Trophy Trout

What a spectacular day on the Kenai River! After breakfast at the B&B chatting with some salty old fisherman about how obviously we were responsible for the gorgeous weather, and getting outfitted in chest waders, (definitely not as glamorous as the riding gear) we climbed in a drift boat w/our guide Paul for a day of fishing.

Paul gave us some casting instruction (which was definitely needed) and within an hour Marj had caught what would be the largest fish of the day - a 23.5 in rainbow trout! And she wasn't even trying! We were just drifting under a bridge and barely paying attention when she got a bite! Paul was amazed she caught one that big, especially since she was apparently doing everything wrong, but clearly she had the magic touch today because nobody else could match her!

A little bit later, we noticed the trout were eating dry flies right off the surface. Trout were rising everywhere! Paul anchored the boat and fixed up a couple dry rods he had on the boat and and asked if any of us wanted to wade. I jumped at the opportunity to get out of the boat and do what I was more familiar with. Paul offered some further casting instruction and went through every fly in his box, but we couldn't catch a single one. The trout were taunting us! Feasting on mayflies and pretty much everything but what we were casting! It was so maddening! Paul said he'd never seen so many trout rising in the Kenai or AK yet they were not to be caught!

Back in the boat, I did finally manage to catch a Dolly. So I can go home happy that I caught one fish in AK. Though really, with so many fish in the river I feel like should have caught more. I also think my brain is totally screwed up trying to learn both drift boat casting and traditional fly casting in one day!

We also saw a couple of King Salmon in the river (one almost jumped in our boat) and hundreds of dying sockeye salmon.