One of the things that I love about Washington is that there are so many places to fish. You can jump in your car and drive for an hour in just about any direction and find some sort of body of water, be it a lake, creek, river or beach, and stand a good chance of catching something. In the north west portion of the state we are particularly gifted with the number of small rivers and streams we can fish that hold trout, salmon and or steelhead. These are the kinds of rivers that, in my opinion, you only truly learn by walking and wading; burning river miles and firing off casts into every seam, under every log, into the back waters and under the riffles of pool head ins. The river often doesn't give up its secrets easily, and sometimes the difference between being skunked and being successfully lies in the willingness to make the casts that other people don't make and fish the areas that other people won't go.

As it would so happen, yesterday I had the chance to take my first trip out to the Dungeness and explore yet another one of these small rivers with my dad. I had never fished the river before and he had only fished it three times prior to this trip but had been able to find a number of good looking holes. So off we went into the morning darkness, luckily managing to leave the threat of rain behind us throughout almost the entire time we fished. Upon arrival at the river we began twitching jigs and moving our way upstream. Most of the day was spent casting patterns that were predominantly black, purple, pink, or some combination thereof. At the second hole we stopped at I saw an active Chum shoot upriver and into the darkness underneath an overhanging log jam; our first positive fish sighting of the morning. Continuing upstream we worked the next hole pretty thoroughly with the jigs before I decided to tie on a size 0 copper Vibrax, hoping that maybe some trout were hanging around that would show interest. Nothing in that hole seemed to care about what we were offering, so I decided to move back down to the hole where I had seen the Chum and cast the spinner there.

Upon arrival at the hole I made some casts, quickly working the water and determining yet again that either nothing was around, or they didn't like my presentation. Wanting to get a better view of the rest of the hole, which was situated behind the log jam and unfishable from the area where I was standing, I climbed up onto one of the logs in the jam and saw that there in front of me, sitting on the bottom at the head in to the pool, was a good sized fish. At one point it turned to its side, flashing the beautiful chrome of a full set of mirror scales. I immediately began casting to it, but regardless of what I tried I just couldn't seal the deal. I tried numerous lures in numerous colors, but the fish just wasn't willing to commit. I did however at least get it to turn its head for a purple twitching jig, a white twitching jig and a gold size 2 Vibrax, even momentarily opening its mouth for the jigs, looking as if it were almost willing to strike.

As I was fishing the purple jig, reeling back quickly as soon as it was past the fish in order to avoid snagging into another log that was right in front of me, I saw another fish from deep down in the pool dart upwards and downstream. Within the next few casts, still targeting the fish I could see, another fish darted out from under the log in front of me and nailed my jig just as it was about to disappear under the log. The fish immediately went downstream and I found myself in the extremely awkward position of standing on the same side of the log as the chrome bright fish that was thrashing at the surface, but with the tip of my pole extended upstream with the line running under the log and back downstream. I was concentrating so much on keeping the fish from going any further downstream that I never managed to get a solid hookset and proceeded to lose the fish, but was lucky enough to get my jig back.

Finally deciding that I had thrown enough hardware at the unwilling fish, I moved upstream to where my dad had just landed and released a very nice looking Chum on a black twitching jig. This particular pool was a beauty; a long stretch of water that was deep enough to hide the bottom with a seam on the far side that joined right up against some good looking frog water. Working my purple jig through this pool I saw what was either a good sized trout or a jack Coho turn away at the last second during one of my retrieves, but was able to get no other interested looks on that jig. At the top of the pool I switched to a size 2 gold Vibrax, noting that it was one of the lures that had drawn interest from the unwilling fish just a bit earlier, and eventually began working my way back to the bottom of the pool.

Casting cross current into the frog water, letting the lure sink out of sight, popping the rod to get the blade kicking and then letting the current quarter the spinner downstream, I had a Coho hen nail the spinner down deep and then come up to the surface in all of her classic Coho "death roll" glory. I landed and bonked the fish, marking yet another fishing goal off of my list, first ever salmon on a spinner. After that fish my dad and I continued to work the pool, me with the size 2 gold Vibrax and him with a size 3 copper Vibrax, but received no more interest. We continued downstream, fishing a few more holes and seeing fish moving around and splashing, but had no other interested takers on the day.

Another successful trip that will likely be my capping point for a great Coho season.

Tight lines!

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