5-14-13 It is so about time...

About time for that action right there! No not the girl that snuck into my pic, behind her silly. The Park. RMNP. Natty Park. Natty Rock. Rocky Nappy. Heaven on Earth. Whatever you call it, it's time for Rocky Mountain National Park. I have had to cancel my first trip of the year there 3 times now and nothing was stopping me today.

So after dropping C-Dog (the kid) off at school, I took off and arrived to the Beaver Meadows entrance 45 minutes later. You can't beat that convenience. I couldn't help but notice how slow it was with just a (near) total absence of people and cars. Just the way I like it.  

After soaking in the views for an hour or so I set out to destroy The T. First hole I missed what had to be at least a 16" trout. He turned on me the first cast and got me all crazy excited. Just what I came for, right? And then second cast...I missed him. You thought I was going to say I caught him, ay? I didn't. I moved on.

I continued to walk downstream, throwing my black BH booger into all the slower water, for which there was not much, and stripping it back up. Nice thing about a meadow though, every turn is a hole. I was getting a ton of bites but most were those short bites on my long booger tail. I continued and then finally hooked into a really nice trout. I lost him though.

I stopped and took a break to enjoy the view. That really is my favorite part of this place, the serenity. I never feel the need to just stop and soak it all in like I do this place. Today's view was elk that were about 25 yards or so away from me.  After a while, I turned around and continued to fish upstream. This time, I would dead drift my booger and see if I had any more luck. Sure enough I did.

 I ended getting 2 or 3 on the way back up on the dead drift and they were all really nice healthy browns. The key was just pounding those banks and looking for the undercut banks. This is where most, that were fishable on the drift, were hiding out. I continued onto my truck and then again took another break and grabbing a bite. I was hoping the storm would pass during lunch, but it just never really materialized and ended up only dropping a few drops during and after lunch. I decided to keep heading upstream of my original start point and fishing on the dead drift. I got some more bites but no more trout.

By around 3:00 or so I decided to make my way back. I would once again go back to stripping my booger on the way down. This time, same result. Several bites, but no takers.

Finally one did eat that whole thing. I set the heck out of that hook. He was going nowhere. Ended up putting up a great fight for his size. Took himself into some pretty deep holes with some timber and rocks. He tried to sneak out but I wouldn't let him. After finally landing him, I could see that he practically swallowed the whole thing and I had to perform trout surgery on the banks. That is why you will see him on the ground in the picture. But have no fear, by the end of it all, and a few minutes of assisted swimming he was off. Somehow, that barbless booger slid all the way down to his stomach. But like I said, he swam off safely.

Being more satisfied than I have been since the last time I was in the Park, I decided to head back. A great day.  

Pre surgery trout. Notice the lack of wooley boogers in the picture. That is because it is (not for long) in his tummy.

Tight Lines-Rocky Nappy style

5-7-13/5-13-13 Boulder Creek Fishing Report

5-7-13 Boulder Fly Casters Hole
I actually got a chance to get out today and the fishing was good. I forgot to set a hook and also how to fight (small) trout so I lost quite a few. I don't what my problem is. Too much guiding...not enough fishing? Good problem to have I guess if that is the case.

I had pretty much the exact same conditions as the day before so i just threw the same thing. Rainbow warriors and Pheasant Tails. Never did have to re-tie. That is always nice. Especially after retying all week.

5-8-13 Roger's Park
What a cold, wet, sleeting, snowing, raining, wet, miserable, cold and wet miserable day outside it was today. It was miserable. It was 36 degrees when we arrived at our hole. Cold! And Wet! And it was 10:30 and still 36 degrees.

But...man was the fishing awesome. I mean off the hook. No pun intended. We had our first fish on probably 10-15 minutes after we got there and it just never really stopped. We did have to take a 20 minute break right around noon and as the miserableness was definitely peaking.

After that though, the fishing just got better. With the temp eventually making it up to 55 as we left, I think it really helped. The client even caught a brook, brown, and rainbow. A Colorado Hat Trick. I asked if he wanted to go up towards Eldora and try for the Grand Slam with the Cutty but he was pretty happy right there catching fish every five minutes. Probably a good choice considering the weather.

We ended up throwing Rainbow Warriors and Purple San Juan worms. Those worms were the ticket. The river really mixed em' up apparently. I retied once early and that was it. I think the Warrior was helping get their attention on the off color water and leading em' right to that worm. Money. I pretty much just carried the other rod around and followed Joe Master Angler around. Really fun.

It was unbelievable fishing though. We had to just grin and bear it because when the fishing is that good, you don't care about the weather.

Didn't get a pic of the brookie, but he caught it. I attest. Ended up with probably more than 20 or so total. We both lost count. That's a perfect trip.

 Brown Trout. 1 of a couple dozen on the day.

Rainbow Trout. The one and only that we found.

5-11-13 Roger's Park (Warriors, Worms, Tails, and Tungs)

Beautiful Day on "The Riv"

I split a trip with one of our newer guides today. It was his first trip out and he nailed it. We had 4 people so we split into 2 clients each and went our separate way once we arrived at the river.

Fishing was great. We threw the same recent usual suspects...warriors, worms, tails and tungs. (Which happens to be the name of my new rock band. We sing fishing songs.) My guys were catching left and right once the experienced one got the hang of the hook set.

I met up with Colin and his guys were doing the same. Trip Awesomeness...Check.

 Reilly about to eat a Brown trout, raw, after being dared by me. He almost did it. I would have idolized him.

This is the where it all came together for Kevin. So he stayed there for an hour or so. Good man. 

Looking back towards Lower Roger's Park. How many anglers/guides can you find?? Answer is 4. (Howard?? Where'd you go?)

