Overnight Float Trip, 6/11-6/12

[OKFlyFisher44]

The crew and I made our way over to the Kings River on friday night where we met up with a couple other buddies to do an overnight float on the Kings River. Our plan was to float from Trigger Gap to HWY 62 bridge using my drift boat, Joey's canoe, and Coreys kayak. We launched saturday morning at 7AM and began our 13 mile float to HWY 62.

Fishing started off slow on sat. morning but got better as the day went on. We were throwing a variety of crawfish and baitfish patterns throughout the morning before we finally got the fish dialed in. Baitfish patterns seemed to be the key as clousers and other minnow type flies were bringing fish to hand. I had good luck on a dark green/white clouser for the 1st part of the day but, later on, switched to an #6 olive Circus Peanut and drug it across the bottom with good success.

We found an awesome gravel bar that evening and set up camp for the evening. We were worried for a while as a storm blew in but never dumped any rain on us. It seems to swirl around us and go to the north, clearing up and making for a great night to camp. We woke up the next morning early to yet another storm trying to blow in on us. We went into panic mode and started tearing camp down. The storm seemed to die off so we took our time taking camp down and loading the boats up. As we finished up, we took some group pictures with the boats before we launched and then, just as we stowed the cameras away, it started to POUR! It rained HARD on us for a good 30 minutes as we floated down river. It started to lightning and thunder as we went so nobody fished which made us pass up some sweet looking water. It finally cleared up and the weather just got better as the day went on.

Fishing, once again, started off slow in the morning but soon picked up after the sun came out when the clouds cleared. Once again, baitfish patterns were the go-to flies for the day. The fish were hanging out in the shallow water amongst the chunk rock, chasing baitfish all day, which was pretty cool to watch. For me, when Joey took over on the sticks...I stuck several smallies on the circus peanut once again. It was like fishing a jig on the bottom, just drag it or bounch it along the bottom and the fish would inhale it!

Overall, we had a great weekend and float. The fishing was great, nothing big came to the net though. We caught a few around 16" with most of our fish being in the 12-14" range which were a ball on the 5 and 6 weights. We did see several really nice fish but they were super spooky while holding in that shallow water. This was my 1st trip on the Kings and absolutely love this river. It was great fishing....