Lake Crescent

My year one anniversary of really learning to flyfish is this month. I still need to reflect on and write about that. It's been an amazing year learning to cast, read water, scout new locations, study fish, etc.

My last two adventures have not been very productive, however. I fished the Cedar River last weekend. I managed to slip away Saturday late afternoon. Water levels were low but it appeared to me that they were releasing water from the dam because the flow was a little more pushy than I had remembered. 

I used an Elk Hair Caddis and caught little 10-inch rainbows. Beautiful, feisty little fish.  As I waded downstream hoping to catch a feeding frenzy or at least a nice sized, my line got caught in a large tree stump that jammed into the middle of the stream. Rather than lose my fly, I waded out to dislodge the little bugger. Slippery rocks and pushy water caused me to force it more than I normally would. I pulled the line and heard a snap.

Snap!

The third segment of my wonderful Trout Unlimited 5-wt Winston rod snapped. It's the first time I've broken any equipment in this first intensive year of flyfishing. I wasn't upset but was disappointed that I didn't simply close the fly. I am now in touch with the Winston rod manufacturers. I will need to ship the whole rod back so they can customize the replacement. Because the rod is registered it should cost just about $50 plus shipping and handling.

On a happier note, I chaperoned my daughter's 7th grade school trip to Lake Crescent, nestled in the Olympic National Park. Below is a photo I took the first evening looking West.

 

 

I was excited for the experience with my daughter and her classmates, but I was also excited to learn that there is a rare sub-species of rainbow trout in Lake Crescent called the Beardslee trout. One of the camp counselors told me that he routinely catches 14-15 inchers, and he told me where to look.

 

In between programs and during free time, I would literally sprint down the lake shore looking for rises.  The counselor said to use large stimulators. At the mouth of Barnes Creek I found several rises near sunset on the first night. While searching the water for the next rise I felt a couple of good strong strikes, but never managed to bring one in. I got several follows, but that was about all the action over the course of several days. The weather shifted and the fish quit biting.

 

While hiking up Storm King Mountain on the second day I snapped the photo below of Lake Crescent from the trail.