Sigh....

All is right with the world....I am fishing again!!

Not exactly a stellar day but not too shabby considering.
The water was just a titch on the high side but I managed to sting a few anyway.



Normally I prefer a cold and gloomy rain-soaked Steelhead outing but even I could appreciate the beauty of todays weather.



I bumped into a couple of Brians old buddies.

I pulled into the parking spot at around 6 am only to find that some old creep had beaten me to the river.
Hats off to my new buddy George ...at 70 yrs young the old prick goes even harder than me!!!
NICE.



I hope he got a fish but he and his comrade weren't making out too well when we parted ways.



God I was happy out there ....

This has been a long summer and the fact that there are a few fish in the river already is a very good sign for this fall.



Fresh air and Chrome ...
I will never get over how beautiful these fish are. That last moment when you are cradling them in your hands submerged in the water is really something. The sun just made them glow.
What a treat today was for me.

OUT.

DIY....

Before.....

AFTER.....

...never again.

I am not a big fan of work of any kind.

Around late July of this year a friend of mine talked me into renovating my basement. It was an eyesore and with my parental leave I certainly had the time.He assured me that with his know-how and my limited means we could create the ultimate basement sanctuary.

"A weekend dude...we could bang this off in a weekend...three days tops."

Fast forward to 10 weeks later...lol

It is good for me to have friends like this because without Garnets enthusiasm I never would've made an attempt and as corny as it sounds,.....even with the wee course areas , I can now look around and say "I" did this!!! ( With help of course)It is a satisfying feeling and I can understand a little bit how the DIY thing can become addictive. I am almost going through project withdrawal.........almost!!

The river is up and the nights are getting cooler. I have removed some eggs from the freezer and tomorrow will be my first run at'em ( barring any unforseen marital VETO). I usually have been to the river by now somewhere and I feel a little strange not having wetted a line yet. I console myself with the knowledge that it is still a bit early.

I restrung the guitars today and hopefully my drywall hands will return to normal and I will be able to play again soon. I praticed a little bit today but I felt like a lobster. The acoustics in my music area are way better than I could have ever hoped for.

I don't know a thing about designing a room for good sound so I must've gotten lucky.

Now I can play my guitar without waking the baby.....which is huge. She is my worst critic.Anyway....that is where I have been......And now I am back .....

With any luck I may lift up on one tomorrow.Good luck to all you Steelhead freaks this fall....I have a good feeling about this year and I am pretty sure I can get the time off work.

Dog Days....

Here is a little something for those hopelessly addicted Steelhead fiends



For those of you philistines that can't dig Sonny Rollins playing the Blues
please feel free to turn down the sound ....or put a gun in your mouth.

Watching this helps lower my blood pressure....I particularly like the part right around 51 secs when the little round ports start spinning counter-clockwise....pretty.

October is right around the corner and the clock is ticking.


.....And BTW....flying to Alaska is cheating.

The long wait...

Well,

Summer is here and the Steelies are somewhere in the deep.

Only three more months or so...

I hope they are packing on the pounds.

'Til then I have been filling my days with Bass fishing, the Walleye harvest and diaper changes.

Awesome.

Morin and I did a little Bass fishing today and it was fun.


I figure I am Bob Izumi and he is Roland.

There are worse ways to spend a morning.

My New Fishing Partner..

Yesterday my Daughter surprised me by asking to go fishing!!!
<><
I guess I had been watching quite a bit of fishing on TV. Kimi is still a wee bit laid up so I have been sticking around the house quite a bit Ella and were able to skip out for a few hours and beat up on the Bluegills a bit.
She showed great patience and a genuine interest.



My son is only interested in Spiderman at present and won't fish with me even if I beg him.

Rotten kid.
;o)

Oh well..maybe Ella will be hittin the tribs with her old dad.

Oh YaH!!! JFL and I are crazy to think there is a CAT in there.....

Shame on all of you!!!
LOL
I may have to start packing heat this fall.


