Just a note about closers

     I know I know it’s been a long ass time and I have gone fishin more than I have reported, so has Gary  my partner in fishin adventures.  Yes we have drugged RB and Spock a time or two.

Season started here in the beautiful northcentral state of Confusion or Wa. on the 22^nd of April or the fourth Saturday of April. ( Just for you readers outside of here) the 51^st state  I call Confusion.  Our fishing regs are a bit confusing to so many that the state is now rethinking and getting read to totally rewrite them and so the stories are out that are so wrong with what is really happening.

On opening day many of our lake are still inaccessible doto late snow falls, heavy rain and thunder showers and the lack of real working man power (State and County employees) and their excuses  of why thing haven’t been done. Budgets, cut backs, and higher taxes. To damn many Chiefs and not as many workers to do the jobs.

The road to Chopaka is closed and may not get opened until sometime late this month or maybe early next June.  We had a better than fair fall with little to no presip. But they had lesser important projects to do.

The road to Buzzard Lake is impassable,  Limebelt Road impassable to get to The other Blue Lake the Road to Washburn impassable and iff’n you wanted to go from Conconelly to Big Blue in the Sinlahekin Valley you had to come all the way down the hill almost into Omak, take the Riverside cut-off to 97 then head north to North Pine/Fish Lake Road then north again another 6 miles, At least they could of put a sign up saying the road was closed before people drove the 13 miles to find out then turn around and go all the way back into Conconelly  (26 miles round trip or an hour) and then drive another hour and half to get to Big Blue.

Iff’n you were stayin in Tonasket there is no signs telling you the north end of Sinlahekin road is cut off just 1.5 miles from the lake making it another 2 hour drive to get to Big Blue.

The main road from the Methow Valley to the Okanogan Valley Hiway 20 has a major wash out due to a uncleaned covert pipe and blew out more than a quarter mile of road and will take weeks to fix.

With so much snow in the mountains and the north-cross passage  Hiway 20 a last start and some more snow Hiway 20 may-not get opened till last this month.

We didn’t have a Steelhead Season here in the Okanogan or the Methow water sheds due to low returns, But they sure took out $$$$$s for the upper Columbian endorsement stamp so we could.

Rocky ford Creek is a blast to fish in the winter most of the time. This year the weather getting there was a different story we started getting freezing rain in late December, fog  thicker than pea soup and frozen to boot. I did make it there a few time and was support to meet up with a few old friends that live on the Wetside of Confusion. I did catch some fish when I went not many but some.

Many other popular lake still have or are just coming off.Like Beaver, Beth, Lost, Long and some of the other higher lakes that have campgrounds.

Just something I was thinkin about

    Late September Through March, usually  the primary gamefish pursued by Okanogan and Methow Valley fly anglers is chasing summer steelhead. BUT not this year, many dreams of coastal rivers, but don’t make it there much anymore, because they are to far away to drive for just a day or two, and usually either too low and clear for good fishing, or too high and blown out. The steelhead-never plentiful these days-might be in the river,  or most of them might have died as smolts going through the turbines  Just getting here over 9 dams and over 500 miles, only the  strongest remnant have made it back, and WF&W make us  keep the adipose clipped fish. 

    The odds are so deeply stacked against winter fly flinging Steelheaders that you have to wonder why they would leave a comfortable warm toasty home to stand in a freezing river, testing the limits of new age hi-tec long johns and human endurance in pursuit of a fish they're unlikely to catch. The easy explanation--"we're nuts"--doesn't dig deep enough into the soul of the winter fly flinger.
   To be sure, there are some whom hook at least one fish on most trips. And every now and then you might hit it just rite on a mild, cloudy freezing but windless day, when the river is dropping and  hook three strong wild fish before noon. Those days are rare, however, so you have to dig deeper to answer the question.
                                        "Why do people do this to themselves?"                        
    One line of reasoning goes like this: North-central Washington is a great place to live and fish. Some people feel they can’t enjoy it unless they prove themselves worthy. Winter Steelhead fly fishers is one way to do this.  It taxes your ingenuity, commitment, knowledge, courage, and faith. If you can keep fishing through a North-central Washington winter, then your mental has been tested, and you have earned the right to enjoy yourself. This attitude combines many elements with ancient "rites of passage." It fits the traditions of the Okanogan and Methow Valleys: it would have been understandable to both the Indians and the religious-minded pioneers who settled the valleys.
For some anglers, however, the winter fishing urge may have even deeper roots: nothing less than the need to demonstrate a victory of the spirit. They go forth in miserable, uncertain conditions, endure the worst that the forces of cold and darkness can fling at them, and thereby attest to the strength and resiliency of the human soul. It is not masochism that makes these Fly-flinging anglers leave a warm hearth for a cold river. They are on a noble quest, spurred by an idealistic compulsion to demonstrate a triumph of hope over despair, faith over cynicism, spiritual strength over physical weakness.

Or maybe we R just a bit nuts.