Well, I couldn't wait for 4 weeks to pass so I decided to brave the miserable whether up north. As I left Federal Way, it was raining pigs and chickens. By the time I got to Mt. Vernon, it was mostly sunny and the wind had died down to practically nothing.

Got on the water by around 2:30 P.M. Rather than wasting time trolling a big bugger, I headed straight towards the West shore and worked my way down to the Northwest corner of the lake. Passed what appeared to be a father and two sons fishing the grassy point. I watched the father try to land and loose two fish as I went by them using a dry pattern. I immediately tied on a #12 hard-back caddis, worked my way down about 200 yards from where they were fishing and began searching the weeds.

It wasn't until about 4:00 P.M. that I landed my first fish - about an 20" rainbow. Unlike the rainbow I picked up two weeks earlier up here, this one had some shoulders on it. However, all of these fish seem to just sip my flies off the surface. That is, until I found old Sam again lying in his hole down near the house on the lake. That sucka' came completely out of the water, missing my fly on two consecutive casts into his lair. I estimate Old Sam to be at least 25 to 27 inches and weighing in at around 3 pounds or more. I know his hole and I'll be back to knock on his door again.

By the end of the day, I had pulled nine rainbows up to my boat - no browns this time. Three of them were in the 20" to 21" range and the rest were all under 11". I'll Be Back.

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