Dream Stream Take 1

It's that time of year again where all I can think about are large spawning browns. It's like a mental disorder. Really. I'd like to say it doesn't affect other aspects of my life but I would be lying to you. I will freeze my butt off, lose sleep, go hungry, whatever it takes to stick and land that trophy brown. But, just because you are willing, doesn't mean you are able :-)

I've been fishing the Dream Stream for years. I've never quite figured it out. I am usually able to snag a few anywhere except for the Dream Stream. It has become my nemesis. I have the uncanny ability to miss the spawning browns. I'm usually too early or too late. Or I'm walking right past them and don't see them. I think it's a combination.

There is hope though! I can feel it coming together. I'm learning more and more each year. I have to slow down and start doing more looking and less fishing. I have the tendency to rush into things when I'm excited and when I get out of the truck at the Dream Stream my arm wants to start casting before I'm on the water. The Pros will tell you to hunt these beasts. You need to spot them and then carefully plan your approach and presentation.

Spotting fish is something I've worked on for a long time. It is not a talent I was born with. Some guys have X-Ray trout vision. "You see it? Right there, about 50 yards out 6, feet down in the plunge pool, I just saw it take a midge". Uhhhhhh...... yeah.... sure did. On top of that it is VERY hard for me to stop fishing long enough to really focus on spotting fish. I know this is a problem. Solving it is going to probably take regular days of leaving the rod in the truck. Something I'm not really prepared to do.

The battle rages on! I'm going to be up there several more times this year. It may or may not happen. The Dream Stream for me is like day dreaming about winning the lottery. Even though I've been schooled day in and day out up there I still keep going. It will happen! Maybe not this year but it will happen!

As for the fishing, I thought (my first mistake) that it was early enough still to see if there were fish staging in the inlet of Eleven Mile. If they were they didn't like the barrage of Streamers Ben and I were throwing.

Wait a second! Wait one damn second. I almost forgot. I need to give Marty crap on this post! How could I almost forget that? How should I politely say that Marty's lady parts kept him from getting up early and caused him to miss the fishing bus? Maybe Marty knew all along that it was a schooling in the making? And if he did, why did he not warn us? Hmmmmm.... Does Marty know more than he is letting on...... Hmmmmmm Very suspicious... I've got my eye on you Murphy.

 Back to the fishing. After a few hours of slinging rabbit strips in the inlet we walked back to the truck and headed up stream. By this time it was an absolute MAD HOUSE on the river. I have never seen it so packed. We counted 80 cars in the three parking lots! That probably equaled over 100 peeps throwing multiple hooks. What a gauntlet these fish have to swim through!

Instead of elbowing in, Ben and I decided to head up to Spinney. We walked along the dam and managed to hook a few on streamers to include the nice 20" bow shown above. This thing took some serious runs! My original Ross Cimarron hasn't screamed like that in a while. Really a good looking fish.

I also hooked and landed a small pike. Very cool fish. I have been saying for a long time that I was going to target pike on Spinney. Just catching this little guy was a lot of fun. They just look built for killing. Fresh water barracuda. Ben and I agreed that we need to learn the pike game next summer at Spinney. Would be sweet to be pulled around the res in a float tube by a 40" pike!

Spinney saved us from being skunked. The Dream Stream has landed yet another direct hit on my ego. I will be going back for more punishment soon!

Frying Pan River (9/21 and 9/22)

Oh where to begin..... This might be a long one. If this weekend is any indication of what fall fishing is going to be like this year, I may be getting a replica made. 30" brown is the goal. Two bugger barns full of nastiness, new pair of long johns, and first trip with gloves. More on that next post.

Back to the Pan. The toilet bowl has to be one of the most unique fishing spots in the country. I'm not going to make a brown trout joke, but the name just doesn't do this place justice. The Old Man and I have been fishing the Pan for the past 20 years. Dad has been fishing it since the 70's. He's got pictures of Baetis Bridge from way back. He confirms that it was as good as you think it would be.

