As you may know, I’ve had the good fortune of fishing on the USA Masters Fly Fishing Team.  Last year, Bret Bishop, Pete Erickson, Loren Williams, Mike Sexton and I took home the Gold Medals in Italy.  None of this could have happened without our generous friend and sponsor, Jerry Arnold.  Jerry has been covering all our competitions from entry fee, flights, hotels, food and etc. making competing possible for a longtime.  Winning gold last year was awesome for all of us but by far what was most satisfying was seeing the Gold placed around Jerry.

I promise you we celebrated the day we received those medals while over in Italy.  But the festivity was brief and before we knew it we were all home and back to work in our busy lives.  This weekend Jerry flew us all down to Arkansas to fish the White River.  We stayed at the White River Trout Club and enjoyed guides, great food and I guess you could say, we celebrated.

The White River Trout Club is a gorgeous property on the banks of the White eight miles below the Bull Shoals Dam.  There are trout rising along its banks.  Jerry got us all cozy rooms with fridges full of beer.  After a homemade breakfast this morning we hit the river.

Teammate Mike Sexton is a guide here on the White and he manned his boat for Bret and Pete.  Jerry headed out with White River legend, Davy Wotton.  Loren and I fished with the young and energetic, Michael Saladin.  The best part about the White River in June is that you can count on big brown trout on dry flies.

Michael ran us upstream in his boat a couple miles and we began a drift down the bank.  White River boats are larger than traditional drift boats and although you can row them, its hard to completely stop a boat for a cast.  Despite Michael digging hard to slow us down when we found rising bank-feeding browns, it still wasn’t a complete stop.  You need to make your first and usually only cast count.

Luckily there were lots of risers this morning.  Enough so that you could blow a few then kick back and wait a few minutes and you would be on another.  Loren and I worked hard.  Though most the times we got the cast, usually the fish would snub our offerings.

These trout were tough.  I changed flies more than I have in a long time going parachutes to upright style mayflies, spinners and I even tried a beetle.  I got a rainbow trout and some looks but we were far from cracking the code.  At the advice of Michael I finally put on an emerger.  It was a Quigley Cripple, an old favorite of mine but it sits low in the water and can be hard to see.

I should have gone to an emerger style fly sooner.  I spotted a dimple of a rise an inch from a grassy bank.  I wasn’t entirely sure I saw a fish.  But I tossed my Quigley there and boom!  Fish on!  I landed a beautiful brown trout easily around that sacred 20” mark.

Once the skunk was out of the boat things got rolling good for us.  I started watching for more tiny rises inches from the bank and found some.  Soon after the first brown, I stuck a couple more and landed another.  Then Loren put a dandy in the boat as well.

By 1 PM its hot here in Arkansas.  The controlled flows of the White rise at this time as well and soon the fish went to hiding.  We ended what was a phenomenal morning before 2 PM then returned to the water for the evening.

In the evening things were different.  We had a midafternoon thunderstorm and after it passed it left us temperatures on the low 70°s with a steady drizzle.  If you don’t think you can get cold in Arkansas you are incorrect!

While the fishing was ok, it was not like the morning.  I fished with Pete this session and finding fish was a challenge.  Michael worked hard for us though and Pete and I didn’t disappoint.  We had a few rainbows mixed in to go with some nice browns as you can see.  It was a great time and we pulled off the river shivering around 8 PM

We just finished and incredible fish dinner.  Not local Arkansas fish but rather fish Jerry caught in Alaska last week.  The chef here at the lodge cooked us up sockeye salmon, halibut and rockfish.  It was all you could eat and absolutely amazing.

That’s all for tonight.  We’re sipping beers under a canopy of oak and hickory trees on our deck.  The fireflies are glittering in every direction and on the other side of the White we hear two whippoorwills.  We’ll be back on the water tomorrow!

Jeff Currier Global Fly Fishing