Arkansas River (Pueblo) - Alicia's First Fish!

Alicia with her first fish ever. And she caught it on a fly rod!

The Girls are in Grand Junction with the Grandparents this weekend and Alicia and I were sitting around eating breakfast at Uncle Sam's Pancake House thinking of what we were going to do when I decided to offer up teaching her how to fly fish. She looked at me and said, "yeah that sounds fun". What! Oh Yeah!!!! 15 years of persistent prodding on how fun and relaxing it is finally paid off! Alicia had never caught a fish before so fishing to her was just staring at a lake or a hole in the ice waiting for something to happen.

I decided we should take a short trip down to Pueblo. There are some nice runs that can easily be fished without wading when the flow is low. We hit the water around 11. I seined the water and showed Alicia some BWO nymphs and "San Juan Worms" so she could get an idea of what she was imitating. We went over the three Cs of reading water (current, cuisine, cover) and I pointed out a nice run that provided all three. I showed her how to rig up a two nymph rig and we talked about the approach, casting, line control, detecting a strike, and what to do once you have a fish on. She picked it up really quickly! 

She was getting good drifts within 10 minutes and she hooked up within 20. The only mistake she made was to look down at her hands to get the line on the reel and when she did the rod tip dropped and the barbless hook pulled out. No worries there were more where that came from. She hooked up again 5 minutes or so later and got a good hook set. This fish was a little nicer and went on two nice runs. I really enjoyed the look on Alicia's face when the fish ran. During the first run Alicia yelled, "what do I do!!". It was pure excitement! Once the fish settled down a bit I said, "OK now slowly reel him in and keep your rod tip up". I immediately saw the rod straighten out and the line go limp. I looked over at Alicia just in time to see her reeling backwards sending line shooting out of the reel! LOL!!! I grabbed the rod and stripped line in and got her on the reel and she was able to bring in a nice bow! Fist fish ever and it was on a fly rod! Very cool! In the video she is trying to tell me that it's cool but I have to hear it twice before I admit that it was in fact cool :-)

She wound up hooking and landing another small bow and a sucker. She knows what it feels like now to think you have a nice trout on only to see a big sucker mouth staring at you. She did have a 16-18" bow on for a few seconds but the hook pulled out.

We had a great time on the river and I really enjoyed spending some time on the river with my best friend. Now we need to gear her up!

Eleven Mile Canyon 9/22/12

Back up to Eleven Mile Canyon today for a morning of fishing with Ben and the folks. Alicia came along and got some great pics. The leaves are changing and the scenery was great. This is my favorite time of year in Colorado. Crisp mornings and room temperature afternoons with blue bird skies. Can't beat this state!

We fished just passed the third tunnel. Small Tricos and Blood Worms were getting bites. Nothing huge this trip but we caught some beautiful trout with great color.

Mom was fishing a nice plunge hole and her persistence paid off in the end. She hooked two fish but didn't have any luck landing them. She never saw either fish so they were probably really nice!

At one point Ben was across the river from me and he was casting around a rock. I was spotting his indicator and was yelling "set!" when he got a take. Below is a cool vid of him fighting a nice bow in that run. (if you are viewing this in an email you'll have to go to the site to see the vid)

Another great trip. Even if you don't catch fish it's just a great feeling to spend time in such an awesome place.

WWT Trip - Eleven Mile Canyon 9/14/12

The first WWT Fly Fishing Trip took place in Eleven Mile Canyon on the South Platte River. We hired the Angler's Covey to provide transportation, lunch, and most importantly, guides! This trip was a real blast and everyone had a good time.

We met up at the Angler's Covey at 6AM and loaded up the van. After a short stop in Divide to pick up Joe V we hit Lake George and headed up into the canyon. We met our guides at Camp Alexander who were ready to go. We all geared up with the equipment that the Covey had provided and split into groups of three. Each group was assigned a guide. We all loaded up and headed off to fish.

Ben Lewis with a 23" bow

My group included Joe V and Keith. We linked up with Greg Blessing. I had met Greg before in the shop and knew that he was a very experienced guide. You would never know Greg was a guide by the looks of his truck. Three rod holders mounted on top, paint barley visible through the fishing stickers, fly boxes stacked on the dashboard, back loaded up with gear, etc....! This guy does a lot of fishing!

Mike with a nice cutthroat

We made it to Greg's office after about a 10 minute drive and jumped out. Greg handed us each a fully rigged setup and we started hiking down to the river. Greg positioned each of us in a run and gave us some pointers to get us started. We had all landed fish within the hour. We worked our way upstream and continued to catch fish throughout the morning. Greg was an awesome guide and we all learned a ton from him.

Aaron with a nice bow

After four hours of fishing we headed back down to Camp Alexander where Phil was grilling chilli cheese burgers! Talk about a sweet day. We all met up and ate lunch and swapped stories about the morning's fishing. Everyone caught fish. Ben wound up with the fish of the day and it was a trophy! A 23" bow that he caught right of the bat that morning. Several guys on the trip had caught there first fish on a fly rod that day.

Todd with a nice cutthroat

All in all it was a really great half day of fishing. I was more than happy with the Angler's Covey and will be calling them again for next year's trip!

Arkansas River (Pueblo)

Solid 16" bow.

What can I say - love fishing this river. This has really become my "home water". Really starting to learn this river well. Had a great half day fishing with Mart. We hadn't been to Valco bridge in a while so we decided to hit it at daylight and fish till 11 or so.

We hit the parking lot right at sun rise and were at the bridge around 6:30. The bite was on almost immediately. I think I hooked up on my 3rd or 5th cast. The flow was around 70 which makes fishing my favorite run in that area perfect. Not the easiest run to fish but WELL worth the rewards.

The bridge is called Valco but the unofficial name is Heartbreak bRidge. She giveth and she taketh away. Within an hour I had hooked my first 20" class fish of the day. I had seen an article on Orvis about the Forget-Me-Not Midge and had tied up a dozen or so the night before. These things absolutely glow under a black light. The takes I was getting on them were HARD. They don't sip these flies. Had the fish on for about 20 seconds and the hook pulled out. Just didn't get a good hook set.

There are big fish in this channel and they eat big fish flies. I tied on a large San Jan Worm and dredged it with about a pound of mojo mud. Had a monster take and a very large bow came up and broke the water several times. Didn't come out of the water because it was so big but threw several huge wakes on the water. These fish have been hooked before and they know exactly where to go. He headed straight for the pile-ons under the bridge and broke me off. I'm getting used to being owned under this bridge. This guy was easily 20" and was probably a good 22" and FAT. I hurts to loose fish like these but one of these days I'm going to land a 24" class fish in this hole. It's just a matter of time!

Good hatch activity. Midges, a few BWOs, and some Tricos. Mart hooked half a dozen or so on dries. Missed a nice bow on a dry. Activity up top only lasted for 20 minutes or so but Mart took full advantage.

We landed 16 altogether in 4 and a half hours. Not a bad morning of fishing.