Tag: Crooked River

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Good Fortune at the River

Not sure what happened.

Time of day, day of the week, or maybe just heat of summer …  regardless, there was no one at our favorite picnic site on the Crooked River!

 

And then we were visited by an osprey and treated to aerial acrobatics and maneuvers …, good luck indeed.

Monday we got going early to avoid afternoon heat. We were ready for what had become typically packed campgrounds and had riparian picnic gear at hand.

As has become custom, we start with a fetch/swim at the reservoir, which has been drawn down quite a bit.

Wet and happy dog back in the car we head down into the canyon and search out a parking spot on the river.

Over the past few months the river has been unusually crowded, however today Post Pile CG was completely empty. It stayed that way until we left about 3 pm.

The other thing that stayed away was August heat. These last few weeks have seen temperatures hit near ninety by noon. Shade trees aided with a light breeze up the canyon offered pleasant reading sites all day.

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A Day Trip

This week marked the start of summer and saw Deschutes County dipping a tentative toe into reopening. We remain masked against the potential second wave, avoiding areas of population while still seeking out forest retreats.

Fishing, hiking and photography have offered good distractions and excellent means of social distancing over the last few months.

As society stumbles back to some semblance of normal, if that is even possible, the river banks we frequent are seeing increased pressure. BLM (Bureau of Land Management.) opened Crooked River camping this past week, which greatly increased traffic on parking sites.

Discovering a tent set up in our favorite spot, we moved downriver a couple of miles.

This new stretch of river is more of a canyon with rock walls dominating the far bank.

It is every bit as peaceful and will be added to the list of potential stops.

There are lots of places within an hour’s drive of our house offering fishing, views, trails or a combination of all those.

Day trips will continue to present a great way to maintain a level of sanity in these chaotic times.

New Photo Essay … check it out!

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Tight-line Dead Drift

For a few years now we’ve been dabbling with the ‘Euro-nymphing’ flyfishing technique. About this time last year we got some formal instruction from Mary Ann Dozer. Then this week we finally broke down and purchased a dedicated euro-nymph rod.

I found an Orvis ten foot three weight that cost less than two hundred dollars. It arrived this week, so we took it out for a test cast on the Crooked River.

Euro, or tight line nymphing uses a two fly rig with weighted wet flies or split shot. As the name implies this is fished with the line kept taut through the arch of the drift.

The day was warm, for mid-February, and sunny. We hooked up to several fish and caught a couple of decent ones. There is an old adage which says, “a bad day fishing is better than a good day at work.”

Well … this was a GREAT day on the river.

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Cup of Camp Coffee

Life in Central Oregon affords us the luxury of day trips to a large selection of scenic places. Occasionally we’ll hit a pub or restaurant, but more often these trips are accompanied by a packed lunch and sometimes dinner.

The one constant in all our adventures is a cuppa camp coffee … or two.  Sometimes we cook a meal but regardless the size of the offering we always put the kettle on the stove.

 

We’ve had the same picnic kit for nearly 40 years. At it’s heart is an old  “Frostline kit” with a small nylon utensil bag both gifts from Jack’s older sister. In here is a small ‘billy’ can, tea pot, two bowls, a couple sets of eating utensils, a sharp knife and a white gas stove.

Gear has gotten upgraded over the years. We still have a vintage Svea 123 Bronze stove, but our current cooker is MSR’s PocketRocket canister stove, it is a much quicker set up. Yeah, there is a S-bucks on every corner but our steamy hot mug served up with a view is unlike anything you find outside a chain latte store’s window, It is hard to equal.

The go to recipe on these cool winter outings is equal portions cocoa mix and Trader Joe’s instant coffee stirred into a mug of water fresh off the boil.

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Back on the Crooked

November is turning into a really great month, weather wise. We’ve had sun and mild day temperatures for the last few weeks. Mornings are frosty but by 10 am the sun has taken the chill off.

This week we headed out to an old favorite, the Crooked River, to do some fishing and take some photos of the canyon in fall. Had the place to ourselves, set up the camp chairs and really enjoyed the day.

Fishing was good even got into an afternoon dry fly session. As you can tell from the post the canyon was very picturesque.

The other activity was to put up a ‘Flybrary Project’ card.

You likely saw the post on Instagram @jstv. Essentially this is a fly sharing project to encourage people to share their pastime. You can check it out at www.flybraryproject.com and if you are interested, catch an episode of ‘huge flyfisherman’ on YouTube, it’s hilarious.