So it's taken me a bit of thinking on this trip to put it in perspective, and after you've heard the story I'll let you decide. This was probably the craziest thing I've ever done, probably the most difficult, and I apologize for the level of detail in the report, but it's a story that's gotta be told.

My brother and I had hiked in the 8 or so miles to Wallace lake once before to fish only 15 minutes for extremely good fishing. Wallace lake is a small but extremely deep mountain lake out of Gold Bar in the Skykomish Valley. We had heard rumor of Mackinaw up in the lake, and we wanted to check it out. So the first time we found that shore access to the lake is difficult at best and waders or a float are essential in fishing it. So I came up with the bright idea of hiking our raft into the lake.

Now our raft is the best raft for fishing two people. It's a our man Sea-Hawk with rod holders and a motor mount, perfect for carry-in only lakes and even trolling bug lakes with a small motor. Plus, it was only $80, which in this economy is a great deal for the amount of fishing that I love to do. Alas, the dry weight of the raft is probably about forty or fifty pounds, so it's not exactly tailored to carry in fishing.

But anyways, I've got this huge duffel and a bunch of straps, I figured with enough sinching and padding I could make it up so that the raft wouldn't be that difficult to carry. Which worked out well enough. Of course the duffel looked like some sorta frankenbag, with paddles (as my brother consistently would correct me they are actually OARS) sticking out willy-nilly and my rod and camera in it's impervious Pelican case strapped to it. Even though my brother had the "real" backpack and was carrying the rest of the gear, I imagine that this thing probably weighed in at 100 pounds. It was ridiculous, and ridiculous looking. But I was dead set on getting it to the lake.

So we got to the parking at Wallace Falls state park at about noonish, and Got all set. A couple on the way out warned us of muddy trail conditions. It was true, the gravel trail turns into a creek when the rains leave the mountains. It was a bright sunny day though, so we weren't discouraged.

About a mile and a half down the trail, my frankenpack started to fall apart and I was beat. My brother was like, maybe we should turn back, but I was steadfast in my determination. I rearranged the straps and stuff and put it all back together. IF it weren't for my Merril hiking boots and comfy wool socks, I don't think I'd've made it.

But we did. In record time. It took us two hours and a bunch of jokes about how crazy I was, but we made it to the lake with the raft. I don't think I've ever been so exhausted. I made my brother pump up the raft.

So it was sunny with a light mist when we started fishing. The water was relatively warm and slightly brown, and you could see fish rising all over the lake. Once we got the gear and Jack Bauer into the raft, we set out for the deepest part on the otherside. I made my brother row.

So now about the fishing. This lake is full of fish. Every cast of a spinner will get follows from hungry cutthroat. And when hookedthese fish fight like a nice wild cutthroat should fight. But we wanted to check out the rumors of Mack's in the depths. So my brother trolled a Little Cleo and I trolled a Kastmaster for a bit, but then it started to pour. On of those moments where it's perfectly sunny and then you blink, and you open your eyes and you're knee deep in rainwater in the bottom of your boat type of moments. I started to get cold, and trolling and sitting still just wasn't an option. we decided to fish the far bank for Cutty's instead.

What I found that worked the best was to let the spoon sink deep and then to reel it back medium-medium fast with and erratic retrieve and just as it leveled out near the surface is when they would strike. But they strike very quick and my reactions were a bit slowed, so I was having trouble setting the hook. As soon as I get the chance I'm going to sit down and replace all of the hooks on all of my lures, because they just weren't sharp enough, because I was having so much trouble setting the hook. So frusterating when you can see three fish following and striking your bait but you just can't seem to get the hook set.

So anyways, my brother cast towards the middle of the lake while I was working the logs on the far side when I finally got a fish hooked. And it was in all truth GINOURMOUS. I've done a lot of fishing in my life. I've caught 15 pound steelhead, 20 pound lings from shore, big chinook and rainbows. Giant carp. This was a giant fish. It took the spinner right by the boat and pulled straight down, while my drag screeched and the adrenaline pumped enough so that the rain didn't matter anymore. I got him turned eventually, and for a brief moment I saw him on his side turned by the side of the raft. My rod is a six foot ultra-light ugly stick, and as he was flailing about he paused and I glimpsed him alongside it, and he was damn near half as long as that rod. He was big, with a big fat ugly head, and a long slim speckled body. As I went to try and turn him alas, he did a quick flippflop splash and a jump and self released and swam back into the murky depths.

It all happened so fast that my brother and I were dumbstruck. We sat there in silence and brooded for a second in the rain, before we got back to fishing.

We worked our way back around the lake by some of the entrance streams, and I resumed not being able to set the hook, and I think that they got tired of our lures. Everytime we'd switch up our spinners, they'd come back out curious again, but after several casts they wouldn't take it anymore. If we put a bit of night crawler on the hook to entice them to hold on longer, they wouldn't even touch it.

Long story short, we were burning daylight in the rain and should've set an alarm because before we knew it it the sun was starting to set. We ended up floating out by the logjam at the outlet and in fifteen minutes my brother boated and released over five pretty cutthroat, from 10 to sixteen inches. The bite really started to heat up as the sun set, but I was freezing and wanted to go home.

And of course, to add insult to injury, I hurt my knee on the way down, and it took us twice as long to pack out. We got back to the car about one AM and were exhausted and soaking wet. And I like I told my brother, if we were cubscouts, and there was a badge in cub scouts for being B.A. I would be an eagle cubscout in BAness for carrying that darn raft up 4500 feet to fish a lake for a couple hours.

We've decided that we're not going to do it again until we can spend the weekend up there camping, as for two or three hours of fishing it was a LOT of work. But it was probably one of the most rewarding and exhilarating things I've done in years, and I don't regret it.