Weekend with the Barkey Bunch

goodmorning

thanks babe

well worth the trip


nice little creek




absolutely no side spots



tight quarters

gotcha bitch!



full of cutts




love the orange on this fish




one of many beautiful cutts




slut!

chris and dave




michelle at the camp site


nice fish, blurry pic. chris's tiger



biggest caddis's i've ever seen. about size 12


small but colorful

Chris invited us to go camping with his family and some of their friends. it was a 4 hour drive south but was looking forward to the trip. unfortunately we got off to a lter start on friday then i had hoped. i would have liked to have gotten to the camp site while there was still some light just to make it easier getting set-up and un-packed. we didn't arrive till about 9:30pm. we arrived b.s.'d for awhile then off to bed as we were all tired. after some breakfast a few of us drove down to one of the lakes that were in the area to hopefully get into some fish. the reports were killer. chris had been sticking quite a few. me, michelle and her daughter jasmine fished for a few hours with not a fish to be had. we had some follows on buggers and leeches and a i had a few rises to some dries but notta. after we went back to camp for some lunch me, michelle and jasmine drove down to the creek that flows out of the res. were i was hopeful that i could maybe redeem myself. they didn't want to battle the wind so they did not fish. after trying some ants and beetles, it was the hopper that was the ticket. they weren't big fish but i caught quite a few good looking 10-13" cutts out of that small stream. they weren't the big fish from theres. but i felt as though i had redeemed myself somewhat. after dinner we all headed back to the lake to try our luck again. chris and dave did well once again and it wasn't till close to dark that i decided since nothing else was working i would throw on a streamer that had a big deer head to hopefully intice some fish hoping that maybe they would mistake it for a mouse or something as it skipped along the surface. i fished in this one location for about an hour and a half and had a good 40 strikes on that damn thing but just couldn't hook up. it was cool watching these wakes chsing this fly, time after time. i was so damn frustrated. if i have that many hits on a stream i will USUALLY hook at least half and land a fair amount. so i went to bed irritated and frustrated. woke up this morning and headed straigth to the lake with payback in mind. what was i thinking?! i went through an endless variety of different patterns trying to find something that would raise the fish and it wasn't until i rigged up and pink/tan chernoble and a flying cinnamon ant as a trailer that i was able to raise the fish consistantly. although i only landed two i did manage a few more hook-ups and lost a really nice one on the ant. although another dissappointing morning at least i got some to hand. after i returned from the lake i grilled up some lunch, we packed up our camp and me, michelle and jasmine headed back home.

Fishing With a Criminal

the 'riot'

nick right before the po po showed up



me putting the bike on display

sweet spots

the 1 fish on the hopper

i love this face full of streamer pic

streamer on the swing

pelicans in flight

toad 'bow'

fatty fish on the dropper

underwater macro

nick fish...nick photo

good cuttie......destroyed tail

nick's 21" 'bow'

Nick calls me the other day asking if i wanted to take his boat out on sunday and although i had planned on fishing by my lonesome on the weber how could i refuse some boat action. i had to stroll out of bed at 4:30 in the a.m. to meet up with nick. we make our way to the destination point and after getting the boat in the water nick drives away, with his new scooter in his vehicle, to drop off his rig and boat trailer at the take out point. so about an hour later while i'm sitting with the boat nick shows up on his 46cc's of road fury. before we could get it packed up and loaded into the boat the fish & game po po showed up with guns drawn and sirens blaring. ok no guns or sirens. this rookie looking dude comes over to check licenses and the pimpness that is the 'riot'. after writing down some notes and asking some questions the officer says "i don't know what it is, but you can't have it hear". apparently in the refuge any motorized vehicles have to be registered, which the scooter isn't. the bummer is is that anything under 50cc's, which the scooter is, can't be registered. the officer said he was just going to check with his boss on this one, but he would just issue a warning and take down nick's info. in case the scooter showed up again. if a ticket was given then it would have cost nick $170 bones. actually nick, returning from dropping off his rig, over shot his turn off and went a couple of miles to far, so if he had turned where he was supposed then the officer would have never seen the scooter. it's nick's own dam fault. anyway after the officer left we launched out with me rowing first and nick right off the bat doing the catching. with in maybe 8 casts nick netted a nice, fat 17-18" 'bow'. the day went pretty slowly for both of us. nick took fish on streamers and a dropper including a 21" beauty rainbow and i took a few fish on the dropper and 1 on a hopper. i chucked streamers quite a bit but lost all 3 fish that i hooked. nick's smallest fish was bigger then my biggest fish. the weather was great, a little crisp in the a.m., for about the first 2 hours then the wind got ridiculous. casting became a real challenge and nick pegged himself several times. it was an enjoyable float and it was my first time really rowing a drift boat so it was nice to get some experience there. i wish nick would've caught more fish so i didn't have to row so much. haha

A Few Hours With Michelle

Michelle wanted to try some fishing at night thinking her chances would be better at catching fish on a streamer. i couldn't disagree with that. we drove to a spot where i had moved plenty of fish a couple of days ago so my hopes were certainly up. well michelle threw streamers for the 4 hrs. we were out and didn't move a fish. i started and finished with a streamer not moving afish but in between i switched to a floating line and a mouse and did managed to catch my first fish on a mouse pattern, which was a plus. that was the only fish that we saw. after the storm came through last night today was fairly chilly and as evening set on the river we were able to see our breath. it's to early for that crap. i am thinking that the cold front again put the fish down.