Anticipation, excitement, and wild brown trout filled the Denali as I picked up my friend Jeff and his son Sam. It was summer and the big bugs were out and the fish were on them. I had fished an out of the way stretch of river the following week and couldn’t wait to show my friends the kind of fishing it offered. 25+ miles on a rocky dirt rode and we were there! Instantly we got set up and were off  in hopes of out smarting a brown or two. “WAIT!” Jeff said, as I was walking down to the river. “Do you hear that”. “Nope”, I said as I was focused souly on fish. Then can the second worst situation a fly fishermen can experience on a beautiful summer day.(Getting a call from ur significant other saying you need to be home, being #1) ”Hey, ahhhh. I think your getting a flat” Jeff exclaimed.  ”What!” I yelled as I ran over to check things out. To my surprise I wasn’t just lucky enough to get one flat rear tire, but BOTH rear tires were loosing air and fast.

SUCK! I thought what the heck are we gunna do. We are an hour away from the closest highway and 2 hours away from home. Not to mention, we are 25+ miles on a dirt rode in the middle of nowhere and to top it off it was a Wednesday, so we probably would see another soul. There was only one thing to do. Go fish, until we figure something out. So we fished for a couple hours until heard a vehicle coming our way. I ran through the tress and bushes luckily stopping the SUV to ask for help. To my surprise it was a fellow fly fishermen and his wife enjoying their day off from guiding on the Provo. We came up with a strategy and the kind couple, drove us down the canyon until I got phone service and was able to call Geico to come pick me and my car up. After a huge thank you. The couple drove back to Heber with Jeff and Sam, leaving me to wait out the tow truck. What was only supposed to take two hours turned into a 4 hr wait, thanks to a couple of wrong turns by Tom the Tow Truck Driver.

After the Denali was loaded and we were making our way back down that rocky dirt road. I couldn’t help smile as I looked into the rear view mirror.

It had been a long stressful day with a lot of ups and downs, but even with all the bad I couldn’t help feel a sense of peace as I watched the sunset over the canyon walls. It made me re-realize that life and fly fishing isn’t about the destination, its about the journey that we take to get there.

With work taking me up to Coalville, I spent the afternoon on a local lake catching Rainbows and Browns from the shore, stripping buggers. Ended the day on the river without any love from the bigger streamer eating browns that lurk in its undercut banks.

The following day I found myself, on a favorite local stream catching some nice sized buck browns for this tiny water.

Amazing fall weather and scenery took us up to ride the famed Wasatch Crest Trail. Throw-up hill was nothing to Liz, Mallary, and Greg, but for me and my downhill bike. It earned its name… The rest of the trail was fast downhill as we dropped into Mill Creek Canyon. It is one of the best Alpine trails I have been on in the state and a must ride for all mtn. bikers.

Sat. I found myself waking up at 4am to go on the annual Lancaster General Season Deer Hunt. Lucky for us the weather(Snow) held out just long enough to give us an eerie foggy morning and Andrew a shot at his first Mule Deer. The fun began as we had to choose to either drag the buck 2 miles up hill or 8 miles down. We choose up and after an hour of  toucher we made it back to the truck. (After a little 4×4 with the truck to get back) It was a great hunt to be part of.

Recounting the day as they over look Andrews Deer…

Finally it was the big day! As I open my garage I was welcomed with 6 inches of fresh snow. I thought for a minute back country snowboarding, but quickly my thoughts fell back to a certain lake that I can’t resist. My only goal was to have fun and enjoy being out on the water with my wife. Little did I know it was going to turn out to be one of my best days on the lake this year. Guess it got the b-day memo… It ended up being a blue sunny sky day with a slight breeze here and there, just perfect conditions for site fishing these large trout. The key to the day wasn’t so much the fly, but more the fast and slow retrieve. Cast let it sink to the desired depth.  Strip fast to get the fishes attention and spark a follow, once it follows, stop! Then slow down/twitch and wait for their mouth to open, SET! It was an all day event.

I had fulfill my days desire exactly like I wanted to. After that I worked my way upstream working all the fishy spots catching Cutts and Browns along the way, but a few hook-ups stick out a little more than others. 

The big surprise of the day was right at the base of a little waterfall. There was a little open slot (maybe 2×2) between big boulders that looked like they could hold a fish. Bubbles covered the surface, so as I went to lift my rod to recast I notice some pressure and then a big head came out of the water. I instantly realized I had a huge cutty on. It rapped me around the rear by log, then shot across the stream and wrapped my fly line around my pole and then like a train it shot down stream and snap! It was easily pushing 20 and an eye opening experience to be under control from now on. (because this stream does hold some surprises)  The next cast to the above run produced a very nice brown. Go figure…

As I was working my way up stream I noticed a nice little run on the opposite side of the stream. It wasn’t very deep, maybe a foot, but it had an off color bottom and overhanging bushes making it likely that a fish would hang out waiting for the next grasshopper or beetle to fall in. I got into position, made an OK cast and just like it should of , a nice cutty rose slowly and inhaled my PMX. It was as picture perfect as you can get.

