Went to Oceanside for Labor day weekend; 8 adults and 8 kids. We rented a big house on the cliff overlooking the beach, complete with hot tub on the deck looking out at the surf. Great beach walking, tide pools and hikes in the local state parks. The shot below is from a hike out to Point Lookout, just outside of Netarts.
That sweet living only gets you so far, so on the trip home we decided to fish. Since Oceanside is just outside of Tillamook we had to drive up Hwy 6 along the Wilson river to get back to Portland. Mark and I stopped at the first bridge over the river on the way East and parked at the trailhead that leads up to the Little North Fork. This is the only tributary of the Wilson that is open for fishing, and is a salmon and steelhead haven.
We hiked up an abandoned road for about 45 minutes and then bushwhacked down to the river. The bank was almost all well worn gravel, ranging from about 3 to 8 inches in diameter. Clearly the water was well below the normal fall and winter flow, but there was still plenty of water flowing. We sat on the bank and ate lunch while plotting our strategy. Meanwhile we started seeing small trout or smolts going airborne after something on the water. That made the decision easy, I tied on an Adams.
The river was a series of fast shallow riffles broken up by deeper riffles and flat shallow stretches. There were also occasional deep stretches along the bank, which appeared to be from 4-6 feet deep. It was from 10 to 20 yards wide in most places and easily waded in sneakers. However, I wish I had felt and spikes on, those rocks were REALLY slippery. We had constant harassment of our flies by smolts, but very few fish actually to hand. My biggest was about 4 inches, and had the markings of a rainbow, which I assume means it was a young steelhead. The Wilson is reported to have resident Coastal Cutthroat throughout, but we never saw any during our time there. I am thinking we may need to go higher up to get away from the big water favored by the salmon and steelies for spawning.
There were a lot of ribbons hanging from trees adjacent to the plentiful gravel bars, and ODFW signs warning not to mess with the census collecting, so I think we were in a prime spawning stretch. However, being between seasons we saw no big boys hanging out. It was cool to see the river at such a low flow, you get a feel for where the deep troughs and big boulders tend to accumulate, which can only help in reading the water come winter when it's high and roiling and full of bright returning fish. This river is clearly prime habitat.
It is also clear that by hiking in a couple miles we got above where most people fish. I think this is the first river I have ever fished that had no trail along the bank. The only way to move along was in the water or along the shoreline gravel bars. There was absolutely no way to either get up the steep bank or through the brush along the shore. As a result getting off the river was no easy task. We hiked and fished our way downstream for a mile or more before we found a trail up the bank. As always it was not the fish, but the fishing that mattered. I would definitely put this one on your list of places to see if ever you find yourself near Tillamook with a few hours to burn.
