Kyner, Cabo and I attended the LAF this year (my first time) by driving up on Friday night, arriving at 7pm. We set up the camper quickly, said hello to some of the other attendees and headed to the water to fish the Parshall hole for an hour or so. I have fished this area a bunch of times, but never the Parshall hole. The Hole is amazing - a long chest deep rifle that is prime trout water - especially for nymphers.
Kyner took a bunch of pictures, and even caught a couple of nice trout. I hooked a few, but only landed one 14 inch brown trout. It got dark quickly and I couldn't see to tie on a streamer, so we called it a night. The bugs were furosious, even after dark!
The night's festivities included me trying to cook sausages over a roaring fire! No luck, so I went back to the camper and set up the stove. I ate and fed the dog half of it and headed back to the camp fire. The guys (and Kelly - the lone girl) were whooping it up - including Kyner doing a little dance to IanB and Old Frat playing the guitar and singing. Kyner drank more than a 12 pack of Coors Light tall boys and everyone had a pretty good time. Cabo and I called it a night first around 12:30am, Kyner crashed back at the camper closer to 2am.
We got a late start on Saturday - on the river just after 9am. We drove by the Parshall Hole again and there was at least 10 cars in the lot. We decided to move up a bit, another mile or so to a spot I can't remember. The river was wide and never over waist deep. Kyner hooked into a thick rainbow right away and I hooked a 6 inch brown. We moved down quite a ways, but I didn't even get a hook up the rest of the way. The fish were keying on trico spinners - there were clouds of them moving up and down the river. I didn't have my dry fly box with me, but I had a little caddis that I tried - to no avail. Kyner managed another nice rainbow further down river.
It was hot and we were ready to move on. We headed back to the parking lot and met up with Zackdog who was ready to go down and fish the same spot. We moved back to the Parshall Hole and met up with most of the gang. We chatted for a while and then headed up to the confluence of the Williams Fork. The Parshall Hole was completely full. I had never been to the confluence, so it was nice to sneak a peek. There are some nice holes in that area, including the Cable Hole and the Confluence Hole. We crossed over to the other side and fished down the Willy. I hooked and almost landed a small brown right off the bat - it was a pretty yellow/brown color of about 13 inches.
I didn't have much luck on the Willy, I did however fall into the river in a spot that looked shallow but was much deeper. I was trying to stay within the river bank and not cross the barbed wire fence. I bit it into the river and lost my breathe for a second until I realized I was taking on water. I had a ton of water in my shirt and more in my waders. Luckily there was a nice breeze and it was hot, so I dried out quickly. Of course there was a huge black cloud blowing in with some thunder and soon the wind kicked up and we got hit with some big drops. Cabo and I met up with Kyner and got out of there.
Back at the Parshall Hole (where you walk into the Willy from) we met up with the gang. We fished the area by the island split and I hooked into a nice 16 inch brown that fought well. Kyner got a cool picture of me the fish and dog. We fished the deep hole on the far side and landed a couple of other fish, including a nice fat colorful rainbow for Kyner.
We hung out a little while longer chatting - then decided to call it quits. We headed back to the campground, broke down the camper and headed home. I was home around 6:15pm. It was a fun trip and although I didn't catch many fish, it was good meeting everyone and getting the chance to fish.
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