Rapid River Fly-In

I’ve wanted to get down to the lower Rapid River for quite some time so last year we started planning a trip. This last June a Monsters Of Fishing team went in. The lower stretch of the Rapid River has been described as one of the best trophy brook trout Rivers in the country, perhaps the world.  Legendary for mammoth trout and solid salmon, it’s located in a relatively remote part of western Maine.  Its very existence was only discovered as little as 100 years ago.

We’ve fished Middle Dam on the upper part a few times but, access to the lower rapid can be a little challenging. Logging roads will get you close until you come to a locked gate…then its a few miles hike. A couple of sporting camps have gate keys and can take folks down in if you are a guest staying at the camps. Some Maine Guides with access can get you in if you hire them.   But we opted for float plane. We called up Keith at Acadia Sea Planes who was our pilot for last year’s Kennebego Fly-In and arranged for him to take us down, drop us on a spot where the river widens to a bit of a pond, in fact it’s called Pond in the River, and pick us up at the end of the day. He landed us near where the lower Rapid begins and with a short walk in we were at the start.

The water was really high and, a guide we bumped into that was staying down there in a guide cabin explained that they had done the first spring blow of middle dam up river that very morning and things were raging. Bummer, because he said when they do a big release the fish actually head upstream when they sense it, and go all the way up to the dam where they nose right up to it. Killer fishing right there when that happens he said… lesson learned. Next trip we check for release news and go accordingly. Anyway, this was our first mission to the Lower Rapid and all good recon.  Dean snagged a couple of small brookies but that was it as it was pretty impossible to get to any wading or workable pools with the water running so high and fast.   We did scout over a half mile of river though, walking down the old Carry Rd and finding points to cut down to the river, and found some good access areas for the next trip when the water is running normally. We’ll be back next time and know where to go so it was worth the trip to scout it. We headed back to our pickup point and waited to hear the buzz from over the trees of Keith’s plane as the pickup time arrived.

Just as a side note, the day before I hooked into a sweet salmon on the Magalloway. It tore out into some raging whitewater before I could drag it to shore and Dean snapped this shot of me struggling with it 30-40 yards downriver right before it leapt three feet into air right at a water fall and showed off twenty four inches of silver thrashing salmon.  It slammed back in on top of my tippet and that was it…..gone. Actually going to be back up to Magalloway soon …. going back after that one.