My neighbor and I slipped the 12' aluminum boat, complete with painted shark's mouth, into the still, mirrorlike water of Badger Lake at 6:00 a.m. We enjoyed the quiet, cool, pre-dawn morning that was interrupted only by a lonesome coyote's moan echoing over the chrome surface of the water, and my comment on dropping a fishing lure into the lake. Even the putt-putt'ing of our trusty outboard was more subdued at this time of the day, as if it was whispering in reverence to the stillness. As we slowly trolled from the launch to the cliffs on the opposite side, my neighbor and I began to be solicited by fish answering our wedding ring lures (down 1-2 colors and garnished with maggots). Before we began our promenade off the cliffs, we had two respectable rainbows to our visitors' list. We continued under the power lines stretched over the cliffs (and, the water!) and took time to wave at the osprey nested on one of the high-tension structures. Meantime our lures were still !
emoting attention from fish. All along the cliff-edged, eastern(?) side of the lake we were entertained by fish and their attention they gave us (If we would've kept what we caught, we would've had to stop about halfway up the lake!) As we progressed up the lake we renamed the geologic features we encountered along the lake's shoreline. The sun was breaking the horizon and changing the topography, minute by minute. Fishing at this time of day is spectacular! We finally committed ourselves to a race-track pattern near the midpoint of the lake and limited-out on rainbows, cutthroat, and a few silvers; all over 12 inches. The the entire fishing experience was...GREAT. We ended our journey about 8:30 a.m...I could scare you by saying Badger Lake is terrible...but I'd be saying that only to scare any prospective fishermen away. The Lake in late-summer fishing is top-rate! (Note: we have been fishing at dawn nearly the entire summer sampling the Spokane area's lakes...Badger is my favorite.

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