Tweet
I just got back from Erie, PA where a buddy and I fished Elk Creek for steelhead. It was our very first time. There were actually a few snaggedliners up there that we enjoyed some conversation with.
We arrived mid day Thursday and we took all our newly purchased gear and went straight to fishing. From above, using polarized glasses, you could see pods of fish and it was a stunning sight to us newbies to see such large fish all together. It made our mouths water. We soon found out that they were a lot easier to see than they were to catch. It took a few hours before we caught our first and only fish that day. I pulled in a 27 incher that made my heart race. Wow, that thing fought like crazy. It as in the air as much as it was in the water. Just as I thought I'd gotten it, it went on another run back into the hole. It did not stop until is was completely exhausted. My buddy had one on the line earlier and fought it for awhile but we didn't realize how much they fight and I think he tried to bring it to the shallows a little too soon. It took another reel buzzing run and snapped him off mid line which was probably a nick from a rock. Being that it would have been his first steelhead and only of the day, he lost some sleep over it.
It all works out in the end though. The next day we fish hard and we each picked up a steelhead before noon....ah, all was right with the world again and the pressure was off. So with a few steelhead on the stringer we went back to the cabin where we had cured the previous night's catch and we were smoking it. As it turns out, smoked steelhead is delicious. We grilled some of the other fillets and they weren't bad. They seem to get a bad reputation but it was fine...not as good as rockfish :-) We headed back down to the river where we fished hard with no luck but then between 2:30 until nightfall as the sun was getting low, we hammered them. It was so fun. We got a whole stringer of large fish. We had such a good day that we actually didn't think we could top it and we called the trip short by the last day to get home. We knew that Saturday would bring a massive amount of fisherman, which it did. We wanted to leave on a high note and not be soured by combat fishing, although most of the guys were great.
So our long trip ended exceeding all expectations we had. We talked on the ride up about getting skunked and wondered what the long car ride home would be like....turned out it was all smiles
We arrived mid day Thursday and we took all our newly purchased gear and went straight to fishing. From above, using polarized glasses, you could see pods of fish and it was a stunning sight to us newbies to see such large fish all together. It made our mouths water. We soon found out that they were a lot easier to see than they were to catch. It took a few hours before we caught our first and only fish that day. I pulled in a 27 incher that made my heart race. Wow, that thing fought like crazy. It as in the air as much as it was in the water. Just as I thought I'd gotten it, it went on another run back into the hole. It did not stop until is was completely exhausted. My buddy had one on the line earlier and fought it for awhile but we didn't realize how much they fight and I think he tried to bring it to the shallows a little too soon. It took another reel buzzing run and snapped him off mid line which was probably a nick from a rock. Being that it would have been his first steelhead and only of the day, he lost some sleep over it.
It all works out in the end though. The next day we fish hard and we each picked up a steelhead before noon....ah, all was right with the world again and the pressure was off. So with a few steelhead on the stringer we went back to the cabin where we had cured the previous night's catch and we were smoking it. As it turns out, smoked steelhead is delicious. We grilled some of the other fillets and they weren't bad. They seem to get a bad reputation but it was fine...not as good as rockfish :-) We headed back down to the river where we fished hard with no luck but then between 2:30 until nightfall as the sun was getting low, we hammered them. It was so fun. We got a whole stringer of large fish. We had such a good day that we actually didn't think we could top it and we called the trip short by the last day to get home. We knew that Saturday would bring a massive amount of fisherman, which it did. We wanted to leave on a high note and not be soured by combat fishing, although most of the guys were great.
So our long trip ended exceeding all expectations we had. We talked on the ride up about getting skunked and wondered what the long car ride home would be like....turned out it was all smiles
Seeing a couple hundred 5-15lb Steelies crammed in a hole the size of a small swimming pool really is something! And those chromers can really wear a drag out especially using noddle rods and light line like you have to when its low and gin clear like that! I'm going to get my yak up there one of these days and fish the mouths of some of those creeks 
Comment