Goodbye Spokane...

Goodbye Spokane.

It's been an weird interesting past year and a half in this town, and I sure as heck won't miss the snow, crappy roads, plethora of tweakers, nor will I miss the under-abundant cultural offerings.

I will, however, miss the good fishing friends, awesome co-workers, the Spokane River, and the fact that I lived in a jumping off point to famous/wonderful fly fishing waters within just a few hours.

Since the next day plus will revolve around finishing packing and loading a moving truck, I decided to get some final urban river time in with good friends and my Dad who is in town.

First up, was a Monday walk and wade on the Spokane with Wayne, the Trout Jedi. I cherish every opportunity that I get to fish with Wayne because I try to observe the way he inspects water, fishes it, and how he truly loves and respects the resource. If I was told to choose one fly fisherman who I look up to the most, I'd answer Wayne without a doubt.

Anyways, Wayne and I did some hiking, missed a few fish, fell in the river minutes apart from each other, and then proceeded to hook into, and land, some sweet Redbands. Urban gold as I like to call 'em.

A Redband in the net with my Prince nymph still attached. 

Wayne with some morning gold on the Spokane River.

After Wayne left for work, I returned home to prep for the move and plan the evening's float with my buddy Blake.

Blake had a raft on loan and we decided to put it to use on the Spokane. We launched mid day, and within 10 minutes on the water I had quickly hooked and lost two fish. The strikes were short and I was far from surprised considering recent reports from this stretch of water. Slow fishing, soft strikes, and warm temps were the reports from friends floating the river...

Sure enough, my luck changed. I hooked into a PIG. It flashed hard and turned right into the current. A good 20 seconds of fight were for naught though as it came loose. I landed a scrappy Whitefish in the same run minutes later but Blake and I talked about the lost fish the rest of the float.

After another nearly fruitless river mile, we beached the boat and began to fish the bank. Bingo. Double. I landed a healthy Redband and Blake netted a fat Whitefish.

Blurry shot, but a nice Spokane River Redband. 

Back to the raft, I switched spots with Blake and took the sticks. Disclaimer, I had only once before rowed a raft and I was TERRIBLE at it. For the first 100 yards or so, I felt that a repeat of my previous rafting experience was occurring, but something miraculous happened. I figured it out. That's right, I took the sticks for most of the rest of the float, skirted by some nasty water, got Blake into fish (I got a few more myself...) and developed some sweet blisters on my palms. The best part of it was the fact that I now feel comfortable running a raft and can be of some use to my float fishing friends besides the obvious gas money contributions.

The evening was a success and I had a great time fishing with a good friend. But onto my last Spokane River experience of the year...

My Dad came into town this morning and I had a few surprises for him. First off was a shiny new fly rod... nothing fancy now, but still a good, fishy piece of graphite. Second off, was that I was going to work with him on his casting and get him on the water.

After a nice lawn cast with the Old Man, I got him out on the Spokane. In the first run, I managed to hook (and land!) a feisty, and very nice Redband. Dad was a bit new to the throwing junk game (double nymph rigs on big water are not the easiest things to manage as a new angler) but he managed to up his game throughout the day.

Showing the Old Man how it's done in Spokane. 

We fished hard in several spots, but being that it was mid-day, I wasn't expecting much. Our last spot of the day yielded another gorgeous Redband to my rod, and another fish that when hooked went aerial and came unhooked.

Sweet fish coming unhooked? On my rod? On the Spokane? No way?!?!? I see a pattern developing...

Needless to say, it was a great experience taking my Dad out to water that has meant so much to me over the past year, and showing him how to fish it, and why the Redbands that I rave about are so special.

When I landed the first fish and showed it to him, he remarked at how it was such a beautiful trout... yeah Dad, rub it in. Those trout are now going to six hours away from me.

On to new waters, and new adventures.

Thanks Spokane. You've actually been pretty great.

Cutthroat, Dry Flies, and Bats...

I'm moving away from Spokane soon. The end of August to be exact. It will be bittersweet... I'll miss the Spokane River, my fishing companions, co-workers, and the proximity to Montana. I won't miss the crazy tweaked out meth addicts, the terrible roads and drivers, nor will I miss the awful economy. I guess I'll miss the fishing most of all though...

That lead me to this week's short fishing trip, originally planned for a two-day trip on the St. Joe River in North Idaho. The Joe is a tributary to Lake Coeur d'Alene and is renowned for its Westslope Cutthroat fishing. I hadn't been on the Joe since last September and sunny skies greeted my fishing partner and I when we arrived on the river this past Wednesday.

This 18" Cutt fell for a Stonefly Nymph. Caught by Dustin Bise. 

The intense heat and cloudless day was not great for hatches (sparse PMDs, Golden Stones, and Caddis) but fish were still active. Combining nymphing slots and buckets and throwing attractor dries, we quickly got into fish. In fact, our first fish of the day was actually one of two on the same cast. Yes, my first one-man double... a 16" Cutt on the stonefly and a 6" Cutt on the Prince dropper. The day was looking solid until an incident on the next hole.

Two Fish = Win! 

While I was hiking down a trail to a boulder that created a huge eddy, I reached forward to brace myself (going downhill) on an old tree stump. I looked at the stump before I reached for it, and saw nothing unusual. As soon as my hand touched the top of the stump (and my fingers reached over the edge of it) I felt a sharp prick and heard an odd screeching noise. A small creature of some sort fell to the ground and started crawling around while I quickly jumped down to the river bank, scared to death. I looked at my finger and saw two small puncture wounds (practically superficial) and looked on the trail to see a small bat (silver haired bat) hissing/screeching at me.

Now, I was scared, didn't know what to do, and in hindsight I should've captured and killed the little bastard, but instead I went to the river, got out my soap and began washing the wound out continually. We continued to fish for the rest of the evening and set up camp that night. I figured/thought that rabies took some time to set in and the bite looked mild enough that I'd be fine if I waited till the following day to trek back to Spokane.

We fished through the night, netting 20 fish between the two of us, mostly Cutthroat with a few Whitefish thrown in for varieties sakes. The following morning, we fished for a few hours working fish on dries and nymphs in the nicer buckets on the river. Even a big pool produced fish for us, which was shocking considering how much pressure these fish had seen recently.

Great Cutthroat from the "Bat Hole."

It turned out to be a near 40 fish trip for us, which is phenomenal considering the chatter from most anglers on the river was that fishing was terribly slow.

Nice Cutthroat following release.

Wrapping up early, we drove back to Spokane where I went immediately to the hospital. It was determined that I needed to get a Post-Exposure Rabies treatment (series of 5 shots, plus an EXTREMELY expensive anti-body shot to start off with)... the bummer is that insurance will barely cover any of it (read none... just adjustments... they say it's not a preventative thing but rather an injection) and the average bill for people bitten by bats who need the treatment is $10,000. No joke. In fact, that first day I had 11 shots at the Hospital including 6 of the anti-body into my fingertip... painful freaking stuff.

So a trip that went from being a cheap, camping overnight for Cutties, turned into the most expensive and frustrating ordeal of my life (wait... maybe college takes that title).

I won't be posting too many fishing reports in the near future as medical appointments, work, and packing for our move will occupy most of our time. I do have a float planned for next week on the Spokane and will have a full run-down on that.

So next time you're out fishing/hiking/exploring in North Idaho, be aware of bats and stay the #%#@ away from them. They do have an important role in our ecosystem but they sure can be expensive and possibly deadly.