A story

A few years ago a writer from a magazine was staying with us at the lodge. He had come to do a Katmai Park/Bristol Bay Rainbow Trout story. I had guided a group including him back in 1996 at another lodge. We had stayed in touch over the years and I was pleased to finally fish again with the guy who holds a quirky wry sense of humor.

It was the second day and we had wanted to fly up to Funnel Creek, situated on the upper Moraine. Certainly a fabled place and worth visiting.

It was a beautiful flight from the lodge near King Salmon to the Northeast end of the lake. Though we saw traffic on the Moraine, the Funnel was too damn busy. Now is when our philosophy shows itself. Our pilot “ Well? Lets go over the hill “. It is early for this other river but I am always up for fishing, not waiting for water. We had a guest with us, young guy and he was in capable hands with Elijah our guide. While flying over we saw that the entire lower river was empty of fisherman. Clear water and had sockeyes milling around, surely, rainbows around, maybe a bunch of them.

We landed, geared up and approached the short braided area of the lower river. I had only guided on this river, never stood in the water with a rod myself. Adam, one of our great guides and the writer went up a braid as we fanned out. I plinked around by the lake letting everyone get situated then headed up to fish the high bank north side. This slot/flat produced spring and fall before, fishing clean up I still brought a couple to hand.

When I got closer to the braids I could see our guys stalking something in a bend. A big trout sat in the deepest part of the 2-foot hole. They told me just down stream he had gotten a big fish in the same channel. This fish seemed aggressive but wouldn’t take the fly. Adam said the tactic is then to throw a different fly, first cast the fish ate, spit and was not spooked. I watched a few more casts to this hog and then moved upstream. I learned they caught that fish, 28 inches, with photo and videos.

Elijah and our guest had crossed and went to the other side of the main channel to throw streamers. I kept going looking to my right into the flats and holes; I could see a number of trout hanging in the wood and debris thru the entire run. The head of the hole was a swirly corner and tough to fish. I had to give it a go before getting out of sight. On maybe the 2nd cast I felt a rip and was fast to a very nice buck that skyrocketed out of the water doing the rainbow chik,chik, chik. Twenty-seven inches of chrome bright rainbow, one of those big bucks with a mean looking jaw and a square body, he was perfect and yanked me down river.

I decided to walk up and look around the corner. A long diagonal bar with a nice tail was set before me, but kind of deep for crossing. Since no one was around I had room to walk to the top of the island, perfect. An easy cross at the top with fishing as I go, then a long bar on the other side with a deep straight seam and tail out with a woody corner. It is one of those setups where you know you are going to catch fish. I took my time crossing, fishing above the lip and the top edge, nothing. Still I was confident something cool was going to happen. The fish were just too grabby not to have them chase the fly. I went all the way to the dry bar as is my habit. “Slow down and get ready. Look at the run one more time and make the approach”. I don’t recall the exact series of events but I caught a number of fish, one right after another. The cool part came from the chase, they would slide over onto the shallow bar chasing, grabbing and most of the time getting caught, but not all of them. It was fantastic. I spent the day catching fish all the way back to the plane. Nice to make the right move. Regardless of how great the fishing may have been on the Funnel. Right call to come here, every one had a great day and caught dandy big rainbows.

We decided to try the Funnel two days later, again it was wild with people - approaching and landing planes. I looked at the pilot, shrugged and went to plan B. Lets go somewhere else. I hate using all the names so we will call this Mountain Creek. Flying over we see again only one-group that is miles above where we are heading. Land on a lake; jump out of the plane heading southwest. At the ridge we see a beautiful shallow rocky river stretching for a mile where it hits a big bluff and turns to the right. No one around besides the bears.

Our guide was familiar with the area and we walk straight to the river. He said to try a dry so I put on a stimulator and immediately had a fish rise to it. This is a theme. I could see that there were dark pockets in the rocks. There were trout in all the dark spots as well.

I decided to look around the short bend. A few sockeyes spawning. With some grayish shapes around and behind them, Hmmmm, char. On goes an egg pattern and in comes char plus a couple of smaller aggressive rainbows. They yelled over it was a nice stroll to the bluff, so I went with them.

When we reached the bluff we could see the entire deep part of the run was choked with sockeyes waiting to run to their beds. The flat and trough below them was just as packed with Rainbows and our guest and writer proceeded to catch them at will.

I went up the bluff side and took pictures reveling in the fact that again we had changed our minds and gone to see Alaska.

The run above the bluff looked like a good area for upstream dry fly fishing. I wanted to go back across and walk the ridgeline to look at the valley from a falcons perch. It ran about 300 yards and looked like it would drop back down to exactly where I wanted to start. After a few photos and deep breathes I strolled the length of the bluff taking in western Alaska. Still not a soul in site as far as I can see. Dropping onto the run at a small tributary was an island forming a beautiful slick pool. Immediately a nice fish pounced on my fly, then another. Both did perfect head and tail rises and fought hard. The time I had spent on the ridge was long enough to have the guys finish the lower hole and make their way up to me. I asked if they wanted the area, no they said, two of them wanted to walk back up and would jump in above our guest and myself. I set him up with a big dry and told him to take one side of the island working up and making short casts to each dark looking spot. He could fish well and knew exactly what to do. I took the other side and in the first bucket caught my biggest of the day. All the way upstream was a hoot of fish and fun. Two for two is typical for Rapids Camp Lodge. I know with the ability and passion from our pilots and guides we put our guests into the optimum situation, everyday.