Deschutes Trashfish Extravaganza.....

First off.....we were trying...hoping...any other word for wishing our asses off for a steelface encounter.

With that said...

we drank a lot of beer

Ate way to many double burgers

And caught JUST about every type of fish in the Deschutes besides our friend, the summer run Steelhead


Steelie Mike...muggin

There is nothing, I repeat nothing better than the anticipation of driving towards a destination you've been thinking about for weeks. This trip for me was no exception. Loud-ass reggae by Toots and the Maytals blared out of my truck as I made my way down I-84, blatently speeding. I was preparing my lines for the po-po, but thankfully they never threw out the net for me

I had a new spey rod with a cherry just begging to be broken, an open weekend and gas to burn. I bombed out of work on Friday and got down to Deschutes River State Park just past Biggs Junction at 7, with a short window to fish that evening. It felt great to load up the spey pole and bomb some casts out in to the water....even if I have a lot of work to do in my casting stroke

I was more excited for our prospects for Saturday and Sunday as I hooked up with a new friend, Mike , aka...Steelie Mike and his buddy Eric for a float through Macks Canyon



We worked the water hard on Saturday, floating Beavertail to Macks Canyon and I THINK I had a couple of grabs....but mostly I just got better at making my Thomas and Thomas double hander bomb away. Eric brought up a couple of whities. Mike caught this brute



These guys are great. Being completely new to them, the were extremly welcoming and offered tips when they could to help improve and balance out my spey casting.


Whoops...caught a trout

We did start the float on Saturday with over 30 beers.

Ehh, pretty confident that would be enough to last through the day and a few for camping purposes

At the last run...we discovered we had 0 beers..shit

The highlight of my day, drilling and burrying in my hand, a razor sharp Green Butt Skunk. Thankfully, I pinched the barb.

Sunday we worked some runs below Macks until about lunch. Couple more "trash" fish to hand amongst us three and we called it a trip

A HUGE thanks to Mike and Eric for being so helpful and cool ass guys. It was a great, great trip and it has only wet my appetite for the spey game

Lastly, a few other good images from the weekend




Eric rocking his Sage


Swinging away