Nor Cal Fly Guides
Swing Trips
Two-Handed & Single-Handed Swing Trips
Northern California Targeting Steelhead • Trout • Shad • Striper • Salmon
Do you really want to learn how to use a two-handed spey or switch rod the right way? Or maybe you want to turn that single-handed rod you already own into one sweet swinging machine? There’s only one real way to do it — get on the water with a qualified spey casting instructor and start fishing.
Swinging flies is not something you truly learn on a lawn. You learn it by standing waist-deep in moving water, reading current seams, feeling tension build in your line, watching your fly swim across a run, and experiencing that moment when the line goes tight and everything stops. That’s when it clicks. That’s when you’re hooked. And once it happens… there’s no turning back. To swing is the thing — and the tug is the drug.
Nor Cal Fly Guides
Where & When These Trips Happen
Our two-handed and single-handed swing trips take place across some of the best swinging water in Northern California and beyond. These trips move with the seasons, the fish, and the conditions. We do not force a river — we follow what is fishing best at the time and what fits your goals.
Swing trips may take place on the Yuba, Feather, Trinity, Klamath, Lower American, Lower Sacramento, Upper Sacramento, Truckee, and select Coastal Rivers. Location is always based on what you want out of your trip, what species you want to target, what technique you want to focus on, and where the fish are actively moving and feeding. The species we target on swing trips include wild rainbow trout, steelhead, American shad, and salmon, and swinging can be done year-round depending on river and season.
Some days we will use the aid of a drift boat, raft, or jet boat to access prime runs and move efficiently between water. Other days — especially on coastal systems — we will walk and wade exclusively, covering classic swing water step by step. Every trip is built around the best water, the best timing, and the best learning opportunity.
Nor Cal Fly Guides
For Beginners — Where the Addiction Begins
If you are new to swinging flies, don’t worry. This is exactly where you belong. Your day begins with proper setup. We take the time to show you the equipment needed to complete both a two-handed and single-handed swing setup, from rods and reels to lines, tips, leaders, and flies. Once your rig is dialed, we ease into casting — slowly, methodically, and with purpose. You will first learn the Double Spey, followed by the Snap C (Snap T). These two casts alone will allow you to fish almost any river in almost any condition, whether the wind is up, the banks are tight, or the current is heavy.
As the day moves on, you will practice these casts on both river right and river left, simulating real fishing situations — upstream wind, downstream wind, and everything in between. But here’s the secret most people never fully understand about spey casting: it’s not the cast that hooks fish. It’s the mend… the presentation of the fly… and the swing itself. This is where the real lesson lives. This is where we show you how to control your line after the cast, how to shape the swing, how to manage speed and depth, and how to make your fly come alive in the current, rather than just drifting through it. By the end of the day, you won’t just be “making casts.” You’ll be fishing the swing.
Nor Cal Fly Guides
For Non-Beginners — Fine Tuning the Machine
If you already know how to swing a fly and don’t need instruction, then we simply get down to business and start covering water. But if you want to refine your casting stroke, clean up your anchor placement, improve your line control, or get more consistent with your swing, we are more than happy to fine-tune your mechanics.
Sometimes a single adjustment — timing, hand position, rod angle, or tempo — is all it takes to unlock a cleaner cast and a more dangerous swing. When everything flows correctly, the rod feels lighter, the line straightens effortlessly, and the fly fishes deeper, slower, and more naturally. That’s when the grabs get serious.
Nor Cal Fly Guides
What Makes Swinging So Addictive
Swinging flies is unlike any other form of fly fishing. There is no bobber, no dead drift, and no visual cue—only tension, current, and faith. You make the cast, set the angle, mend once, and then wait as the fly begins to arc across the current. The line tightens, the rod loads, and then comes the pull—not a tap, not a peck, but a true pull that stops your heart for half a second before the reel starts screaming. It might be a steelhead, a trout, or a shad that thinks it is a tarpon—you never know, and that uncertainty is exactly why swinging becomes a lifelong addiction.
We Supply Everything — You Bring the Addiction
For our swing trips, we can supply everything you need — rods, reels, lines, sink tips, leaders, flies, and instruction. All you have to do is show up ready to learn, ready to fish, and ready to discover why so many anglers eventually abandon everything else in favor of the swing.
Because once it gets into your system…
it never leaves.
Nor Cal Fly Guides
Spey Tuning by an Aircraft Mechanic
Allow this former U-2 Aircraft Mechanic to diagnose your casting stroke with his “SPEY CASTING TOOL BOX” and fine-tune it with surgical precision. Proper Rod path, Anchor placement, Timing, Power application, Line control, and Presentation angle is what we will work on. His tool box is full of all the right tools and TO’s (technical orders) to get the job done.
The same attention to detail that once kept reconnaissance aircraft in the sky now keeps your cast honest, your swing prefect and your fly in the zone, the way it was meant to.
Let’s Go Swing
Whether you’re brand new to two-handed rods or already addicted to the swing, these trips will change how you fish forever.
Solid Grabs and Tight Lines
Capt Brian Clemens
The Spey Mechanic