So today was a day to wander the East Fork Lewis and visit the usual haunts to see what type of activity might be swirling around. Zachary, my 7 year-old son was my first mate on this epic adventure upriver to each available public access we could manage. Our trip began at Lewisville Park, a beautiful park set outside of Battle Ground along the East Fork. The water is running at a nice level, and there were quite a few anglers littered about the river near the park at the usual holding areas. Little success from what I could see, and a host of methods being thrown at each seam.
We meandered along the couple of miles of bank we could, collecting a few rocks here and there for his collection. Nothing too rare today, but a couple of finds indeed. He's busy washing those while I write this before our dinner of turkey soup.
While Lewisville was a buzz with walkers and fishermen, farther upstream offered more vacancy along the river. Zach and I were carefully pacing the bank, watching the foam line develop and spying a rare splash at the surface where a frisky one decided to flash us. We followed this new clue as to their holding place and found a few well-aged spawning Coho hanging in the shallows. I scurried slowly down to the river and did my best cat-like impression to sneak up on the two, but to no avail. I caught some video here but couldn't get the camera under water for a better shot of them. I'll post if it is worthy...
After our failed attempt at Hollywood, we carried ourselves up the river a mile or so until we reached a large falls, where two fisher folk had been making their offering for the day. I saw no action on their line but stopped them for a quick chat.
Action had been slow today, but stories were surfacing lately about winters making their way into the system. A few summers still hanging about, and quite a few coho spawning throughout. As river levels begin to rise and fall in a more dramatic way in the coming month, I can only assume I better check back on this system often. Of course, I probably won't report on what I find. Or I'll lie.