The next bend in the river presented what once was a very large beaver dam that had been blowout creating the best hole in the river. I as analyzed the hole I noticed what I though was a log, was really a fish sitting about haft way down in the water column. I crawled up the bank to get a birds eye view and with a better view I noticed that the hole had two nice fish working its main current. After studying them I decided to give my dropper a couple more feet and with that I casted my flies into the run. As they drifted over the feeding fish, one of the fish moved up,  instinct set in and I set the hook  and had a nice brown on the other end. After letting the run settle for a min I could see that the other larger fish was still working the upper end of the run. I tried to make multiple casts at the fish but only catching the side of the old beaver dam and breaking off my outfit. After a new outfit I cast my flies to what I thought was too far left in the eddy, but out of no where the larger fish moved over and grabbed hold of my pheasant tail and gave me a great fight through the old logs of the beaver dam. It ending up being the most beautiful native cutthroat I had caught all day. As it danced in the water the reds, oranges, greens, and tans were as brillant as they were intended to be. 

I would have to say that the highlight of the trip was some of takes I had while site fishing my way back. The first was a cutty in really shallow flat water, it was sitting on the bottom of the stream.  I thought my cast would for sure spook it, but just like some of the other takes it moved up a couple feet to eat the dropper and the fight was one and off with in seconds…The last was just before I got back to the car. I spotted a rising fish and as I got closer I saw what I thought was a nice cutty. I casted up to it, but only had a take from a tiny fish. I tried a couple more casts in different seams, but with one last desperation try I cast back to where I saw the fish. The water turned and the large trout hammered my pmx in less that a foot of water. As it raced by me I noticed it wasn’t a cutty, but an oversized brookie. I got all excited, but it was short lived as it ran under a log and snapped the line. It was OK…I was fulfilled. It really was a perfect day of fishing on a perfect little trout stream.  

Saturday brought a new light and an opportunity to try a new location. I had decided on the Weber River above Echo, but as I was about past the Daniels turnoff, I decided to cutt down the x-mas tree first and fish the Provo as it empties into Deer Creek for running Bows. After a two hour detour trying to find the perfect tree, the tree was on the Jeep

and the 12 degree temp was now around 25* I fished the upper water first with only a 17′ brown, so I moved lower and got into a nice little side stream and finally got into the red striped rainbows I was dreaming about.

After a couple hours of fun I cruised down to meet Jeff, Grif and John. We had decided earlier to meet at 12pm and go form there. I talked them into hitting my productive little stream. The situation had changed dramatically in just a day. With it being Sat. the river had already been hitt hard all morning and the fish still had sore lips. Also there were too many fisherman for such a small stream, but we delt with what we had and between the four of us still managed to catch and release over 20 bows. As the sun disappeared behind Timp. our day came to and end on this stream.

I dropped off Jeff and Grif and headed straight for my brown honey hole to see if they were still there in numbers. As I approached my hole I was greeted by high flying browns and I knew that the day would end just right. In the last 30 mins of daylight I caught 4 browns over 17′, but it was my last fish that sealed the deal.

It was a picture perfect brown, measuring 20′. It was dark, but yet golden yellow.

As I released the beautiful fish to be caught again, I knew my day was complete. I walked straight out of the river and back to reality. I had left my house at 6am and returned at 6 pm without a single meal or break to relax. As I was thinking on my 15 min drive home, I couldn’t help think about what I had accomplished in my days outing. I had done everything I set out to do and in the process gained a deeper understanding of God, life, career, goals, friendship and nature all while fly fishing. Some people can’t beleive I take fly fishing to the extreme levels that I do, but until they feel and experience what I have. I will still laugh.

I am rainbow deprived

]]> http://www.xstreamoutdoors.com/2008/12/08/rainbow-deprived-part-3/feed/ 0 http://www.xstreamoutdoors.com/2008/12/07/so-rainbow-deprived-part-1/ http://www.xstreamoutdoors.com/2008/12/07/so-rainbow-deprived-part-1/#comments Sun, 07 Dec 2008 22:04:00 +0000 Dr. G http://www.xstreamoutdoors.com/2008/12/07/so-rainbow-deprived-part-1/ I had been hitting the brown trout spawn pretty hard and felt a a little deprived from their northern cousins the rainbow trout. I know a few good waters that have falling running bows so I decided the last few times out to target them excusively. The Friday after Thanksgiving was my last free day before a week in New York, so I decided to make the most of my free day. With a text from Mallary and Greg at 6:30 am the days line up was set and a little 5 foot stream would be are playing field. The morning was brisk with a new thin layer of snow that banketed the surrounding mountains.

It was a beautiful morning and a good sign of good things to come. We fished the upper section of the stream with constant success for 12-17′ bows.As we moved up river and past a large beaver dam we switch from the running bows to local browns. I hooked up first and Greg finished the day strong with a par of brown with one pushing 18′.

We left the river early with a sense of accomplishment and frustration (Mallary, had one of those days were her hubby out fishes her and she gets all the tangles) We had visited the river early before the crowds, caught the bigger fish and left before 12…