After a long and rainy winter/spring in Eugene, fishing
season left me unsatisfied. The McKenzie was hit or miss, and I was ready to
get into some fish. When my Uncle Mark called and said he wanted to take my
cousin Mitch and I on a trip I asked where he was thinking. He mentioned the
Lower D, which don’t get me wrong is one of my all time faves, but when he
mentioned some random lake I had not heard of, ice-off, and hungry fish, I was
convinced that was the ticket for my fix. Sorry D. Olallie Lake was the name,
and we were in for a real treat.
Ollalie Lake is located just west of Mt. Jefferson, and it
is one of the prettiest lakes I’ve had the privilege to fish. Getting there
though, took some luck and help from my sleep deprived cousin. The beautiful
drive up the picturesque Clackamas River and into Olallie Lake seemed to cause
his eyelids to become heavy enough to stay shut through every curve and sudden
“brake checks.” I was enjoying the scenery a little more than I should have
which resulted in a sudden realization that I may not have a drift boat on its
correct side through the curve if I didn’t slow down. The luck part came when I
just so happened to see a barely visible and faded “O” on some pavement. That
“O” stood for “Olallie Lake This Way”. Who’da thunk? As I mentioned earlier, I
needed my cousin’s help. That came when I misunderstood which road to take to
get to the lake. Oh that’s right, there were no signs, and multiple roads! No
big deal. I got up one road that was too narrow to turn around in with the
boat. So I woke up the sleep deprived teenager and told him we had to un-hook
the boat and turn around. He was happy to help and we had a few laughs. I
managed to guess the right road (after two or three forks I might add) and we
arrived at the campground eager to get to the lake. After a recap of the trip
up, a few more laughs, and some grub, we were set.
It was a beautiful day. The sun was shining and the grandeur
of Mt. Jefferson was incredible. My uncle was confident the fishing would be
good; he was unaware just how good it would be. See, we just happened to get
there after ice-off, and the campground had just opened. It was closed the week
prior due to snow. My aunt Lisa dropped us off and said she would be back to pick
us up in about an hour or so. We hopped in the drift boat and started trolling
around. Each of us tied on some version of a woolly bugger and cast out with
high hopes. Those hopes turned to doubt after about 30 minutes of a whole lot
of nothing. But we kept rowing and finally reached the other end of the lake.
That’s where the fun really began.
Mitch was the first one to hook a fish. It was about 9-10
inches. Nice fish. Then I hooked one. Similar size. Then Mitch hooked one. Then
I hooked one. Then Mitch hooked another. Then I hooked another. Mark was
laughing the entire time because we could not, NOT catch a fish! We ended up
calling this stretch the gauntlet because every time Mark rowed through on the
edge of this shelf, Mitch and I successfully hooked (there were plenty of
missed hook sets which fueled Mark’s laughter) probably 3 or 4 fish each time
we ran the gauntlet. Pretty soon we remembered that we had to go meet Lisa at
the boat dock. Not ready to leave, we did. We met up with her and she asked how
the fishing was. We said it was just ok. There were many people on the bank and
we didn’t want to give up our spot or cause any mass exodus to where we had
found what seemed to be every fish in the lake. We told Lisa, who is an avid
fisherlady herself, to get in the boat. She wasn’t real eager. This was
probably because we downplayed the fishing. She caught on though when we told
here she HAD to get in the boat. We went right to the same spot. A few runs
through the gauntlet, and quite a few more fish and we were all laughing just
how good it was!
Mark was nice enough to row for us most of the time, but I
told him I would row for a bit so he could join in on the fun. I didn’t know he
would catch the biggest trout in the lake! Right after I had started rowing
Mark hooked a HOG! It was awesome. The fish was a beautiful rainbow that was
about 26 inches. I couldn’t help but give Mark a hard time and tell him I was happy to work on my trophy trout
photography skills. Honestly though, I was glad to do it. After all that
excitement we headed back and had a good ol’ fish fry for dinner.
The next day we hit the same side of the lake just off of a
shelf. The fish didn’t miss a beat. We probably hooked about 50 fish apiece that
weekend. Obviously we didn’t keep them all. Then I got to work on my trophy
trout photography…again! Mitch hooked another impressive rainbow and ended the
fishing trip on a high note.
Unfortunately I didn’t hook any trophies. However, the trip
was a memorable one and I was happy to capture it. In fact, a couple pictures
appeared in the Spring 2012 issue of Fly Fisher and Tyer Journal. So I got that
going for me.
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