Late (very late) start to my adventure today. Arrived at the river at 2:00 PM. As I got out of my car one of the tree fallers (cleaning up after this weekend's wind storm) comes up to me and says "you missed him by two minutes". I was bewildered by his comments and asked him to clarify what he meant. He said I missed the Conservation Officer by 2 minutes. We both had a chuckle over that.

As I was heading up the trail the tree faller said the steelheads are stacked in there.
A 20 minute brisk hike brought me to my favourite run. The water was absolutely perfect; emerald green with approximately 4' that steelheaders drool over.

As there was nobody else around I took my time rigging up. I decided to start with a coho roe bag. Ten minutes in my float took a little dip. I immediately set the hook but nothing. I reeled in to find my roe bag shredded. I continued working the run systematically with a variety of baits. On one of my drifts my float again hesitated. I set the hook with the same result; the bait was gone.

I decided to switch to a prawn. It proved to be irresistable to the steelhead that was stealing my bait. On my second cast my float just submarined under the surface. I retrieved my slack line and reefed back on my rod. FISH ON !! In the clear pristine water I could see every move by my steelhead. I could see that it was hugging the bottom next to large boulder. My worst fear eventually came true. The steelhead managed to free itself on the boulder

Tomorrow is another day.