GRRRRRRR

Bear Sightings - Thu. June 12 07:52 am
Huron O.P.P. officers are working with the Ministry of Natural Resources investigating several reported sightings of bears in the area. Police say that not all sightings have been confirmed, but say some are valid. The latest unconfirmed report came yesterday in Bayfield.

And then there were three...

Sunday June 8th 13:42 Avery Elizabeth Norland was born in to this mad world and I love her.


I had come home from work Saturday night exhausted after working three horiffic 12 hr shifts in a row in the worst heat imaginable. The last thing I had said to my co- workers on our walk out to the parking lot was "you watch,..tonight will be the night".


Kimi was due on the 15th ...so we knew it was close and our other two kids were a week early as well.
Oh well....thats about how it usually goes.
Baby is here ...all is now well...or on the road to well and the good news is that I am off for right around 39 weeks.
I am not sure what I am more excited about....the baby ...or the time away from work.
Kids are a blessing and I am going to try my hardest to savour this year and take advantage of something that most parents ...particularly fathers ...don't get the opportunity to do.


The fishy side of things has been very slow.



I did take Owen down to the hatchery on kids day. This is the day where the club members release the pond fish to the wild(lol)..and before they do that they let some of the kids in the neighbourhood catch them.


It kind of gives me the creeps but smiling kids can make anything sweet.
Some of the Steelhead in the pond were easily in the teens and there were a couple that were an honest twenty.



Owen caught a Brown Trout for his fish and it went around 15 lbs....3 pounds bigger than my biggest...



:o)
We should start the assault on the Walleye shortly.
The water just needs to warm up a bit on the Canadian side.

The word from the commercial fishermen is that the numbers and size are even greater this year...although I don't see how that is possible.

Any way....I hope we get some sleep tonight.

The Return of the Kings!!

Well....

May be not exactly...

However the fish are bigger and better than last year and there are more of them.

This is good news for the open water shitrat armada.

We can break out the Monkey Pukes and Kevorkians and get busy with the Chinooks in the spring.

For a while there the fishery was looking very dismal.

A salmon in double digits was a thing of the past and the sound screaming line was a distant memory.

The derby is in full swing and we just finished the third day on the water.

The wind kept us on the beach for one and for another day I had to work (ugh) but the three days that we did fish we have been hitting fish consistantly...and it has been a blast!!!

I had fogotten how much fun and how relaxing trolling for salmon can be.

Although we have yet to tag anything really big I know we are in the right area and we have as good a chance as any.

Tomorrow we'll be at again.

One bit of bad news is that we have been seeing alot of these things lately.

One of the Kings we got had so many on him that he looked like an octopus.

Call me Ishmael<><.

Fiddleheads

Today was my opening day.


The actual opening day was last Saturday and I was forced to miss it due to work.
I couldn't spare any leave because of the pending arrival of the Nipper.
I start my official parental leave on June 26th ...and I can't wait.
The Storks ETA is June 15th.


Work has been bumming me out lately and the break is a very welcome one.
My scheduled return to work is March 11th 2009.

Fuck it...I am out.

I was sorry to miss the actual opener.

Even though the river on opening day is typically a horror show it is something of a tradition. I have been in a bit of a funk lately to say the least and my mood is such that I am painfully aware that there are a finite amount of Steelhead seasons and great moments should never be taken for granted.
We lost one member of our fishing group this year.
Terry was a great guy and I always enjoyed his company....except for when he was tuning me up at Euchre.
Rest in peace.


I usually share the opener with a great group of guys that have a sweet piece of property right on the river.There is more card playing and drinking than fishing during this gathering but I always have a good time.

Oh well....I can't play poker worth a shit and I am pretty sure that I will be able to make the Fall get together.

Today I faced the river at its worst.


The water was low and clear and the fish ... I am sure were shell shocked from the opener.
A cold front had pushed in and I was actually a little chilly this morning. The rain that had been forecast never really showed so the river is even worse now.



One lucky break for me was the complete lack of pressure today.

