Bourbon, Flies, and Lies: Maine

Day 11 A Day out in a boat and this whale of an opportunity was only possible because of the generosity of others. We went out of the Piscataqua River. First off what a beautiful river and it was full of bait. I don’t know what types of bait exactly, but it was everywhere.

After seeing the first striper boated with bait, I switched from the eggbeater to the fly rod and then to bait.

We went out to sea lol to catch some mackerel and these were a lot of fun to catch on sabiki rigs. This reminded me of what we call perch jerkin up on the great lakes. We fish with emerald shiners on a spreader with a heavy weight on the bottom. The spreader has 4 to 6 baited hooks. When one nails it you reel up a little and the others feel compelled to do the same the most likely say “well Earl ate one well why not!”.

We caught almost 2 dozen and headed back in from the 4 to 5 footers. Side note I am glad I took some Dramamine cause this old sea dog does not have his sea legs like he used to! I did well and at some points I was impressed.

We lived lined with mackerel with circle hooks and this was a total new experience for me. After missing a few after feeling with bait go nuts because it was getting nervous, I took the boat captain’s word for it and reeled slowly in.

This was the same slow retrieved motion up in the southerly north Maine woods ironically enough.

Then on a medium heavy rod the magic happened a stripper took my money! It was on and took drag out like I hooked an E-bike!

I fought it for a few minutes trading line for line and then finally I gained ground on it. I got it to circle the boat and finally got to see this nice slot. It was Bert almost all grown up. Lol

I am always open to all sorts of styles of fishing and sometimes as long as it’s legal you have to change it up.

Thank you to my new friends, I had a whale of a time and again I greatly appreciate you and all you did for me to give me an experience that will last forever.

Day 7, 8, and 9 The Southerly Edge of the North Maine Woods

I headed out to the North Maine woods, and this will be as remote as I have been in a long time when it comes to the continental United States.

I headed to the southeasterly outskirts of Greenville and was on roads that are rougher than a cobb! Now, I get it they are logging roads and roads that are just improved enough to be driven. I also realize that these roads are made this way to keep maintenance down to a minimum.

So, after traversing these roads. I made it to the Big Eddy Campground. Driving this direction allowed me to see the B52 crash site and one huge bull moose that had been eating well all year.

He was crossing the road I stopped well before he stepped onto the road to give him a wide berth. It was amazing to watch him wind his way up the mountain in between trees. This was my first moose and kind of brought me some type of strange closure to a small part of my life.

I will have a post on my blog about the B52 crash site so people reading this don’t think I just brush it off.

Back to talking about camp. This campground is really nice and was better than I had expected being in the southern reaches of the North Maine woods region.

I would have expected the weather to be a lot cooler. I expected frosts most nights and the temperatures being in the 50’s during the day.

It was none of this. It got maybe into the high 40’s at night and well into the 60’s during the day.

So, the reel reason I even choose this area is because of its bortle rating. Right now you’re saying Bortle rating what’s that. Well, I will tell you.

This webpage will tell you what it is without me long in the tooth about it. Bortle Scale Definition

I did not really come up here to fish lol I was going to hike and take photos honestly. Then I invited a dear friend up there with me and came to find out he used to fish in this area a lot when he was younger.

So, he was gracious enough to show me around and it was a true blessing.

As we all know by now I enjoy swinging flies. I do also enjoy streamer fishing too for anything with gills. The take from a predator is normally violent.

I got my custom 10’8” switch rod and used my Skagit short 20’ head that has 350 grains. I would use as a leader a rio sinking leader of 1.5”/second and finished it off with a 4’ section of 4# seaguar floor so that I would not blow my anchor.

I tied on a dace pattern with a silver tinsel body and a red silk thread butt section. I tied these bigger than normal from what most throw on here I would imagine. The length of the fly is 2-3/4” to 3” on size 8 hook.

I knew I would hook nearly zero fish using these flies, but I was looking for the larger fish to have a poor judgement moment.

This is the same size I used on the remote pond in the Rangeley Plantation.

My friend arrived and we beat feet to the river and put his canoe in. This is where it gets interesting. I was able to cast with no issues and got some good swings.

We new that the likely hood of anyone covering this pool like we were fishing was highly unlikely. So, after trying to redefine the definition of insanity I said let me try something.

Before I overhead casted this bulky a$$ line and leader setup I felt the water. The water was warm and then it clicked. I bet these fish are lethargic and want it with a slow retrieve because of the water temp.

Well, they wanted it with painfully slow retrieve and with a long slow retrieve mother nature smiled upon me. The first fat and sassy LLAS (Land Locked Atlantic Salmon) was not so sassy because of the water temps. The other hens I hooked jumped and danced though. I can’t imagine fishing this in the summer if these temps I felt are warm it’s got to be like bath water in the summer.

I would bring several fish to hand using this method on this day. They ranged from 8” to 14”. Well, my friend did fish for a bit, but no LLAS came to hand this day.

We loaded up the canoe and went into camp and cooked hamburgers and brown rice for dinner over the two-burner propane grill.

We would go to the same section of river in the AM and figure out what to do from there. Because of my friend’s vast knowledge of the area I was blessed and did not have to think where to fish.

I brought one fish to hand my friend did bring three to hand out of this pool. We fished for a few hours then decided to hang it up on this pool.

He took me upriver into the wilds I call it. She’s fast and has no ducks to give in this section. You fall or get hurt all on your own here. Since this will be all pocket water fishing, I still used the same leader set up except for my main line was a SA steelhead master series 6wt and it loaded up well on my TFO TiCr 6wt. It’s the model with the fighting butt and is a nice rod.

I would swing soft hackles in brown and did well I was shocked really. One of thee hardest things was to figure out how they wanted the fly presented to them.

I used the limits of the bubble lines to pocket swing the fly through. Then I would fish the hang down and most of the LLAS came from that technique.

The soft hackles were 12’s and with a tungsten bead-head. I will post pictures of the flies. They were the same ones I tied up for my Montana trip a few years back.

I went out over night to look at the stars. I could clearly make out the Milky Way Galaxy. This made my trip know I picked the right place to go to see the stars and the Milky Way Galaxy.

I too took a few photos of them, but I inadvertently deleted them when I downloaded my photos. Lol It was only 6 photos but who knows how I deleted them. The images will always exist in my mind.

We got the canoe the same hole again, but this time my friend was the only one who brough fish to hand.

We fished for a short time, and I went swing the main hole in the upper river. People looked at me like I was nuts wading deep into the hole and swinging for the fences. I used my Skagit set up and I had one good bump, but the fish would not fully commit.