Erie

[Jfey]

Bullship, Franzen and I made the trip to Erie to meet up with about 40 other guys from the Drake forum to drink, eat, laugh and occasionally fish.  All of those items worked out very well.  Food consisted of chili dogs, fajitas, pork, prime rib, fried halibut, french fries, baked beans homemade pie and several pickled items.  This was all spread out over several days, but no one was hungry around camp.   I think I finally stopped laughing sometime before I went to bed last night.  Good times all around and makes the 9-10 hour drive seem reasonable.

Got in Thursday night and found my bed/living space for the next three nights. 



Friday was windy with low water that eventually rose and turned to chocolate.   I hooked up with a nice brown dredging the bottom, but that was it.   Here is the only pic I took


After gorging on food and taking plenty of turns with the liquor shelf I was up early on Sat and very anxious to break the skunkage.



After walking about a mile downstream, I found a person in our group on a nice stretch of water.  We rotated through the hole several times, swtiching rigs after each run.  The results were good.





I dropped this fish multiple times.  Bully has some good action shots of me trying to get it under control




After flogging the hole to the point of no return, I moved up to fish some fast water and saw a nice steelhead trying to navigate the waterfall.   I dropped a fly into this small seam he was holding in and he hit it just as it touched the water.  Freakin cool as hell.  Had another do the same thing on in the next seam over, but didn't land that one.




I celebrated with a beer


Moved upstream to some new water as it was getting dark.  The fish in the slow water were hugging the bottom and moving out of the way of any presentations, so I tried the head of the riffle and caught a juvenile to end the day



Back to camp for more hilariousness

Fire fail


Much better


Getting the halibut ready to burn my mouth


The cook feeding the masses. 



Good night


I'm paying for it today, but worth it.

[Dougfish]

You had me at "Bullship, Franzen and I.....".

I started laughing right then.
You suck. 

[Transylwader]

Bastages. Got your texts. Y'all really suck. I wanna see pics of that Yinzer all messed up n shit...

[raz]

ha, man, i got blasted friday.  paid for it dearly saturday.   

[bullship]

[bullship]

I had a terrible time. These are literally the only photos I took aside from the fumble montage. Hands were full of beer. I laughed some demons away. Yankees are pretty ok. Even some Canadians.

[Big J]

He looks happy playing with that trout 

Nice trip.  Looks like it was a blast.

[Michael Toris]

If hands that big cannot hold on to that fucking thing, I want no part of it.

Overall,  it looked like it sucked so I feel better about staying at home.

[RiverbumCO]

Everything is gay and stuff.

[Grannyknot]

Here is what I gathered....
Y'all got real drunk and slept in beds not fit for a psych ward.
JFey wrassled with a fish.
Everyone slept while bully drove them around.
Hard to tell what was happening with the fire.
Lots of solitude on the crik.

[sanjuanwormhatch]

Looks cold, dreary and awesome.
Gas line to fire fail?  By the way I have one of those torches.  Best damn $15 I've ever spent. 
If I so much as sniffed that liquor bar my vision would probably be similar to the focus of the picture.
Is there such thing as a decent stretch not stacked up like that?  Is that right at the lake and that's why it's so crowded?  Inquiring minds...

[Big J]

Looks cold, dreary and awesome.
Gas line to fire fail?  By the way I have one of those torches.  Best damn $15 I've ever spent. 
If I so much as sniffed that liquor bar my vision would probably be similar to the focus of the picture.
Is there such thing as a decent stretch not stacked up like that?  Is that right at the lake and that's why it's so crowded?  Inquiring minds...

You thinking about taking your fiberglass spey rod up there?

[raz]

bullship, that traffic jam looks like 79 north cutting over to 70 west just west of washington, pa.

yes? 

[bullship]

It's busy. If you're a peace and solitude or bust kinda guy, then it's likely bust. But, for me, to be honest, the fishing, is like, secondary, you know? I mean...it's a fishing trip. Not a fishing trip. Dig?

[bullship]

bullship, that traffic jam looks like 79 north cutting over to 70 west just west of washington, pa.

yes?

Bingo!