Doubles

I miss Alaska. Terribly.
This photo reminded me of the day my friend Dan and I went fishing and just railed on them. We kept looking at each other and laughing every time we had doubles. Contentment is an understatement....

Angel Found

Skimming through WFF, I came across this photo of another Angel, Teresa, and love her genuine smile and excitement...this photo is oozing with energy. Nice fish on the fly too!

Delta Dawn

Rogue Angel Dawn shaking up rivers near you and banishing all shadows with that deadly smile. And sore mouthing the big boys so you don't stand a chance....



Forgot to post this one from Dawn's honeymoon....looks like marriage has been good to her ;)

Goodbye Alaska!

There were a few inches of snow on the ground as we drove the mile to the airport in King Salmon. I decided leaving was probably a good thing. Upon arrival in the Anchorage airport I discovered the delay that awaited me. Avoiding culture shock I did what I always do, peruse the fishing magazine aisle in Hudson News...there were so many! My excitement surged as my eyes fell upon a familiar and loved face:
Angel among us





I did what any self respecting friend would do, bought a few copies! Without further recognition to any other magazine in the airport time waster, I hurriedly paid for my purchase (took some photos) and hurried back to a quiet corner to read what I knew was to be a great article. And naturally she did not disappoint me. The article was beautifully written, funny, and entertaining. Pick it up when you get a chance. Well done April!

Run Sockeyes!

This is a pretty typical scene on the rivers I guide. I always feel joyful when they succeed at locking down a sockeye in their jaws....maybe that is because they are so close I sigh a bit of relief at their being preoccupied. ;)

Too cold to fish?

There is a very small portion of river flowing in there topped with slushy ice chunks and moving at an incredibly slow pace.

Even Taggish was cold...

We left him in the boat to fish for an hour and when we came back his whole body was shivering. Nothing a Patagonia down puff jacket can't fix, I don't know why everyone does not have one of these... within a few minutes his shivering had stopped and he was less than stoked about being out there... as you can tell by the look on his face.

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Posted By k8 to Rogue Angels at 10/24/2008 01:54:00 PM

Approaching Nature

When you perceive nature only through the mind, through thinking, you cannot sense its aliveness, its beingness. You see the form only and are unaware of the life within the form-the sacred mystery. Thought reduces nature to a commodity to be used in the pursuit of profit or knowledge or some other utilitarian purpose. The ancient forest becomes timber, the bird a research project, the mountain something to be mined or conquered.
When you perceive nature, let there be spaces of no thought, no mind. When you approach nature in this way, it will respond to you and participate in the evolution of human and planetary consciousness.


-Eckhart Tolle, Stillness Speaks

Of Angels and Tigerfish

Jenny is back at her easel and creating more great art; this painting is near completion.... she is inspiring my urge to fish in Africa!

11 degrees with wind chill

It's cold.
I'm going fishing.
-k8

Starting off another week right...

With...

Where the Wild Things Are...

And 29 inches of trout porn since it is freaking friday and you are going fishing tomorrow....

Wanna Go Fishing?

In this weather?



Hell yes!

Lady Luck

Photo by Rogue Angel April

Monday Morgan

Please welcome Rogue Angel Morgan and steelhead...a perfect way to start any week! Morgan is a fly fishing consultant in Idaho...I dig that title.

Bamboozling Bears

my first fish on a bamboo rod!
Having cast bamboo rods before, but never experiencing the pleasure of fishing one, I felt intimidated by it. This hand built soft rod commanded care and respect in my hand, like I could feel the love and time the builder had dedicated to the rod..... I was a bit nervous. Then I bucked up and made a cast. Beautiful! I lifted the line and cast again just to feel the action, to get the feel. I did it again. I was not even fishing, I was feeling. Then I committed to a cast and wa-la, it softly bent over as I set the hook and the trout jumped. I felt the trout's every move.

