just got done building sink tips for the first time. The last two years I have been fishing three tips, a type 3, 7 and 8 and thats it. Usually this will suffice, but when the water is up it is going to be damn nice to have some t14 tips in the wallet. I even got grimy and built some with intermediate cheaters. What really initiated the event was the acquisition of a new stick. Neighbor Nate (from now on N^2) built Kari and I a sweet St. Croix Avid 7/8 (really probably a 7), a real spicy rod. As soon as we figure out the right line for it, Kari and I will finally be able to fish two handers together and not fight over one rod, this should decrease rock throwing and splashing each other when posturing for the rod.

On an unrelated (mostly) note, I dirty mcdirted a hatchery rat on saturday. I had never fished corkies and yarn and since the water was high, there were dudes everywhere, it was cold, and we only had a couple hours to fish (read: I am turning into a lazy hick), I figured I would try to put some meat on the table with the gear. When we walked up to the run Kari said, "Alright, we are going to get one here.", very matter of fact like. About 15 minutes later the fish was on the bank. Tasty tablefare, indeed.

Comatose, but walking still

The holidays are shitty, in that you miss out on fishing. But they are good, in that you get to fish more. This paradox has shown itself through recent circumstances. Now, I must say, I use the term "holidays" here rather loosely. It doesn't necessarily mean Christmas or Kwanza or Thanksgiving (it could though), but more precisely means a cause for celebration. So my friends want to celebrate, but I unfortunately am stricken with this condition that requires me to drink just enough to not fish the next day when friends want to celebrate, now I don't get plastered, but drunk enough that I shouldn't be driving until at least 8 or 9 the next morning and also drunk enough so that I will probably sleep til 10 anyways. This is a shitty condition for a fishermanperson. On the other hand, if I can somehow manage to avoid anymore of these celebratory affairs, I have two consecutive four day weekends coming up (thanks to the "holidays") that could very well fill themselves right up with fishing. However, to avoid the celebrations means to alienate ones friends, quite the conundrum really. I have been partially contemplating not having friends except for fishing friends, though this would rapidly wittle my total number of friends down to about 2 (another condition I have is not wanting to fish with a solid 98.7% of the fishermanpeople I meet). I can't decide if this is good or bad.

Anyways, I guess the point is I got too drunk on friday and saturday last weekend to fish (I feel like I should maybe whip myself for saying "too drunk to fish", it somehow goes against previous statements I have made, I just can't figure out how). So maybe the real point is that this has nothing to do with friends or celebrations or holidays, but solely with my own ability to balance activities, although it feels really 90's to blame myself for my problems, this is the 2000's, I should assuredly be blaming this on the government or more aptly on someone else's government. So there you have it, I think I will retract blaming the "holidays" and instead blame the government of South Africa (or wherever the Miller brewing company moved to). See, I think the kegs of shitty Miller would have been cheaper than the PBR if they hadn't relocated, thus the party would have had a keg of shitty beer instead of the sweet PBR nectar and therefore I wouldn't have drank so much and I could have fished. This seems perfectly reasonable to me.

Side bar: Brothers, sorry we can't make it back for the "holidays", have fun and do some fishing (target species unimportant) cause we will be for sure!

Side bar 2: I swear the permit story is coming. I have a lot to say about it, but haven't really felt like typing it all yet, maybe I will just type a little and let the pics talk more...time will tell I guess.

Side bar 3: Nate sucks. He hooked two winters on the swung fly yesterday and locations fully disclosed (to me, bitches!), if my skills ever make it to such a level you can't count on much more pertinent posting!

For those of you that get them, enjoy the long weekends!

