Set It Free

I've been starting to revisit some of my favorite holes in the Truckee since making the switch to a fly rod.  It feels like starting over in many ways, but the rewards have appeared occasionally.  Last week I returned to some deep water I was fond of. 

Two casts in, something angry ripped my beer-head baetis off the line with 2 big shakes.  I used to be able to tell the size of a fish plus or minus 2 inches from the moment I hooked up.  Not so anymore.  Learning what fish feel like on the fly rod has been one of the biggest challenges, but having recently landed a few 20"ers, I am pretty confident this guy was much bigger than that.

Then a few casts later, something lighter took me for a ride.  After a nice surfacing and plenty of swim-bys, he broke me off.

Fast forward a week.

Determined to finish our exchange, I popped back to the same run yesterday.  Despite the silty water, I managed to hook up with a fish before heading into the office.  I'm 90% sure this is the same 19" fella.  My need for closure satisfied, I left with a grin on my face.  Long live the baetis.

Frenchman's FTW

Frenchman's was insanely windy and insanely productive. We caught around 50 trout between the three of us over four hours. None of them were huge, but it was one of those days when you hardly had enough time to let your thoughts wander because there was so much action. Most of them took a blood midge or zebra midge below an indicator. Good times.