On a side note...when I took Kevin and Reilly down to the riv for the first time to show them the how to I cast for the first time and...trout on. I apologized. Kevin said if you are trying to show someone how to catch trout then you did good.

TOUCHE KEVIN!

5-13-13 More Roger's Park

Flows have dropped significantly in the last few days so we were forced to change it up a little bit. I went to the same spot but tied on some different flies. The ticket early on was the purple worm and an Olive brassie, sz. 20. I hardly ever fish brassies. Not sure why. But something told me throw it today. And it worked...for them...and for me too. I caught a nice trout on the how to. (Touche Kevin)

The fishing really slowed down in the afternoon as it actually got super hot in the canyon. I recorded a temp of 79 at one point late. But we were sweating. A sign that it shall soon be here for good.

It was so slow in fact that I went to the original slumpbuster after striking out on a few things, including Prince's, Tails, PMX's, and a Hull's Gummy midge; which almost always beats the slump. The ticket...a size 20 red Tungsten BH zebra midge. Small and deep. That is what they wanted cause that is where they were.

Evidently I found out that the other (Lead) guide had the fish completely shut down on him and his client as well in the afternoon. So it wasn't just us!

All in all a good day. That low flow combined with the sun just drove those trout super deep later on in the day. It happens. I'm glad that the clients got into trout before it got so slow.

Another typical Spring week on Boulder Creek...snow, rain, sun, sleet, murky water, clear water, low flow, high flow and the one constant that never leaves...TROUT!

Tight Lines-

5-6-13 Boulder Creek with some Canucks!!!

I love Canucks! They are always so nice. Today was no exception. I had a father and his son out on the river and it was a good day out. The flows were slightly higher and murky, but the fishing was alright given the conditions. We stayed a little lower, but above Four Mile as it is just too chocolaty right now.  The water temp was a nice 56 degrees and the skies were blue, for the most part.



We had most of our luck on black and natural pheasant tails, and rainbow warriors. A couple bugs that weren't producing...Prince's, hare's ears, and worms. We fished for about 4 hours and then called it quits.

 These gentleman actually owned a fishing resort on a lake up in the Frozen North and I told them they would NEVER catch anything this big in their little lake in Canada. They laughed at me.  

This gives you an idea of the higher flows. 

Great trip with Great Company

Tight Lines!

4-27-13 Sylvan Dale Pics

Ever get a chance to go to Sylvan Dale? Take it...

 Don't break the rules. (Waiting at the gate for the gang)

 A look at Mother Lake early

 A typical Mother pig

And another...not the same fish either.

Tight Lines!

4-25 & 4-26 Bonus Fishing!

DON'T FALL IN!

This is what I tell everybody before we get into the river. It's a rule. It's the "stay warm so you can have fun" rule. It's an important rule.

 It's so important that from here forth it will be known simply as...wait for it..."The River Rule".  And seeing how "be safe", or as I now know it to be, "The River Rule" is the first rule on our trips, followed closely by "have fun" (which could really be called...wait for it... "The Fishing Rule"), you would think that this rule would be followed very tightly.

But sometimes, you just have to push the limits. You have to break the rules just to find out what the consequence will be. It's almost as if, possibly, you are afraid that you will follow so closely "The Fishing Rule", therefore having enormous uncontrollable fits of fun; that you must feel it necessary to perhaps sabotage "The River Rule" in order to minimize the effects of the uncontrollable, now super exploding amounts of ridiculously huge gargantuan tons of fun! (Wow! That was a long ( poorly ( I'm sure) punctuated) sentence. That hurt my brain.)

Relax, I understand. I still feel the need to take a dip in the river every so often (2 days ago) myself. I get it. I also sabotage my own "Fishing Rule". I don't know why we do it. But we do.

But that's not it. It doesn't end here. We get up. We get up and we rise to the tyranny of the slippery river bed and we become victors again.

You can fall, but you can't quit. So we didn't. You march on. So we did. Well we didn't actually...alright look, it was cold and he was wet. So we left.

They were done. But I told them no. You will not be defeated. You will rise again...tomorrow...(after you cancel your trip to the zoo and reschedule for next day) and you will be a victor again.

So we went back out the next day. I think they were a bit hesitant after that speech I gave in a Braveheart accent about not quitting, wearing nothing but a kilt and waders.

And the fishing turned out to be alright after all. We got in two hours the first day before all the rule breaking set in, so we fished about another 3the next day. I wanted to make sure they didn't leave with a bad taste (river) in their mouth.

I think they had a good time.

Be safe, have fun, and always follow the "river rule" a little more than the "fishing rule".

Tight Lines!

4-20-2013 First trip of the year! Boulder Creek

That first call that I have been waiting for (and not long), came in and I was headed out for the first guide trip of the year. The weather wasn't quite what I wanted, although it was in the mid 50's and just slightly overcast. I couldn't really complain, now could I? The flows were a little high but we stayed real low in the canyon and hit up Boulder Creek by Dome Rock.



Getting into one of the deeper holes at the end of the day. (Notice all the snow on the ground still.) 

I took a father and son out that had just taken the intro to fly fishing class at RMA (Rocky Mountain Anglers) and it sounded like they were possibly looking to get into it. I always love to see that.

The fishing was alright; not great, not horrible. They both caught fish although the son kept missing his strikes because, boy, those trout were quick that day.  He managed to get one on the hook by the time we left but then the fish decided to jump ship.

We fooled around with some different dry flies in hopes of getting a dry strike for the client, but it never happened. They were however, taking some Callibaetis RS-2's underneath a heavier dropper. This was especially true later in the afternoon around 5:00 or so as the BWO's came out in full swing for a few minutes.


All in all, a good trip. Good to get out again. Definitely looking forward to the season.

Tight Lines!