I saw a few familiar faces but it certainly wasn't the horror show that I had anticipated.


?
Where is everybody??
Maybe the poor conditions spooked everybody.
For the record I didn't miss them.
;O)

Maybe the Wendigo ate them all on the weekend



Anyway..
The fishing was tough but I managed.


As a matter of fact I did pretty good.
;o)
The fish were hot....like greased lightening hot.

I hadn't fished that much lately and it felt nice.

..really lifted my spirits in fact.

The woods in the spring are a revelation.
Trilliums, Fiddleheads and Leeks...
The smell is terrific.



It was cool to connect with nature again.....all exept for the weasel I saw.


It reminded me of work.

(BTW...my elbow is screwed)

Mother of god...

Dig this shot,


This picture is from a poster that is currently scattered throughout Southwestern Ontario....particularly Sarnia.

What a RUBE....camo toque and all.

I have tons of people at work asking me for an autograph...

UGH.

Oh well..there is no sense running from it.

I am a shitrat....salmon killer...environmental terrorist.



Ah well... tis true that a number of Chinook Salmon have found their way from the depths of the Lake Huron to heat of my BBQ...
With any luck this spring derby will see even more.

Every year I fish this 10 day Derby with my Father in Law and honestly I hate to miss it.
It is pretty far removed from the almost religious pursuit I have developed around Steelheading but I love that man dearly and the derby has provided some great memories.



We actually won the thing on the last day a few years back...right down to the wire by ounces if my memory serves me ....and I don't really care if it does or not.

Oddly enough ...my relatively new found sensibilties are rarely challenged on the open water because we almost never hook Steelhead.
This pleases me for two reasons.
I almost certainly wouldn't have the heart to kill one and the boys would likely throw me overboard if I released it.
.....especially if it had a chance of making THE BOARD!!!!


I think first place for a "Rainbow" is a snowblower or some shit....
Oh the humanity...
It is a tough little struggle for me to be honest.....

I cannot deny that I love participating but the shitrats that we compete against for the most part make my skin crawl.

I remember one year asking to see the leading salmon at the 'weigh in' station.
They keep the board leaders on ice in a giant freezer.
The fella behind the desk was only too glad to show me and after some digging hauled out a beautiful 15 - 16 lb fish.
It was one of the biggest Brown Trout I have ever seen.
After about 10 mins I ran out of energy arguing with the guy...lol.
(They saw the light about two days later)
One small point,....
Should people be allowed to stock hundreds of thousands of fish a year into our watershed if they can't tell a trout from a salmon?

They are good people really...with very good intentions.

They have a day at the hatchery where they allow handicaped children to fish for the penned Steelhead.

Anyway...
The Lakes are so screwed up that I doubt they are doing much real damage and they way they dump these pellet eating Salmon into the Lake year after year I suppose it can't hurt me to hang up my ethics for 10 days or so and wade into the Bloodbath...
Who knows...maybe we'll actually win the thing again...


Actually... I am pretty friggin good at it....and I could really use the dough

Morin and Harv are currently hammering real fish on South Erie.
I was scheduled to tag along on this one but had to bail at the last minute due to some babysitting logistical shortfall.
Truth be told it wasn't that hard to do so...
I am a bit of a worry wort and Kimi is right around 7 months in.
Things are going good but I have a hard time being away from home right now.
Besides my elbow is still 10-7.
Ella and I have visted just about every park in the area over the past two days.
It is so good to have some nice weather finally and it is impossible to keep that little girl indoors.

Today we had a picnic at a park down by the Lake. It was chilly ...but that doesn't bother that little monkey.

I don't know what it is but I have been very emotional lately.

Maybe it is the expectation of the wee one or the fact that the winter has finally released us from its clutches ....or just the fact that I am really tired,.. but I have been conscious of some perfect moments lately.

I don't know if anybody knows what I mean?

Today at the picnic was one of these moments....




I think I can afford to trade a fishing trip now and then ...