On second thought

So, I no longer blame the cat. I am pretty damned sure it was a coon, due to the scratch marks themselves and a piece of hair. When a cat scratches shit it does it like its on speed or something, taking several passes at the scratching surface with both paws. This didn't look like that, it was about five or six total scratch marks, and they line up perfectly if one were to imagine a big fat coon trying to climb up the tube, slipping a little, and digging in such that one or two claws from each paw scratched the tube. I asked myself what the hell a coon would want to climb up on my boat for, then remembered it was right around the time of the whole salmon, gear, dirty mcdirt, egg goo escapade. I think that fucker smelled the egg goo and wanted a go at it....I also found a piece of hair, suspiciously gray turning to brown with a black bar near the top and a lighter brown on the other side of that. The boat has now paid me back in all possible ways, inflicting pain upon itself even. Point taken, again...and until further notice there shall never be bait in or around that boat again.

Most pertinent Harry quote: "Let's blame the racoons." - this was said right after I told him about the boat, damned guy is like the Nostradamus of the Carribean.

Cat Scratch Fever

So as most of you know I recently acquired a new used skookum cat from my good friend bacon. I have only had er out one time, which, again, most of you know about. Well she was sittin there in my carport, lookin real good, when one day I squeezed her right tube and it was a little low. "Hmm" I say, a bit flustered, "what the fuck?", I see the cat scratches and get a fever that no amount of cow bells could touch. It was a sad day on the homefront, but only about two days before I left for Belize so I had to forget about, it was a potential trip downer which needed to be put out of mind. A day or two before we came back, I let it start creeping in the back of mind, to sort of prepare for remembering and reliving the sadness. It wasn't as bad the second time around. Anyways, when I pumped it back up yesterday and lathered some soap on the firm tube, I saw no bubbles, smiled and applied aquaseal hoping to avoid a full on patch job. We went bowling (kingpin right here bitches), came back and and the fucker had leaked. I let some air out and tried one more fresh dab of aquaseal but it leaked again. I tried one more time with the aquaseal on a flat tube tonight, I have a penchant for trying things half ass at least 5-10 times before I do it right, I can't seem to shake this. If this attempt doesn't work the patch will be on by tomorrow night, the boat must float with confidence by the weekend.

Oh and E, the permit story (you know the most of it) will arrive on its own time, much like the permit itself.

Boner

As posted earlier, for the first week of the honeymoon we stayed on Ambergris Caye, at a place called Xaman Ek retreat and spa. They were kinda blowholes, just starting out in the "retreat and spa" business and in need of a little direction. Location was fuckin money though...especially since there were bones tailing about 100 feet from my cabana. The first one I caught (the only one I got pictures of...the smallest one, for real!) was about 40 feet from the "retreat and spa's" pier. I caught four total, but it took me about 4 mornings and 3 evenings to do it...I had a lotta shots. The biggest one a local ate for dinner. He was walking down the beach with a backpack pesticide applicator on, always GREAT to see, and he said "is it a good one?" and that he wanted to eat it, hope it was good.



I don't really know when this happened, but all I did after landing the fish was put it in the hook rest, so I am pretty sure I hooked and landed him with the hook like this. Fuckin genious I tell you.

Hot Damn

Fuck eh. Is it possible to make a vacation "long enough"? Cause that one felt long, but it certainly was not even in the realm of "long enough". I need to manipulate some photos so that they are more comfortable on the page and then I'll start putting them up here. There is a couple good ones, permity little pictures even.

Harry Quote #1 - "The higher the monkey climb, the more he expose his ass to trouble."

A Lesson Learned

So I wanted to tie some crabs in a little lighter color, maybe tan or cream olive. The only fly shop within a half hour has no light sculpin wool, so a friend suggested I try bleach. So I put a half capfull in a cup or so of water and let a little chunk of sculpin wool soak for about an hour. The result was a bleached dark olive, not acceptable. I think, "more bleach, more time". Or maybe not.


The fibers on the little piece used to be as long as on the big piece. Bleach changed all that. And it was just liquid remaining. Don't fuck with bleach.

Righteous Writing: Part 1

As mentioned at the onset of this madness, my writing sucks hairy balls. Thats why it is a damned good thing there are people like Salty, who's writing does certainly not suck hairy balls, in fact reminds me more of scratching a good itch on my own balls...you know that feeling of fulfillment and relief right when you finally hit that itch thats been buried under two layers of capilene, one of fleece and a stout layer of gortex for 13 hours? Well if you don't know it, you should, cause gotdamner its good.

