I first guided the Yakima River in 1997 as a temporary situation fulfilling an obligation I had once made to my grandfather that I would one day try the lively hood he so admired and wished he had done. As an angler we go through phases of accomplishments, learning on every trip to the river. This is exactly what my grandfather had taught me since childhood, that and respect for the other anglers. Had I known how smart he really was I would not have wasted the prior fifteen years of my life on construction jobs. By 2000 I had quit my construction job and was guiding full time on the Yakima River for trout and the Olympic Peninsula for steelhead.

I spent 7 summers guiding the Yak before I went on to guide in Montana. Now I am arriving at full circle, back to guiding my home waters where I first learned to trout fish and the skills to be a fishing guide. Every day I float the Yakima I am reminded of them days in the 1970’s when we would fish for steelhead and rainbows in a twelve foot pram with my grandfather. There were very few fly fishermen then and most everyone we seen, which was damn few, was throwing spinners or worms, we fished four different flies, a Muddler minnow (dry or wet), a spruce fly, a olive woolly bugger or a new pattern called a Sofa Pillow, that might date it a little.
The last time I was on the Yakima professionally; shuttles were 15 bucks, black Chernobyl’s where a hot dry fly and brown Mohair’s caught every fish in the river. Also I think there may have been 6 full time “professional” guides here on a busy day! It was a fun place to work and play and I hope to make it that again.

“Its not just a sport its a way of life”

Jeff Brazda
jeff@brazdasflyfishing.com
253-307-3210