Annual Mega Smallie Trip

So for the last three years, a couple buddies and myself make the three hour drive into the mountains of Dent/Orofino and chase state record size smallmouth(current state record is 9 3/4.) This year was a bit different as we have seen three fish over 8lbs, atleast ten over 7 and countless 5-6+ pound fish come out of the lake in the last three weeks so expectations were high. 

First day we roll into the ramp around 6am with a slight rain and no wind. We make the hour run to our first spot in the "three creeks" area to find a boat on the biggest point in the area, bummer but it's okay, we have three days to find one fish. Make a slight move to a secondary point and flat known as "Norisada Corner" and bust out the blades. The lake is completely littered with stumps so within five casts I've broke off two blades and pick up the Steez A, Alpha Zilla and Keitech 3.3 setup. Fire out a 45° cast into roughly 30ft and start the slow drag followed by a faint *tick* and swing. What feels like a small fish comes within sight and my boater goes "that's actually a good one! Real light color!" as he dips the net and brings her in. First fish, hour into the first day is a 5lb 12oz beat up ole one.

We continue fishing the spot and catch a few 12", 2.5lb fish before moving back to the first point we wanted to fish. We line up on the current seem and my boater picks up the 2.8 keitech and fires it out along the drop in about 25ft of water and begins the drag. Same deal, slight *tick*, swing and then the rod completely bows. Immediately he looks and me and is locked up not able to turn the fish. She comes to the surface fast but is too fat to jump. He begins grinding her closer as I grab the net and lean out as she starts a jump, lands in the net and I bring her in. As soon as I lifted the fish out of the net I know it's different and tell him to grab the scale. I'll preface this by saying I've held a 7.00 before and this fish was in that same realm, just shorter and wider. Scale settles at 7lbs 1oz and 21" length by 18" girth. I'll get a pic of his once we are making our posts public. We fish around and start looking for schools of Kokanee to chase the next day in anticipation of what's possibly to come.

Day two starts beautiful. Load gear around 6:15, on the water by 6:30 and on the first spot by 7:35. Only problem is the bite has changed. We begin "point hopping" around the main wintering area of the lake looking for any large schools of Kokanee only to be stumped when they won't eat. After 5 hours of this we go find our friend Ian who has been sitting way off a main point all day watching his active target chasing schools with an a-rig. His first sentence is "I lost an 8-9lb fish but I have a 7 in the well...." We troll over and offer to take his pic and get measurements so he can get a replica and he shows us the active target and how it works(we run a gen 3 hds9, nothing too fancy but we are dialled in with it)

I fire out my little keitech out to about 35ft and slow drag it while bs-ing with the boys when I feel a slight *tick* again and notice resistance. I swing and my rod doubles over. She digs, I dial back the drag and let her do her thing. She turns to come up and gets met with the net. I can tell she's bigger than my previous days fish and immediately grab the scale, she locks in at 6lbs 7oz tying my personal best from three weeks prior with a 19.75" length by 17.5" girth. Needless to say I was stoked, the "audience" was cheering and many laughs were shared. Seasons not over and the fish are just getting deeper. Until next time y'all!