READ IT!

http://busterwantstofish.com/?p=250

Oregon, fuck yeah!

we're gonna save the motherfuckin day,

yeah.

K - the package goes out tomorrow....don't worry E, you may have to wait a month or two, but you too will get a special surprise.

Honeymooning it

T-minus 8 days til departure. Two weeks in Belize, we'll be there over Thanksgiving, but something tells me I won't be missing the turkey. For the first week we will be on Ambergris Caye. It looks pretty frilly but........you can supposedly catch bones right off the dock.
We will be in Placencia for the second part of the stay....more to come before departure next Friday.

A Boats Revenge

Alright, I was trying to figure out how exactly to address this with positivity and joy. This shouldn't have been hard, being that it was a joyous and positive occasion, however I now understand that occasions can be both good and bad, all at once.

The first time out in the new ride took me to a local coastal river relatively full of fall chinook, and even more full per unit volume of water given the lack of rain. We launched at about 9 not being in any rush as we were the only boat on the stretch...the new boat goes places others do not. What I failed to realize is that when there is no water, the bankies can also go just about anywhere. To sum, the float was fucking unbelievably fun and the boat a true master of the waterways.....the fishing, another story.

Which leads me to the following conclusion:

NEVER, I repeat, NEVER, take a boat called "Steelheader" out salmon fishing with dirty gear rods, eggs and fucking shrimp oil scent for your first time together. She deserves more on the first outing and needs to be broken in proper.

If you do attempt such a feat, be prepared for the ramifications....some examples may include:

1) you buy a new gear rod combo, string that dirty thing up, give her a flex in the carport (right over the boat!) and the fuckin thing snaps in half...the day before said outing occured. Boat 1, Me 0

2) you get set up on the prime shit that the dude who knows told you to fish, you work that greasy ass egg gob right over the drop off and no sooner three bankies come in, totally fuckin lowhole you and hook approx. 25 salmon about 20 yards below you while you hook one between two of you in about 3 hours. Boat 26, Me -1

3) you get set up in a little juicy hole in the midst of some shitty water for fish to travel in, and you think, "yeah, finally this is it". and then another banky lowholes you...you leave before you are forced to watch him catch the fish that you will not. Boat 27, Me -1

4) as the day winds down, you think, "jesus, i am in a boat, with gear, fish are everywhere and i have not touched a fish, nor is there one in the boat...its gotta happen in the next pool". so you push and push to find water and next thing you know you've skipped your original take out and your still not to the next one when it starts getting dark...not at 7, like you thought but at about 620. The next thought..."fuck, the dark is not going to make me look like a more inviting hitchhiker". Boat - still kicking my ass

5) finally to take out #2, you grab a rod to make it obvious to the drivers that your a fisherman and not a rapist, and begin to walk down the road. when you've walked for 10 minutes and no cars have gone by, you think about your wife back at the take-out and start running - in simms g3's and studded rivertek boots (not recommended). 10 minutes later, your still running and you hear a car coming...SAVED! NOT!...you watch the cars go by and not pick you up and you think "fuck" as thats about all you can muster. then, up ahead, after about 2 miles of walk/running, you see a few cars on the side of the road...other fisherman! you beg for a ride, they agree. then you retire to watching them haul all the fucking huge ass fish they caught up to the trucks. the one that said you could have a ride has dissapeared so you beg another who is about to leave. there is barely any room to sit in the bed of the truck as it is filled with fish and the driver looks like he doesn't want you to sit back there and he says "not much room back there, and i got two rifles in the back seat so you won't fit there either". you are not scared by his stupid fucking rifles and re-insist that you can fit between the empty pop cans and the fish and that you will "just jump out" when you get to your rig. finally, the boat decides it is done paying you back for all the fucking goopy salmon egg cure you spilled on it and you get back to your rig with no further problems. final score, Boat - 9,867,401 Me - back to 0 for not taking that rifle bullshit.

Consider yourselves warned.