Hours had passed, and we had only one coastal cutthroat caught by Andrew. Steelhead fishing to me is funny, your chances of hooking into one are slim, and landing them even slimmer (I have lost two fish I have hooked) yet there are so many people that still fish for them. I am not your “optimistic” steelhead angler. By that I mean, there are people that truly believe they will catch one, every time they go out. I, on the other hand, am convinced that I will not even be graced by the presence of one any time I go out. I have been fishing for them for four years now, and despite all this time I still find myself waking up early to pursue these elusive creatures. I genuinely enjoy swinging flies and solidarity of my thoughts as the river flowing, but don’t get me wrong, I still would love to catch at least one. We made it to the last good run until we hit the dead frog water before the take out. I didn’t fish the previous runs so Kc and Andrew insisted that I be the first one through. I made my way to the top and started a bit farther up than I normally would have. I begin to barely cast the head of my line out to fish the inside water first.
Slowly after each cast, I pull a few extra feet of line off my reel. My cast still fell short of the “juice” of the run, but all of a sudden I felt my line go taught and my swing came to a quick stop. “Shit,” I thought to myself, as I was sure that I was snagged up. I wait for a few movements and didn't do anything to my rod or line when all of a sudden to my disbelief, the line began to pull from my reel and my heart starts pounding. I let out some sort of noise that I am sure I have never made before in my life. By the time I can get those words out of my mouth, my line was screaming, and I began to scream. I was now faced with this fish running down the river. I have never felt something bend my Spey rod like this before. I attempted to keep my cool while trying to keep the fish in control by keeping my rod low and to the side to keep the opposite pressure on the fish. What felt like forever in the making was over in a flash. I saw a flash of bright chrome fish as it rolled on the surface of the water and in unison, we all let out a joyous holler. I looked to Andrew and ask if he had a net in his boat, he reluctantly said no (just goes to show you how confident we were at catching fish that day). Andrew slid his hand around the fish’s tail and had a firm grasp. I’ve done it, the stars had aligned for me that day and I’ve landed my first winter steelhead.