Let me start off by apologizing to all our loyal TTH readers who I know are out there.  I have run into quite a few of you at our local cascade lakes who have asked if the site is still going and why many of us no longer post reports or pics.  I'm not much of an "excuses" guy, but do feel like i've had to adjust my priorities over the past few years.  My sweet daughter, Madyson, just recently turned 12 and I have been very active in her favorite sport, softball.  She is on a traveling team here in Newberg, Oregon and we are busy almost every weekend from April thru July playing in tournaments across Northern Oregon and Southern Washington.  This year I become an official ASA assistant head coach on our Newberg Tigers Fastpitch team.  We actually started practicing in early February, so free time and free weekends come at a premium these days!  Also, my handsome young son, Wyatt, loves to play baseball and will soon turn 10.  As many of you fathers know, this leaves little time to getaway for a fishing trip, but I'm definitely not complaining.  I love my kids and treasure these times of sports activities.  Just trying to reason with our readers why my reports have been few and far between over the past few years.  I still am able to get away and hit our great cascade lakes from time to time, but not as regular as when the kids were infants or toddlers.  It is also hard to find the time to write up a report between work, kids, sports, and family time.  However, there is one trip every year we do that I feel obligated to do a report on since it is so special to me, and that is our Annual Dad's Weekend trip with Team Wildish. 

Brian and I always try and plan this trip 6 months or so in advance in order to book a cabin for our dads.  We love to support our local resort owners, and it is definitely a nice comfort coming into a cabin after a long cold (most of the time) day on the water.  Get warmed up and eat a great meal.  Drink a cold beer around a warm wood stove......it just doesn't get much better.  Unfortunately, it is always a crapshoot booking a cabin that far in advance because we never know what the winter/spring is going to bring, especially at the higher elevations like at Newberrry Crater.  Lucky for us, we had a VERY mild winter and our timing for a good weather trip with our dads was primed for May this year.  Hard to believe this marked our 9th year of doing this invaluable trip with our old men!  So thankful and blessed for the foresight of doing this every year and can't thank my lovely wife, Robyn, enough for allowing me the time spent with my father for 4 days of fishing each year.  As it turned out, this was right up there with the best ever dad's weekend trip.

Dad and I arrived to Paulina Lake a good number of hours after the Wildishs', and soon learned of their success on a couple browns over the 5 pound mark.  We congratulated them and thought alright this could be good!  We went out that evening and didn't have much success, but Team Wildish put another nice fish in their boat that evening.  Water temps were running in the low 40's so we knew the fish would most likely be feeding in the shallows both early and late in the day.  That night we talked strategy with Brian and Gary over a nice hot Figaro's pizza dad and I brought up from La Pine.  The food hit the spot and we celebrated the successes of Team Wildish's quality catches of multiple browns over 5 pounds in just the one day of fishing.  Brian and I had a plan to work the shallows the next morning in certain areas of the lake we have grown to know hold big browns.  Much of this knowledge was from the school of hard knocks but also from studying the likes of legends like the Hahns, Allan Cole, Ron Lane, John Hofferd, Dan Stewart, and Guy Carl. 

The next morning came bright and early like they always do in this sport.  Team Wildish set out and we were not far behind. Dad and I were determined to work the shallows and work them HARD.  The conditions were prime for lunker browns with a good nice wind chop on the water with descent sized waves and cloudy overcast skies.  We repeatedly beat the shallows to death working our lures back and forth over certain areas of the big lake.  The action was non-stop and insane to be honest!  Almost every pass we were either catching or hooking browns.  The only down side of this was that they were all in the 12" to 16" size range.  Nice fish, but we were looking for 20"+ sized ones.  The fish count kept going up and up, but the size of the browns remained the same.  I just kept telling dad there is no reason to go find fish when we are already on them.  Just a matter of time before a big fish slams us.  Not long after thinking this, I hooked a nice fish for a brief second before he completely cut my leader in half.  Lost the lure and everything!  I caught a quick glimpse and it was definitely a fish over 5 pounds, the type we were looking for! 

Around 9 am, we decided to move to a different area of the lake not knowing it to be a super productive area, but just going on gut instinct and watching the way the wind was blowing and taking into consideration the conditions that were being presented to us at the time.  I had on a lucky craft lure in kokanee pattern and Dad was using a Rick Clune lure I recently picked up at Cabelas.  It didn't take long and we were catching fish in this new area we had just moved to.  Then finally, I was into a better fish that seemed to be pulling harder and felt heavier.  As she approached the boat, I could easily tell she was bigger than the dinks we had been catching.  Dad grabbed the net and I slid her into it.  She was a fat dandy healthy hen weighing in at 5 pounds but was only 20.5" long!  We took a few pics and sent her on her way.  Dad and I high fived and immediatley knew the move to a new area paid off with the biggest brown of the day so far.