Back to the SoHo.
I was out the door at 5 and made good time on the 150 mile trip stopping only for coffee and gas.
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The river was shrouded in early morning fog and you couldn't see 100 yards.
Second cast and I'm into a big brown, I can see it in the eddy. I must be at least 20 inches long. I don't know if I was unprepared or still had cobwebs, but I don't think I got a good hook set on this one and it didn't stay on the line for long. Many smaller fish came to the net and it was turning out to be a good day even if it was spitting rain. The temperature was cool and I don't think it got out of the low 60's in the morning. I didn't pack a rain jacket, my son had borrowed it for Camp Raven (Rainin') Knob and he hadn't finished unpacking.
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The rain began to come down harder and I was getting soaked, but the fish were still biting and it wasn't that cold. I was working my favorite run and I hooked into a whale, I set the hook as hard as I dared with 6x and watched in utter amazing as a huge rainbow blasted into sub orbit leaping clear over the raging current. I got an excellent broadside view of the entire fish, with its vibrant red stripe highlighting its length not 15 feet across from where I stood in the shallows. I would have to say that this fish would measure 30 inches. There I said it! Thirty inches and I stand by it. I've looked a a yard stick at home and am confident in my estimate. The only other way I can describe this fish is to say that it was well over 2 feet long! Unfortunately that's the end of this story. The fish unbuttoned as it turned downstream and the hooked pulled free. I cursed. I cursed the fish, I cursed the rain, but I kept on fishing. A short time later I had a big brown on the line, I fought it up and down the current and I was confident that I would soon have it in my net. It ran back across to my side of the river towards the sunken tree. I was sure that I held the fish above it. But it had different ideas and submerged under the trunk and broke off.
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At this point the rain really started to bother me, I surly would have kept on fishing if I had a rain jacket. I was almost shivering, the rain was running down my back, my vest was thoroughly soaked and I called it quits.
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I headed for Webb's and stopped in for the Sunday buffet lunch, an enormous spread of potato and macaroni salads, coleslaw, corn, green beans, mashed potatoes, meat loaf, backed chicken, roast pork, and much much more, not to mention blackberry cobbler, banana pudding, and several cakes too.
It was still raining after 'lunch' so I headed over to the Wal-mart and picked up a cheap rain jacket and then went to fish the Watauga for the afternoon as the generation on the SoHo would soon drive everybody off the river.
I worked a run hard and only caught 4 or 5 smaller rainbows, guess I wasn't use to fishing the Watauga, I moved on down to Sycamore Shoals and gave that a try. I was surprised to see that they were growing tobacco as part of the historical museum. I wonder how politically correct that will be in a few years.
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Caught a few browns and rainbows at the Shoals and then I started thinking about having a homebrew. There wasn't a good place nearby to sit and relax, so I hauled down the road to the Beaverdam hoping that there would be a hatch and I could cast to rising fish.
The river was up and stained from the rain. I couldn't find fish in the runs and pocket water and the wading was tough. I realized that I had left my wading staff in the trunk. I needed it to negotiate the slippery rocks. I finally hooked a little bow right up against the rocky bank. Then I took a nice fall, both knees hit the rocks as I tried to protect the bamboo by allowing my forearms to break my fall. Sharp pain radiating from both knees kept my from getting up and the water just flowed down my shirt.
I finally picked myself up and sat down on the bank and ended the day drinking a "Watauga Wit" homebrew.
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