Salmon River Steelhead On the Move 5

After a few phone calls to some fellow steelhead sicko's like Bob Ball from Piscatorial Pursuits, Steve "The Legend" Maris at Enumclaw Auto Rebuild, and Justin Crump of AEG Media fame I settled on the Salmon River as our destination for this weeks steelhead expedition. Our original destination was the Bogey, but Bob wasn't sure if it would still be in shape on Tuesday after the monsoon started and both Stam and Crump matched my opinion about the Salmon. Conditions were setting up nicely for this little Olympic Peninsula river.

Crump gave me the number of a somewhat new Quinault guide named Jordan Curley that "really had a great gig going on the Salmon." A quick phone call to Jordan confirmed an opening for Tuesday and dad I quickly jumped on it. In just a few minutes on the phone I knew we'd get along great with him and I couldn't have been more right.

Heavy rains on Monday night had made the Queets borderline fishable and after flogging one of the best gravel bars to no avail first thing in the morning we headed up to the Salmon River hatchery to find the place devoid of people. Hit the Salmon River just after a big rain in December and nutty things can happen. While I knew that this wouldn't be one of those insane 30 fish days that happen here the hint of color the river was taking on from the previous night's rain would have'em snapping.

Dad was pitching a pink jig into a pocket right at the mouth of the hatchery creek for oh, say, ten minutes when Jordan walked up and pitched one of his beads into the run. A 12 pound chrome steely slammed the bead immediately and went berserk, busting the leader just before running the mainline around a snag. All grins, Jordan pointed to another little pocket just downstream and dad promptly hooked into an 8 pound buck on the pink jig. Jordan pulled the same stunt on me later, waiting patiently until I finished drifting a run before slipping in and hooking fish with his home-brewed beads. The kid is fishy, real fishy! 

We picked apart the pocket water downstream approximately 1/4 mile from the hatchery and hooked somewhere around ten steelhead and a chrome silver that Jordans friend Carl hooked on a small Gooey Bob. I fished a small cluster of eggs under a float, dad stuck with the jig, and Jordan used his Raven centerpin to deliver small beads to the wary steelhead. Both he and Carl had great luck with the beads, one of which was Jordans own custom bead. I'm sworn to secrecy, you'll just have to see it for yourself.

The upper Salmon River near the hatchery can only be fished with a Quinault tribal guide and most charge approximately $125 per day for access to the river. With the number of steelhead in the river this time of years it's money well spent, as hookups are all but guaranteed if it's fishable. Jordan Curley has a great personality, excellent customer service skills, is very knowledgable, and flat out just loves to fish. He specializes in flyfishing and center pin fishing, but don't hesitate to call him for a gear fishing trip on the Salmon either.

With the rain Washington is getting right now this little river is poised to produced some off-the-charts steelhead fishing in the coming weeks. Jordan Curley's phone number is (360) 580-4857 and his email address is JordanCurley@hotmail.com. Better get your spot while he still has dates available!  

Click on the image below for a quick VIDEO I slammed together from yesterdays Salmon River steelhead action. It was POURING down rain and I didn't break the camera out as much as I would have liked. Can't wait to go back!