Upper Deschutes, OR

The second leg of my trip was to the Upper Deschutes River. When I say upped I mean at the head waters. Locally know as the Blue Lagoon and Blue holes there are plenty of fish here ranging from a few inches to over 20". Here you can keep brook trout in hopes to protect the native rainbow, bull, and brown trout populations. I have fished here many times as a kid because you can put on any small dry fly and catch 50 fish in the 6-8" range. When you are 12 years old this is a kick in the pants. One of these trips I had conquered a 5lb brown that looked like it ate a coffee can in the lagoon when it at my stone fly I arrogantly threw. Anyways, spent some time up here trauting around looking for fish and had a lot of fun.

Location: 1/2 mile south of Lave Lake Campground Access and up river from Mile Campground day use area
Time: All day
Rod: 5 wt w/ floating
Tackle:  14 tan/brown elk hair caddis, 16 parachute adams, & 12 stone-stimulator
Fish: 20+
Species: Rainbows & Brook Trout
Biggest Fish: 10" Brook
Smallest Fish: 3" Rainbow
Rating: 7/10

Crooked River, OR

This was going to be my first annual Central Oregon tour fishing the three rivers I love best. First on the list was the Crooked. Now I had heard some stories about fish kills and such but didn't want to believe it. This river when doing well should have hundreds of almost a thousand fish per river mile. So I arrived late Friday and found a place to camp. The next day I set out looking for good water. The truth is it was hard to tell because it is very colored and visibility seams to be only a couple feet. I tied up my rig and started to fish. Thinking my fly was stuck in the algae as it often picks some up on ever cast I lifted my rod to set it free. Low and behold there was a white fish on the line and I had caught my first fish. Working behind boulders and good looking riffles I got a second take on my dry this time. A dark shadow came out of nowhere. After a short battle the fish found its way off the hook. Later in the afternoon I rustled up the fish pictured below. Gotta love a colorful redband.

Summary:
Location: Crooked River near Dam
Time: All Day
Rod: 5wt with floating line
Fly: Pink Super Laddy (hopper) with an orange scud dropper
Fish: 2/3
Biggest Fish: 14" Whitefish
Smallest Fish: 12" Red Band Rainbow
Rating: 6/10

Yakima River, WA

Built a contraption for my pontoon to float with my dog down the Yakima River. Stayed at big pine camp ground and shuttled myself between their and Lmuma with my bike. Was a great day on the river and had some success.

Summary:
Location: Yakima River Canyon
Time: All Day
Rod: 5wt Floating Line
Fly: Chubbie for a dry with a nymph dropper and Pats Stone with a midge dropper
Fish: 2/4
Biggest Fish: 15"
Smallest Fish: 13"
Rating: 6/10

Pacific Ocean, Westport, WA (Charter Fishing)

If I haven't mentioned it, I work in Aberdeen, WA. Our company decided for a team building event that they would take everyone out with Westport Charters. If you want to catch fish this isn't a bad way to go. Just mind yourself if you get sea sick. The boats are big but the ocean can get to you. Note that I have never been sea sick in my life, I was out late the night before, and I got a little motion sickness. One time this seamed to help tremendously though because immediatly after I relieved my stomach over the rail I and several others began hooking up after a long cold streak. During this time of the year you are allowed two salmon of which one may be a chinook. You keep fishing even if you have your limit as to fill the boats limit. This works out great because if you are only catching coho and a friend gets two kings you can have a king to take home. This that said our boat limited short of the deck hands and eveyone took home two fish. The fishing was easy. You had a bait caster with a 5 oz weight and a herring. Let your line out about 40 feet and then real back up.

Summary:
Location: Pacific Ocean out of Westport, WA
Time: All Day
Rod: Bait Casters
Tackle: Herring
Fish: 3 (34 kept on the boat)
Species: Coho and Chinook
Biggest Fish: 26#
Smallest Fish: 11#
Rating: 8/10

Cleawox Lake, OR

On Friday my younger brother got married and I volunteered to be the DD that would chaperon grandma to and from the wedding. On the way home I stopped to see my buddy in Portland. So it was about 12:30am and my other buddy text me while I was at a bar in Portland, "You should come down to Huntington Beach." I was dead sober after having not even ordering a beer yet. My response, "On my way". Six hours later I had pulled up to their campground and was ready to have some fun with some buddies.
That day we went and rented a canoe. Drew, John and I piled in and we headed out on the water fishing the local lake. Keeping it simple we used the basic Carolina rig with a worm. The weather was great and the fishing was slow but we were able to catch a few. They keep this lake stocked fairly well. You just have to do some searching to find where the fish are at. We had the best luck in the finger towards the North East Corner.

Summary:
Location: Huntington Beach State Park near Florance, OR
Time: 12-2pm
Rod: Spinning Rods
Tackle: Carolina rig with worm
Fish: 3
Species: Rainbow trout
Biggest Fish: 14"
Smallest Fish: 12"
Rating: 7/10


This isn't fishing I know, but what my dog looks like after a day of fishing.

Nehalem Bay, OR (Crabbing)

For my Brother's Bachelor party we decided to go to Nehalem Bay for some dungenous crabbing. There is a few marina's down there if you don't have a boat or gear that out can rent from which we did. Getting two boats and four traps for each boat we set out to spend the afternoon on the water. The bait they gave us was sea bass but another boat gave us extra shad they had which the crabbed seam to prefer much more. It was early in the season and the bigger crab weren't in but it was still a great day on the water.

Summary:
Location: Nehalem Bay, OR
Time: 1pm - 5pm
Rod: N/A
Tackle:Crab Rings
Crabs:7 keepers
Species: Dungenous
Biggest crab: 6-1/2"
Smallest crab: not legal
Rating: 6.5/10

Taneum Creek/Yakima River, WA

My buddy and I had camped at this place last year later in the summer and thought that we should try an earlier trip this year. We loved the area, lots of space, and complete isolation. Traveling again a long ways up the creek we set up our camp at our same spot. This year was a little extra fun because we brought our mountain bikes and shotguns. Anyways fishing the north fork we had some pretty good success catching some smaller trout mid-day of Saturday. After a small nap and little exploration we went down the the bridge that crosses the river below where the two fork meet. Walking this stretch of river down to the campground we caught several more fish and managed one fish that was about 10".
Sunday on the way out brought some pretty misserable traffic and thus we decided to pull over at the Bullfrog put in on the Yakima river. Found some big water with lots of fish but only caught one.

See this blog as well for additional detail: Taneum Creek

Summary:
Location: Taneum River, near Thorpe, WA off I-90 west of Ellensburg.
Time: All day
Rod: 5 wt floating line
Tackle: Elk hair caddis, purple and traditional parachute adams, misquitos, and multiple other little duns and caddis'
Fish: 10+
Species: Rainbow and Cutt Throat
Biggest Fish:10"
Smallest Fish: 4"
Rating: 7.5/10

Summary:
Location: Upper Yakima River west of Cle Elum
Time: 4-6pm
Rod: 5 wt floating line
Tackle: 8 pat's stone brown and black, 12 skwala stone, 14 tan elk hair caddis, 8 tan body/black back Chernobyl, 16 belly bead copper john, 16 batman prince nymph, 16 tan elk hair caddis, stimulator stone
Fish:1
Species: White Fish
Biggest Fish: 13"
Smallest Fish: N/A
Rating: 7/10