This year’s long, cold, wet spring has not been so good for kayak fishing. High water, at or near flood stage in the main rivers has made fishing there dangerous and the high country lakes, perfect for kayak fishing, have been snowed in until recently. Add to all that, it’s been really windy. All these things make for a slow kayak fishing spring.
The wind died down enough to venture up into the Gifford Pinchot National Forest, which has a number of great backcountry fishing spots.
Got up to Goose Lake late in the afternoon and immediately launched to do some fishing. It was sunny and hot with a fairly good breeze. It doesn’t take a lot of wind to kick up these small lakes.
The really good news that that the fish were biting. Usually the afternoons are not that great here; early mornings and late evenings seem to have the best bite. The cool thing about this lake is that it’s stocked with brown and cutthroat trout that weigh at least a pound; a little bigger than standard stocked fish. Some of the fish, especially the brown trout, seemed to weigh more than a pound, for sure.
After catching a half dozen or so chunky trout and getting a bit of a sunburn, I loaded up the kayak and went to look for a campsite for the night. Plenty of places to camp around the lake, just pick a spot without a “No Camping” sign. I didn’t need anyplace fancy, just a place to park the truck, drink a few beers and get to sleep early to make the 3:30 AM wakeup call the next day.
Did a little tune up on the ultralight fishing gear
Getting in the camper shell early was a good idea. This is a beautiful area with lots of wildlife, unfortunately, most of the wildlife are bugs. The mosquitoes around here are legendary and they were out this night. I hit the sack before I needed to spray myself with insect repellent, which you absolutely must have if you come here. Inside the camper, I could see and hear the bloodthirsty mosquitoes hovering around the screens.
Up at 3:30 AM, pack up and head back to the lake. Even though it’s the middle of summer, the nights and early mornings can be a little chilly, so be prepared. Got the kayak rigged and ready to go in the dark, by 4:45 AM it was starting to get light; time to shove off. Dead glass, clear, starry skies.
An early start was a good call; the fishing was great. Probably caught a dozen fish before the sun came up.
About 6:30 AM or so the sun peeked over the tall forest trees
The fishing conditions were perfect
The bite was on, fish were surfacing and jumping everywhere
About 9:30 AM, things slowed down a little. After an early start, I’d had a good session and caught a lot of fish so I packed it in and headed back to civilization, or what counts as civilization around here.
All in all, a nice little adventure. Goose Lake is one of my favorite kayak fishing spots
Keep in mind that, as of this year, you will need a Northwest Forest Pass or pay $5 a day at the area. The annual pass is $30 so you can figure which is best way to go. A lot of places that used to have free day use parking now cost $5, so keep that in mind and do some checking before you go. These passes are supposedly good at areas in Washington and Oregon. Many of these lakes are pretty remote and there’s no cell phone coverage so you have to be pretty self contained and be prepared to take care of yourself.