First 24" Trout / Authentic Bill Dance polarized glasses

We started fishing in the lower sections of the river in the early 90's. Back then we fished hardware primarily. Mepps #2 red and white. Only spinner you really needed in any of our rivers back then. We slowly made our way up river and found out about Baetis Bridge, The Bend Hole, and The Toilet Bowl. By then my buddy Nate and I were deep into learning to fly fish. We would hang out at Colorado Springs Sports with our buddy George who taught both of us the basics of fly fishing. The hook was in deep and Nate and I learned to cast (well it gets the job done) at the park and learned to tie flies mixing burlap nymph recipes from my Dad with the patterns we were learning about in Roger Hill's book. We quickly realized that fly fishing The Pan was something different. I had 40 fish days standing on a rock just above Baetis Bridge. We would have Blue Wing Olive hatches at noon where a size 18 Pheasant Tail is all you needed. No bead, no flash, just a good ol' Pheasant Tail. It was every cast on some afternoons and one of those afternoons lead to my first 24" trout. Lots of memories on this river which just adds to the enjoyment of fishing it.

The Folks and I decided to mix things up a bit and leave on a Saturday morning instead of the usual Friday afternoon departure. We arrived in Basalt around noon and checked into the Green Drake. We were scoping out the river on the way up. Pretty busy! No way the bowl was going to be open.

We pulled up to the dam and there were several cars. The Old Man walked up and struck up a conversation with the guy fishing the bowl. He was an awesome guy and after receiving a few tips from Dad invited us to fish with him. Dad's tips lead to our new buddy John landing a pig of a 24" bow. Now that is how you fish the toilet bowl when it's busy. You don't walk up, demand to cast, and state that, "you live here". Seriously happened this trip. I don't like to be mean but if you are the guy who pulled that crap and you are reading this - You Sir, are a tool. We would have been more than happy to share the run, some tips, and probably some flies if you had just been nice. Anyway....

Back to the good peeps. John was an awesome guy and we fished together for a few hours. He landed a few other really nice trout during that time including the bow in this pic. Thanks again John for sharing the bowl with us! I hope to get to fish with you again.

What can I say about the fishing? It was good. Real good. We all caught 20"+ fish. Several of them. Dad landed a TOAD. Not your typical angle in this picture but I have to show you how thick this thing was!

Dad's 25" Bow

Mom was killing it too. She landed 3 over 20". All together we landed 70+ fish the afternoon of the 21st and the morning of the 22nd. 9 of them were over 20". Nicest fish of the trip were Dad's 25" bow and my 22" brown. We fished the typical Mysis shrimp patterns and some home grown Mysis patterns and all seemed to work. I have a theory on Mysis. I think they swim in schools. My suggestion is that if you are fishing next to someone who hooks a fish on a Mysis, hold on! Usually when one eats a shrimp another is about to. I think
it's because a school of shrimp is getting sucked through the dam.

Most people fish the edges of the heavy current but you can also fish the main channel both on the left side of the opening against "the wall" or to the right side of the opening by "the post". Watch the water coming out of the dam. Most of the time it's all white water but sometimes the water is less turbulent and you'll see areas free of white water. Not sure why this happens but if you time your cast right, you can get a slow drift right up against the wall or slightly to the right of the center of the opening. Cast all the way up to the dam. Try to cast under it if you can. This is where the big boys are. They don't get fished to much. If they do the flies are usually zipping over their heads. If you wait for calm water you can get down to them. Use a LOT of weight and ditch the indicator. Pull up before the current runs your flies into the fly shop that is certainly the rock out cropping that you stand on.

Something new that I tried this trip was to dead drift a streamer right on the bottom. You have to put on a LOT of weight with this technique. Use a heavy streamer, and put on a quarter ounce weight. Cast up under the dam as far as you can. Tight line it and bounce it off the bottom. You will feel either a "tic" or pause, or your rod leaving your hands.

It was an awesome trip and a great way to wrap up an unbelievable summer to which I am still desperately clinging too! Lucky for us Colorado Natives, fall in the high country here is very hard to beat and we have several rivers that become infested with yellow alligators. That is the focus for October. Big spawning browns! More to come :-)

Rainbow Falls Round 2

You shouldn't be surprised at all. With a night of fishing like we had the night before it was only natural that Alicia would want to get in on it after hearing about it.We left around 5 and the weather was looking great for another night of really good fishing. It was even a little overcast. By the time we were fishing it was drizzling some. Perfect!

