The Playground, Part 2

Friday was the day of all days. Six of us (4 sports and 2 guides) flew to the
coast to fish the Kamishak River, just down the coast from the McNeil River
(closed to fishing). The Lodge has two outboard jet boats stashed there and we
quickly made our way upstream to a long gravel bar. We waded out to water that
was knee deep and cast up and across with lots of upstream mends to get the
gaudy fly deeper. First cast - nothing. Second cast - a large chum. The next
nine casts produced either chums or pinks (Red) and they all fought like hell.
I was a little disappointed because we were after Silvers. But, the
disappointment was short lived. My next hook-up had the fish speeding
downstream with great leaps and bounds and my reel singing a sweet song, into
my backing, past three other fly fishers with this old man running as best he
could. The fish leaped several times with many "ooohs" and "ahhs" coming from
the sports and guides. After ten minutes, I landed a beautiful silver. Three
more quickly followed and the air was alive with "ooohs" and "ahhs". These are
wonderful fish, silvery and fresh from the sea. They are very powerful and
hoot to catch on a fly rod. BTW, I was using my 10 foot 7 wt Sage XP.
Although everyone else was using 8 weights as recommended by the guides, the XP
was more than capable on these great fish.

After awhile we split up as a group with the other boat going up river, while
we took a small tributary to the left. A couple of more silvers came to hand
before my fishing partner broke his 8 wt Sage at the butt. Never saw that
before. He was landing a chum which was foul hooked. We decided this was a
good time to go farther up river, switch to 6 weights and fish for Dolly
Vardens. What a hoot. These fish are feisty for their size. Imagine 3 to 5
pound brookies tearing up and down, over and around, and never giving up. They
have unimaginable strength and stamina. Just about every cast produced a world
class fighter. My best was a 27 incher. BTW, no nets are used to land these
fish.

Saturday found us flying out early and landing on Battle Lake. We waded
Battle Creek, with an inflatable float raft dropping us off at the different
pools/runs. The creek is only about 3.5 miles long and empties into Kukaklek
Lake. Smaller but similar to Moraine Creek, Battle presented a new problem:
There were so many sockeye salmon that it was difficult to get a drift without
going near them. This led to a few hookups with the Sockeye, but they were
safely landed and released to go about their last deed - to reproduce the
species. The few rainbows that we did land were bigger than Moraine and just
as colorful. They fought like hell and many times I found myself walking
downstream with one pulling me the whole way. I know I jumped over some good
fishing spots by not returning to the hookup point, but you have to understand,
it was very tiring.

Sunday was the last day of the trip. Our flight back to Achorage was scheduled
for 1900, so there was plenty of time to fish. We flew to the Iliuk Arm of
Naknek Lake and fished the Margot (the t is silent) Creek. We were after Dolly
Vardens using 6 wts. This creek is very small and brush overhangs it in
several places. It twists and turns from the Valley of 10,000 smokes before
emptying into the Iliuk Arm. We fished only about a mile upstream. Our
progress was slow because of all the bears. At one point we had a big male
behind us, another in front of us about 75 yards when I saw something move
behind a bush on my left. It was another bear, not too big, but busy fishing.
We were taught to say, "Hey, bear," whenever we encountered one. I began to
back up shouting hey bear. The one in the bushes finally got out of the water
and we could wade up to the next gravel bar where one bear had been. We took
many Dollies and a couple of nice Rainbows before turning around and fishing
downstream to the floatplane. Again, our fishing was impeded by the bears, but
we took more fish out of the runs we had previously fished only an hour or so
earlier. We counted 22 bears in the short time we were there, but I believe
some of them were ones we had counted going upstream. Regardless, Margot has
lots of bears, and some very beautiful Dollies and Rainbos. It will be on my
list of places to return to.

After packing, I went to the lodge to buy a shirt and hat (gotta have a shirt
and hat from every place I fish). Amber, age 3, the manager's daughter came up
to me and asked me to "swing". I didn't understand what she wanted until she
grabbed my hand and led me out the back door to a playground, a real playground
with a sandbox, shooty shoot, monkey bars and swings. Lots of swings. I
chuckled to myself and understood that this place was also a playground to her.
Although she had no other children to play with, she did her best with the
guests. I pray I can observe Amber grow into a lovely woman.

The flights home were uneventful. I left Anchorage at 0900 on Monday morning
and slept until they announced our landing at Salt Lake City. And hour after
landing I was again in the air on a flight to Boston. I slept all the way to
Rochester, NY. Joanne picked me up and we finally got to bed about 0100 on
Tuesday morning. I slept until 1300 when a friend's son phoned and asked if I
would take him fishing. I thought, "I can handle that." But, not until next
week. I'm still tired.

I took over 200 pictures but have yet to down-load them. I will post them at
my site asap and let you know.
Dave

http://hometown.aol.com/davplac/myhomepage/index.html