Do people still do this?

[Ed Wahl]

I just read Bill's post on the Truckee River thread. Brought back some memories. Just wondering if the next generation is up to it.

A lifetime ago I used to work the graveyard shift for a small trucking company here in Sac. On Friday's I would get home around 2 or 3 am and load up my already packed backpack. Then head up to the 'Rube or some other stream and hike upstream in the dark. Then nap until first light and fish all day, stay the night and fish a half day on Sunday. Usually had a friend or brother along with me, but not always. Since I wasn't married or otherwise tied down back then this was a regular pattern during the summer months. A couple of years I broke this up with bird dog training every other weekend. Man, that seems unreal now, but I swear that was life between young adulthood and marriage.

I hope there's some young punks out there doing it in a similar way today. My advice for them is "do it, do it, do it". You won't get a second chance at that kind of life. Carpe Diem baby!

Oh yeah, I haven't quite given up the ghost yet, I'm heading up into some really high country next week for a few days. I'll be packing up the bust a nut trail until, well, I bust a nut. There's a fish up there I want to see. It's just that now I have to plan these things out well in advance.

Who else followed that path or a similar path? How about the next generation, anyone out there doing it now? Ed

[Darian]

Hmmm,.... Not quite the same thing but until I was in my early 50's, I used o get off work on Friday night, load up my pram/fly gear, etc., and head for the Eel or Smith Rivers for fall Salmon fishing in the lower parts. Arrive around 1:00 AM, get a couple of hours sleep. Launch the pram and fish from the first legal hour to the last. Go get something to eat and repeat the process for several days in a row. On the day of departure, I'd fish until the last legal hour and drive home to get a little sleep and report to work. The next few days, I would go out in the evenings with "the guys" for some bowling, etc. :smoke: :smoke:

All of that kinda stuff added up to many years of single life and eliminated many unhealthy relationships.... :roll: :roll: Kinda miss some of them "strange" women. :unibrow: :unibrow: :unibrow:

[Bill Kiene semi-retired]

There was a time (1970ish) when I worked in a bait-n-tackle shop in West Sacramento. We would fish and hunt for multiple things in one day back then. We fished day and night too. We fished weeknights after work and then took longer trips on the weekends.

In your 20s, 30s and 40s you can do more than you can in your 60s.

Ed is right............try to go as much as you can when you are young.

Now boat fishing looks more attractive to me.

[dtp916]

:lol: :lol: :lol:

We're still doing it, Ed!

[FISHEYE]

This sure brings back great memories from my early 20s here in Alaska. I'd work all day, which in the summer usually meant flying to inspect some mine or road or something (I worked for ADF&G Habitat Division) and then 4 of us would barrel down to the Kenai River (or Russian) for reds loaded into a little subaru wagon. We would fish all night in the half light/dark dodging bears and mosquitos and then be back by 8 am for work. Sometimes we would do this 3 or 4 days in a row if the fishing was good. Work was always a little less than productive. Thirty years later I doubt that I could do this more than 1 day a week. :D :D :D

Weekends we would drive south, stopping for red salmon and then going to fish kings and sometimes we'd take a break and dig razor clams. Sunday night we'd stop for reds on the way home. Food was turkey sandwiches, donut holes and beer. I don't know how we could function back then on 2 or 3 hours of sleep but we did. We had a saying: "I can sleep in the winter."

[Scott V]

:lol: :lol: :lol:

We're still doing it, Ed!


Of course you are, your still a youngin'.

[jhaquett]

As James says, people still do that kind of thing. I think that there are more people like me nowadays who are just trying to educate their way to some money.

I just take what I can get between fall semester, spring semester, summer semester and studying for the MCAT (not doing that anymore, the next test to stress me out will be the USMLE). A 6-7 hour trip to Deer, Battle, Upper Sac, etc is good enough. 8)

[Adam Grace]

I have done my share of those types of trip, but like Josh school eats up the time that used to be filled with fishing. I tend to fish local waters due to financial and time constraints.

Back in the day my friends and I would stay up till the wee hoursof the night/morning drinking and having fun then wake up after only a few hours of sleep to go fishing, a "burning the candle at boths ends" type of trip..... although as I age those trips are getting harder to perform and recover from :lol:

[Dabalone]

I watch my son doing the exact same things I did when I was his age, changing up gear from hunting to fishing and then back again. When seasons overlap he has everything stuffed in his truck "just in case". Makes me tired just watching him.