Sunday, September 27, 2009

Code Twelve, One Rainbow Four - Do You Copy?

Mostly done editing. Not quite all the way finished with some of they arty shots, but what the hell. You're gonna get what we have because we're pretty sure that after last week, the anadromous fish population of this flow has an APB out on us and we don't wanna stay in one place too long.

Paddy was nice enough to loan us a cool fisheye lens for the duration, and although we haven't officially asked him yet, we're angling to take it on RoadTrip '09 v3 as well - which would be cool, seeing as how we don't think we could sell enough blood and assorted bodily fluids in the next week to afford one of these bad larrys for ourselves.

Narwhal and Drifter were excellent company as usual, and with the exception of the first night's random photos of dirt and leaves ("Push harder, dude...Yes, THAT button."), he proved an able lensman and capably brave in the face of a charging turkey sandwich, no mayo.

Once on the river, we were all business...ok, not really. But we went down that thing like we had a mask and a gun. No nook, no cranny, no side-channel was safe with us around. Armed with a 4-year-old can of bear spray and a net, we got into places that the bears didn't even wanna be.

At any rate, here's the goods from RoadTrip '09 v2.2. To get in the appropriate mood, a Fisha might wanna open a beer and crank up a little Parliament/Funkadelic to fully capture the moment...then again, maybe that's just us.

Every now and then, the plane flies over things that don't have clouds over them.






The fine folks in the 1st class section were nice enough to provide us with many of these tasty scenery-enhancing beverages.


Ready to rumble.




This guy jumped into a tree. Really.




Narwhal on the sticks.






Three from the Giving Tree.






Cheering section.




The MoneyBucket was good to us - when we could keep 'em from going around the rootwad. 2 casts, 2 dance partners.




Sunrise, day 4.




The always-amusing game of "Feed the Starving Dog".






23° and fishy.






The fish we came for.






Back-channel dirty love.


More back-channel dirty love.


The Last Good Cast.


The last night.


RoadTrip '09 v2.2 is now closed. Frantic preparations have begun for v3 in the form of matériel acquisition and massive amounts of fly-tying, but every now and then we sit still, close our eyes, and dream of last week's dance partners.


We wouldn't want it any other way.

Saturday, September 26, 2009

In the Bag

RoadTrip '09 v2.2 is officially in the bag.

We got back to town a few days ago, just in time for that minor annoyance called work. Even an inconvenience like that was not enough to dim the light emanating from within as we glowed with the satisfaction of being in the right place at the right time.

Let's just say that if you were fishin' the same thing we were fishin', you prolly did pretty damn good, too.

We're still editing - over 350 shots from 3 different cameras - but soon we'll manage to get it all in one place and put it to bed. In the meantime, we'll leave you with this.









No time to waste - only 13 days 'til RoadTrip '09 v3

Friday, September 18, 2009

Pins and Needles

RoadTrip '09 v2.1 is scratched.

Work is an annoyance, but it pays for all the cool stuff we get to do in the 8 months we don't work. Sometimes, work and fun have conflicting schedules - anyone wanna guess which one wins out?

The first leg of v2.1 was to commence last Tuesday. After getting the news of a kink in the endgame work pattern, tickets were exchanged and funds re-funded towards RoadTrip '09 v3, the October Harvest Trip. We cried a little, but tried not to sniffle in public, and figured that if we couldn't get to fish the big river with Narwhal and Drifter this year, it wasn't meant to be.

Things started looking up last night.

With just 36 hours notice, we have a reprieve of 5 days.

RoadTrip '09 v2.2 is on, kids. We have been throwin' things in the washer and sorting through gear and painting beads like a house on fire. Less than 20 hour 'til the plane leaves, and we still have a pile of beads to cure, a mess of leaders to tie, and a few dozen flesh flies to whip up.



Just about there...Tomorrow at this time, one of these will be in the mouth of a finny friend at mile 81, river left.



Game on, kids.

See you in a week.