Jacked Up

It was a day when there were other things three guys could be doing with their time. 

But...it also happened to be the only day this spring when the clouds cleared, the sun shone and it seemed fluttering caddis were inevitable.

We had exchanged a few messages through the normal circuitous means (remember when you'd just call somebody?) and each reached a level of green light clearance after each doing that dance and barter thing we all hate to admit we do, but do.

You know what big box stores are good for?   They make excellent park and rides.  6 AM at the parking lot of the Home Depot.  MK and RS stashed waders and rod tubes in my truck and we peeled out and hit the road.  We were jacked up.

No I mean it.  We were jacked up.  The sun made the polarized fishing glasses we going to wear anyway, necessary.  The cool burned off and it actually felt warm outside.  Mid-April with a slight breeze, warming water...I was envisioning trout noses sucking down caddis through most of the 2 hour drive.  The vibe was electric, the stars were aligned...I even had a few fresh dun colored size 18 elk-hair caddis, with insect green dubbing and palmered grizzly hackle, sitting in the box (next to another, not so fresh-but perfectly good, three dozen I already had from previous tying sessions.)

AND, we were going to caddis ground zero.  A river so rife with caddis that it should be called Caddis River.  A stream that first blew my mind back in the late 90's with a disgustingly thick caddis hatch,  on a day just like this one. Exactly like this one. 

Exactly.

The truck wasn't completely in park before RS and MK were hotfooting it to the bridge to see what manner of water we'd been dealt.  It didn't take long to discern that the previous evening's rain had done nothing to cause concern.  If there was a downside it was that the water was TOO clear. 

Now we were at the level that comes after being jacked up.  What's that called?  Really jacked up? 

We wadered up, and were so confident that we tied on caddis dries...at the truck.  At least I did.  RS and MK headed upstream and I went down.  I worked over the next pool down from the bridge.  No fish moved for my seductively tied caddis dry, but it was still early.

It was just a matter of time. 

By 11 o'clock the caddis would be pouring off the river. I added a dropper to my caddis and promptly sent 6 trout fleeing downstream.  No matter, it was still early.

I crossed over the bridge and met up with my comrades.  Nobody had caught anything yet.  It seemed a little strange since in addition to a great caddis river, this thing was usually loaded with fish.  After 90 minutes of nothing, we jumped in the truck to work over another beat.  A couple nice solid, but small fish came to my Beadhead PT dropper, but nothing seemed all that interested in the dry.  I lengthened my dropper tippet to 6x and let it marinate in a long slow run that also coughed up a smallish brown. 

We got in the truck and moved again. 

It wasn't early anymore. 

The caddis were not showing.

And then, at around 1:00 in the afternoon at our 4th or 6th stop, I eased downstream to the tail of a riffle and saw a caddis fly by.  Then another and then 4 and then there were caddis on the water.   I saw a trout rise and cast my dry/dropper to the head of the run.  The trout I'd seen rise was joined by another fish in the next seam over.  My caddis pitched and canted in the chop and the trout came up and splashed at it.  Miss.  I brought my fly in and clipped off the dropper.  It was dry fly caddis time.

And that was that.

The trout never showed again. 

The caddis hatch that we had hoped for was happening, but just on this short run and the two fish living here weren't playing ball.  We went downstream and upstream and never found another rising fish. 

I tied on a new dropper and hooked a couple more sub-surface.

We spent the drive home, on this perfect April caddis dry fly day, licking our wounds and creating a number of new sentences.  The only rule of the sentence game seemed to be that you had to say the word "caddis" preceded by your choice of profanity.

Back at the Home Depot parking lot as we unloaded the gear from the back of my truck, a caddis flitted out from under a plastic wader tote.

And I thought of a new sentence.

I've had a few days to think about this trip, this sure thing, this perfect day.  We didn't kill them, we didn't HIT IT, we didn't even come close. 
But...for an evening and a morning, we thought we had it nailed down.  We were sure we had it dialed.  We were amped to be going fishing and nothing could make us not be. 

So yes, we suffered a beatdown...

...but we were jacked up going into it.