Bristol Bay is for fishing - Alaska part 3

I awoke early on the third day of my trip in Alaska. A faint glow from the rising sun came through the upper bunk window. I lay in bed and imagined large northern pike exploding on my Spillers Diver back in some weedy and wooded slough somewhere on the river.  The idea of it made me smile. I couldn't wait to catch some pike today, but first, we would search the river for bull moose.

We left the cabin before the sun had fully risen and ventured up the channels. We saw a few moose but they were all cows. Chad informed me that we were still early for the Rut: when the bulls get very active in search of cows to breed with. It often forces huge, smart bulls, to wander about in the open during daylight exposing them when they would normally be hiding. With cold hands and no bull moose spotted by midmorning, we headed back to the cabin.

When we returned to the cabin, we ate a large breakfast, readied the boat, and rigged up our rods for pike fishing. If you haven't fished for pike before on a flyrod, I highly recommend it.

Chad took me to a long slack water slough, and I began casting a large weedless frog pattern to the grassy banks. Pike love to lie in submerged grass. It's in the grass where they can blend in and wait for any unsuspecting creature to come close before they attack. 
I shot a cast towards a clump of half submerged grass and made a few pops with the frog before the chaos happened. A pike lunged from six feet away, half out of the water, and crushed my fly. It happened so fast my heart nearly stopped. I set the hook quickly but even that seemed like slow motion when compared to the way the pike hit my fly. It fought with all its might but I was able to bring it in quickly.

We continued to fish the slough on out to the main channel. We drifted closer to a huge beaver lodge that had large sticks and branches reaching into the water. I just knew there had to be a pike in there. I made a cast towards the outside of the beaver lodge and began popping my fly back towards the boat.  A bubble trail on the surface marked the path of my fly as my leader was nearly to the rod.  I stopped popping the fly, and looked for the next spot to cast. That's when it happened! Out of nowhere, a pike flew out of the water engulfing my fly in its toothy jaws! The sudden commotion scared the crap out of me. I fumble the rod and set the hook fast. The pike was not a huge one so I brought it in quickly.  

We continued to fish the slough catching a few more pike. None were huge, but the explosion of a pike hitting a top water fly is something every fly fisher should experience; they even put bass to shame!

After pike fishing we returned to the confluence of the small river we had fished the day before. Just as suspected we caught a bunch of silvers.

The next couple of days brought more great silver and pike fishing. We returned to the confluence of the small river and sore-lipped many more silvers.

  

My trip on the Nushagak was coming to a close. We awoke on the last morning and started boarding up the cabin for our departure. Out here, every window and door needs to be boarded up to protect the cabin from bears or thieves.

We loaded the moose meat and our gear in the boats, however a couple things we left near at hand... such as the fly fishing stuff! We decided we had time to make one last hurrah with the silvers downriver. We pushed off the bank and headed down the river to catch a few silvers for the road.

We arrived at the familiar silver hotspot and started fishing. Chad stuck with a topwater fly.

He said, "I'm not really a numbers guy, so this is a fun way to catch them. I think fly fishing for them with those leeches, and stuff, may even be more effective than regular fishing."

It was safe to say that Reed was also hooked on catching silvers with a fly rod.

I decided to work my way down to the bottom of the bar. This was, perhaps, a hundred yards of river and we had caught silvers throughout this stretch. The bank was lined heavily with grass, and as I made my way along the bank I spooked a pike. I didn't think too much of it until I spooked another one a few feet down. I stopped and looked at my pink pencil popper tied to the end of my 15lb tippet. Those pike will have a hard time chewing through this stuff... I thought to myself.

I moved down the bank a few yards and spotted a likely pike "haunt" up ahead. There was a weedless pocket between the grassy bank and some submerged vegetation growing out in the river. I made a long cast and began popping the fly back towards me. Immediately an explosion occurred that nearly stopped my heart. I lifted the rod and nothing but slack came back. I stood there amazed because at the end of my tippet there was no fly. Crap, I thought to myself. On the take that pike just severed my fly right off.
I looked back at the water just in time for my pink pencil popper to float back up. Sweet, gotta love barbless hooks, I thought to myself.
Because we had everything packed up, and of course my steel tippet was in the other boat, I was stuck with what I had. 
I retied the fly on and placed my cast back in the same spot.
Pop....... pop,.........pop.......... Kaboom!
This time I tried to strip set the hook. Once again, nothing but slack came back in my face. "Dang-it!" I said out loud.
This time I actually got a good look at the size of the "demon pike," as I was now calling it. The fish appeared to be about two feet long. No monster, but now it was starting to get personal.
I cut my tippet back to 25 pound. Have fun cutting this you stupid fish.
I watched the water and once again my popper floated to the surface.
This was getting comical, I thought as I retrieved my fly and tied it to the heavy tippet. For the third time I re-casted my fly to the home of "demon pike." This time my fly made it nearly to the edge of the pocket before he annihilated it. And as if the pike was saying, "go back to Idaho!" I lifted the rod and felt slack as an empty tippet came back in my face. I stood in amazement and watched the fly, once again, float back up. I retrieved the fly and this time "Mr. razor-tooth," had cut the 25 pound tippet 6 inches up from the fly.
"You win!" I said out loud.
I went back to the boat and found some OX tippet and tied a couple feet on. It was time to catch some dulled toothed critters, called silvers. I was obviously no match for the pike today.

My traumatized pink pencil popper made it back onto my line and soared out to "silver land." This was the area between the current stream and the slack water extending nearly into the bank. I made my way down the bank casting and casting with no follows or takes.

A silver porpoised and I placed my fly in route to pop across his plane of vision. Pop, pop, pop, pop... A wake emerged behind my fly as a silver surged to devour it. The wake disappeared and I kept on popping. Sometimes silvers will continue to follow your fly all the way into the bank. A wake appeared again and as quickly as it appeared it disappeared. I continued popping with continued interest in my fly but no commitment. I placed several more casts in that direction with brief interest in my popper. Then I thought, this is the last time I have to fish on this trip, I really want to catch a few more.

I tied on a My Little Pony fly and bombed out a cast. Two strips were all I got and my fly ran into a pissed off silver. The fish made a long run and all I could do was smile as my reel sang. I landed the fish after a nice battle and quickly released it. I caught a few more silvers on the My Little Pony, and before I knew it, unfortunately it was time to head back to civilization.

It had been a wonderful trip and a great reminder of how special, remote and wild Alaska is. Rivers and ecosystems not yet destroyed by man and wildlife in bountiful numbers. I am very lucky to have spent as much time in wild Alaska as I have. If you are going to go to Alaska, you owe it to yourself to get away from the road system and experience one of the many WILD rivers Alaska has to offer. 

When we returned to Dillingham, a painted container said it all.