It was breezy and very sunny. No bugs were hatching and while I had a nice time in the water the fish were not biting.
I headed over to camp. I unpacked and worked on a beer. We headed over to the Androscoggin at about 6 pm to see if the alder fly hatch was on. It was. I stayed at my usual spot. I managed a few trout but was amazed to watch the show upstream; huge trout 4-6 lbs were in a feeding frenzy and jumping clear out of the water in pursuit of the alder flies. What a show.
No big fish for me from the Andy this year.
The next morning we intended to get up and do a dawn assault on the Rapid River. Instead we slept in. Later that morning we went over to look at the Connecticut River and scout of a put in and take out spot for a pontoon boat trip. Here's the take out.
After scouting the drift we decided to fish a bit.
The Connecticut was pretty dead but we both managed to put the hook in a couple of small browns, but they all came off before we could land them.
That night we went back to the Androscoggin in Errol, the alder fly hatch was apparently over and the river was dead. Not a fish moved.
The next morning we again planned to go to the Rapid. We suited up in our waders and trudged in. This trail used to be fairly nice and could be navigated in a pair of bean boots, now you need waders because about 3/4 of the way in you end up wading through 100 yds or so of calf deep boot sucking mud and water. The mosquitoes were insatiable, swarming us the entire way. Thanks to liberal application of natrapel I was able to survive with only a small number of bites. Arriving at the river we discovered we owned the spot, no one had come in from the camp side. I rigged up my rod and was about to head out when it started to pour.
Upstream from our walk in spot.
Downstream from my fishing spot.
I could see some fish working upstream so I worked my way up there to fish. Once there I could see a couple of really large fish working but they were out of my reach. First cast I hit an 18" salmon, while trying to get him into my hand for a picture he spit the hook and disappeared. A few casts later I hit a 14" salmon, once again losing him while trying to line up a picture. After stinging about 6 more fish they stopped hitting. I switched to a caddis emerger pattern and got a fish on the first cast, a real racer (skinny river fish).
Later as the rain ended I moved down stream and managed a few more on caddis emergers. We decided to leave about 11am, the fishing had slowed as the sun started to peek through the clouds.
That night we intended to fish the Magalloway river but it was extremely crowded so we decided to head back to camp and feast on hot wings and beer and watch a movie.
Sunday morning's plan was to hit the rapid again at dawn but it was not to be, at 4:30am it was 38 degrees with near gale force winds and we decided to go back to bed.
1 comment:
Very nice!
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