California Boys strike out again!

[Rick J]

So Bruce and I left around mid day Tuesday from Eureka heading up to Tillamook for our annual trip with Scott O'Donnell (8 hour - 400+ mile drive). We were scheduled to fish with him Thurs, Fri, Sat and fish on our own on Wed. We had been checking the weather all week and it was calling for showers most of the week with rain on Thursday but the rivers were all dropping and looking to be in good shape.

Checked into a motel and the weather on the TV said pretty good storm coming in starting Wed through Friday - where the hell did that come from????

We hit the Wilson on Wed AM and walked around a 1.5 to 2 mile stretch - it was already drizzling when we left the motel and rain got harder as the day progressed. River was in fair shape though a bit high and was slowly rising - no tugs no fish seen - that night it just dumped and the Wilson went from 1500 cfs to 3000 cfs by the end of Thursday - so we decided to play tourist on our drive home and checked out some of the small towns and such but a nasty way to end our winter steelhead season!!! !6 hours driving, 900 miles on the truck and 6 hours of fishing! Oh well, there is always next year and we are thinking of hitting the Grand Ronde in the fall.

[trinity]

Bummer! Gotta try though

[slim]

Better to have fished and lost, than to have not fished at all. (or something like that!!)
That sounds like steelheading. I'll bet the drive was nice.
Did Scott say what sort of season they were having in the Tillimook area this year?

[Dustin Revel]

that sounds like the end of my steelhead season... spent all my money on gas, drove around a lot and didn't catch much.
how'd you and bruce do this season? i know we fish some of the same water.
Dustin

[Jasonh]

Sorry you guys didn't get to fish. My dad and I were not even able to get up and fish with Mike and Scott this year. I spoke with Mike about 2 weeks ago and he said it has been a very poor season and he thought he might set a record for the number of days in a row without a fish.

Not much different down here in CA this year. Aside from a couple of good weeks of fishing in January on the coast, it was brutally tough. The end of March produced a few, but nothing notable.

To cheer this post up a bit, here is a pic I took of a nice bright buck landed by a good friend on the coast.

[Bruce Slightom]

Jason, nice bright fish.
Dustin, not many fish at all. One of the slowest winters in a long time. But fishing is always good, the catching may not be.