See that little frothy bit of water over there on the right? That’s called The White Rabbit. He’s a pretty important part of spey casting. See that guy over there on the left? His name’s Charles St. Pierre. He’s part of our ridiculous lineup of spey instructors at Alaska West. He’ll be teaching our guests…
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Alaska West
Tube Flies – Introduction
Today we’re starting a little mini-series of posts featuring Eric Neufeld, in video format, talking about tube flies and how to rig them. Who’s Eric Neufeld? He’s an alumnus of Alaska West, and he’s the the Pacific Northwest rep for Idylwilde, Simms and Ross, and he’s a smart dude who likes futzing around with his fly…
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Setting Up for the Sweep
It’s time for the next in our series of spey casting tips from Brian Niska. Any time we need to run something about spey casting, we call Brian and he just rattles this stuff off – just think how much you could learn if you joined him for a week of instruction at Alaska West….
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Mr. Hankey Produces
If you’ve been reading our blog for a while, you already know about Mr. Hankey, the Jeff Hickman-created mouse fly that works real good on big carnivorous rainbows. Today, straight from Alaska West on the Kanektok River, we present a further bit of evidence. We like Mr. Hankey! More on Rainbow Trout Catch Them on…
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Lettin’ One Fly
Just a cool perspective on spey casting, courtesy of Cameron Miller and Charles St. Pierre. More on Spey Casting Charles’ King Rig Cast, Then Step Sage 8134-4 Z-Axis
Landing Nets
Thanks to loyal reader Kevin Kelly for getting in touch with an excellent question. Kevin didn’t recognize the landing nets that he’s seen in a lot of our pictures from Alaska West, so he asked about them, and we put together this post about them. Got any questions we can answer for you about our…
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Scott King Rod
Today we present to you a review of the Scott T2H 12510/4 – a spey rod designed specifically for anglers chasing king salmon. Introduction It’s hard to make spey rods designed to catch big fish! Setting aside more ‘secondary’ factors like taper and grips, the two fundamental variables in rod design are length and weight….
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Start With a Lift
Brian Niska’s back today with the next in his series of spey casting tips. Brian owns Whistler Fly Fishing, and he’s teaching spey casting at Alaska West and BC West this summer – drop us a line if you’d like to learn from the best in the business. Start Your Cast With a Lift Want…
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Pull Hard.
We’ve told you in the past about one of the biggest mistakes we see anglers make when fighting big fish – simply not exerting enough pressure on the fish, either by bending the tip of the rod or by not pulling hard enough. We stumbled across a little video that illustrates just how hard you…
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Nice Drivin’, Tex
Our guides at Alaska West are great teachers. They’re fun people and excellent casters. They’re helpful and courteous and really, really fishy. They’re also great boat drivers. More on Alaska West King Salmon in Week 1 Our Facility Leopard Trout