Congratulations, Dave. Helluva way to propose marriage. I'd say that you got yourself a "KEEPER"
Dave Wilson wrote: > Dave Wilson > > http://www.wilsonsworld.org > > -----Original Message----- > From: Dave Wilson [mailto:[EMAIL PROTECTED]] > Sent: Thursday, September 19, 2002 2:18 PM > To: [EMAIL PROTECTED] > Subject: Deschutes Trip Report > > Ok folks, > > I'm back from my most interesting trip of the year (at least for me!). > I started fishing the Deschutes River on Friday the 13th (was that > bad? ...stay tuned) My girl friend and I started off fishing the Mecca > Flats area just down river from the town of Madris. We were drifting > nymphs and swinging soft hackles in all of the easier places to wade > as she doesn't much like trying to find footing in fast water among > the rocks. It didn't take long to figure out that the 8 foot 3 wt. > that she was using wasn't going to have enough backbone to adequately > fish the big water that we had, so we shared my 5 wt. for a while. > After a few hours of fruitless casting, we went back into town to > check out the local fly shops and to look for other places to fish. We > headed up River to the town of Bend where we were staying at a local > B&B, and we saw a fly shop there to check out. Inside we found out > that Powell Rod Co is going out of business and all their rods > happened to be on sale. I checked out all the casting toys they had > and finally settled on a T&T Horizon, while the girlfriend picked up a > set of waders for herself that actually fit well. Before we left I > picked up a very stylish cordura covered fly box that played a huge > part in the evenings fishing. So, armed with new goodies we headed off > to Sawyer Park in the middle of town and started wading and casting. > After watching her cast for some time, I told her that if the next > cast looked great, she could use a fly out of my "special" fly box... > (just wait). Well the next cast came and it looked great, I handed her > the new cool fly box and without opening it, she stuck it in the top > of her waders and kept fishing. I told her to open the box and she > reluctantly handed over her rod and looked inside. To her surprise she > didn't see any flys so she closed it up (all this with out taking her > eyes off of her fly on the water). I asked (TOLD) her to open the box > and look again, she did and found the wedding ring that was nestled > inside. I asked her then, with the sunset giving a lightshow on the > bottoms of the clouds, for her hand, and she accepted. An interesting > aside.... While I was holding both rods and nervously fidgeting (and > sweating bullets), I looked down to see that I had been roll casting > both rods at the same time, one in each hand.... As soon as I noticed > what I was doing I promptly tangled them together. > > The next few days were a mix of fishing and sight seeing around > central Oregon, and we fished the Metolious and Deschutes in various > places. We hired a guide and boat for our last day on Tuesday only to > find out that the water was still too warm due to a heat wave that had > been ongoing for a while and the fish were off the bite. We still > spent a full day on the water starting pre-dawn and ending when the > wind came up too strong to cast into around 7 pm. A full day casting > an 8wt leaves you feeling it the next day I found out. The guide we > had, Shane out of the Numb-Butt Fly shop in Madris, happened to bring > his spey rod with him so I got to learn the double spey cast... WOW! > We would fish through a run and at the end I was still casting just > for the fun of it. All in all we had a great vacation but not too many > fish. Our fish count for 5 days was 3 trout over 11", and except for > the last day about 3 hours actually fishing per day. I was able to > come away from the trip with a love for the area and a fianc� and a > lot of great fishing memories with my best friend. >
