Trout, Salmon, and Grayling Streams

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Alaska

> The Gulkana River

Seagulls were perched on the rocks watching for outmigrating juvenile sockeye salmon to get disoriented in the whitewater and bubble up to the surface where they can be grabbed. I caught one of them that hit my fly in mid-air and got hooked in the wing, but didn't get any pictures because I was too focused on releasing it. It was fine.

I spent at least an hour standing on this rock trying to launch ~75-foot casts of a big streamer and split shot (with a narrow windoer for the backcast) into a piece of deep, calm water across the river, where at least two rainbows kept chasing my fly but missing as the whitewater in between grabbed my line and ripped it away from them. A great trial-by-fire for my new 5-weight rod. When I finally got the hang of the casting and presentation, I caught one around 13 inches and eventually hooked the one I was after, a beast in the 21-23" range or so. But it took off downstream on me faster than I could follow and got the angle it needed to spit the hook.

A Bonaparte's Gull cruises low over a rapids.

Looking upstream

Josh fishing the tail of a big pool in the rapids

The target of those long casts was the far end of that dark piece of flat water behind the rear boulder.

A 17-inch rainbow I caught Thursday evening

Our campsite. Although nobody in their right mind walks the trail we took in to the river, the fishing spot and campsite see quite a bit of traffic from people doing a popular 4-5 day float trip.