....In the photo above, it looks like I am squeezing the fish to death, but in reality he is so fat that the love handles are hanging over my hand, just like this big boy:



I always canoe the side channel canal to the beach where the float plane picks us up....always. I like it best. The canal has intimacy. If I am going to paddle my heart out, I want to love the water....I love this section. Steering the raft in between the two islands, I thought about how there was probably a bear in the channel.... suddenly on the lower island, a big sow bear charges our raft and stops literally three feet from my client, an older gentleman in the front of the raft hanging his feet over the edge....the sow was gnashing her teeth and anger flamed from her eyes. She ran back 20 feet to her cubs, as I was sighing out of relief and back paddling like nobody's business.... quickly she turned on her haunches, landed on her front paws with a thud, and thundered towards us gnashing her teeth and huffing at us again. By now we were a solid 6 feet from her, and I muttered "oh fuck" as she jumped up looking to leap into the water and land on top of the 70 year old man up front....all I could picture was her pulling the skin off his leg like I've witnessed her doing to a sockeye.....I was out of the raft now and pulling it back as fast as my skinny legs could wade water until I was chest deep. As I was hopping in the raft, she ran back to her cubs, turned and huffed with the deepest sign of hatred.... Suddenly I realized time had stopped....and my heart was beating.... LOUDLY.
I apologized for cussing, and the old man not hearing me said, " In all my years I've enjoyed a lot of ladies sitting on my lap, but I wasn't looking forward to that one ."

Goodbye Mel Kreiger

I found out last night that Mel Kreiger had passed away. His contributions to the fly fishing industry are enormous and he will be sorely missed. We wish his family all the best.


I once saw him speaking at a fly club about casting and the "angle of the dangle" ....He was using one of those micro-casting rods and as he showed us how to power through the cast, the darn thing broke in half and went sailing off the stage! It was hilarious! He got a good laugh out of that too.

Small Photo, Big Fish, Huge Smile

Rogue Angel Adrienne bringing us steel and smiles again.

Old Man Winter

I decided to count the bears we saw today....I stopped at 26 from exhaustion as they surrounded us. I saw at least 15 more on our float out. They all had snow on them.....they were all seeming a bit more agro than days past. They look beautiful against the yellow trees and snowy background, huh?

Free Your Fish

Rogue Angel April freeing another beauty for another day....

More Visions of Steelhead....

sunday play day

It is snowing outside as I rush to get out the door in my waders, with all my gear and a Saturday night headache that I am sure will drive nails through my coffin by days end........Shoot! I forgot my gloves and there is no time to go back.
I need to get out on the water!
This is my first play day in what seems like forever and my new rod has incessantly been screaming at me to go fishing, a Loop Multi 7 wt 12'0 Spey Rod attached to a shiny new Loop Evotec..... I just got the line for it yesterday, an Airflo Skagit Compact 540 grain, a beautiful lime green line that constantly has me thinking of Coronas....this brilliant lime green line running through the silver guides beside the metallic green rod with shiny grass green trim is enough to make this red head's day every time I look down......now how does she cast?
......After learning how to Spey cast on my 13'9" 8 wt sage double vodka tonic with a Skagit 550 line and finally becoming consistent with my casts on this set up, it was an adjustment to say the least. First noticing that I was pulling the anchor, I recognized 21 inch difference is huge and thought back to the bow I just landed that long and adjusted my cast to compensate. Suddenly I see I just have to continue my casting motion, never pausing as I had in the past, but a solid fluid movement and I thought the line was going to rip right off the running line as it shot out of the guides landing perfectly out in front of me an impressive distance. I was not sure that really just happened, so I flipped it around like Delores del Ruby and tried again. This gorgeous lime green line shot right out into the air again..... I beamed........I forgot about the headache.

Charred Cigars

Scoot over Swisher Sweets, we smoke Cao, straight out of the DR!

Spey Casting to a Rainbow

Standing waist deep in water, I forge past my numb toes into a sort of meditation I guess...where instead of repeating a mantra over and over to eliminate my thoughts of physical things, I am casting out and working through water in a trance. Suddenly I feel enlightened,



not by a tug tug or nip or screaming run, but by the realization that I am not ready to compromise....Compromise on what I ask myself? Pondering I can only come up with one answer, anything. And well that sounds selfish doesn't it? Yeah, it does sound selfish, but that is how I really feel and I am telling the truth...so at least I admit it, eh? All of a sudden, I feel understood.......by my own self. I understand myself here in this very moment, freezing in the water, and the clouds begin to drizzle rain.... I want to grasp onto this feeling and cling very tightly, to hold this knowing, this understanding tightly in my fist, but experience tells me to gently cradle it.
I am not ready to be anything but myself.


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Posted By k8 to Rogue Angels at 10/03/2008 07:00:00 AM

Rogue Angels coming to your stream....