We stopped at the culverts on the way in. Water level was down quite a bit but was still higher than normal. I knew exactly where I wanted to put Alicia and knew exactly what fly was going to be eaten. 

Game had changed as it always does. Not a fish to be had with the flesh colored Slump Buster. Talk about a backfire. I was talking this up big time. Pretty much guaranteed Alicia a big fish on the first cast and wound up looking like a chump! That's what I get for assuming what I knew the fish are doing. That is never a good thing to do. After a little looking around it was apparent what they were eating. A quick rig change and Alicia had me netting full time.

When things slowed down a bit I was able to take a few casts and wound up landing a couple of really nice bows. This trip was a good reminder to never assume anything with trout. They have spent thousands of years figuring out what to eat when. That beats a summer's experience at RF any day of the week. Lesson learned! At least for a little while.

Rainbow Falls Post Flood

Having to reach back in the memory bank to write this one. Can't believe how time flies. I'm three blog entries down again. Slacker!

There is a silver lining in everything and big rain can work wonders for fishing. I knew RF would be crazy good. It was just a matter of getting up 24 without running the truck down a class III.

I was in the home office last Tuesday head down in network configurations and decided to step outside for a breather. On my second step outside I was texting Ben. Ben and I hadn't been fishing in a few weeks. Life had thrown a curve ball and Ben had to run out of town for a few weeks. I was really looking forward to getting Ben out on the water again and as soon as I stepped into the absolute perfect day, I instantly thought of RF filled to the brim with fresh cool water and knew what we'd be doing that evening.

Ben was down and I was loading my rod in the fish pimp taco at 4. Um, I was putting my rods into the rod holder on Ben's truck at 4. The creek looked great! Water was cool and high. No brainer on fly selection. Pink Sparkle San Juan. They could not help themselves. It wasn't even fair. We fished down to Cougar and pulled fish the whole way.

We decided to head up and hit the culverts above Palmer. We saw them on the way in and I've never seen the water that high before. I had tied some flesh colored Slump Busters and hadn't tried them yet. I took one look at the white water plunge dumping into the first culvert above Palmer Lake and knew that a bottom bouncing Slump would be killer. New color to try anyway so what the hell. There were some big bows loving the cold white water and they were all over the Slump as soon as it hit bottom.

This guy was 21" and hit on the first or second cast. As soon as I released him I hooked a really nice bow that was in the 24" class. Big male, green back, brick red slab marking. I had him on for a minute or so but he took a quick turn and came unbuttoned.

We fished till dark and continued to catch fish. The drop in water temp certainly has turned things up a notch or two at RF. With big browns starting to follow me in more and more, more water, and dropping temperatures, October is going to be unreal! I feel a 10lb brown coming on.

Rainbow Falls This Week's Conclusion

Back up the hill Monday night for the final trip of the "weekend". Mondays are better with Monday Night Fishing. Great to have fishing just up the hill.

We hit the falls section and all caught some nice fish. Dad landed a few 20 inchers (putting on a RF clinic like an experienced Member). Mom did really well. She picked up the fish fighting technique and was fighting fish like a pro right away (see previous post). This is a great tip if I haven't mentioned it already.  

I walked up and around to Ute Lake. I was fishing with an experiment streamer and was getting some good takes in the creek. Four or five casts in and this nice bow hit. What bit was a 17" male
Donaldson's Super Trout. If you fish RF you know this class of fish to be a little feisty. Hooking up with these guys in still water is a very cool experience! An unexpected treat courtesy of RF.  There is something about moving water that I can't keep away from but I'm starting to get the still water thing. I need to get out on some still water with Mr. Kleis and get schooled. Spring, Spinney?

Was a really nice evening and was good that we got out Monday before the deluge. Hard week for Colorado. The water we need. Just not so fast.

Rainbow Falls Ring Search

This is how I know The Mart had a plan all along to go fishing twice last weekend. Later events would reveal that The Mart knew how loose his ring had got over the last year since he ditched 40lbs. In fact we would later learn that The Mart was specifically instructed to leave his ring at home when fishing. Sorry to call you out Bud but good work like this cannot go unsung.

I got a text Sat morning, " Lost my wedding ring last night. It may have fallen off in the truck, or it came off while we were fishing". The only logical thing to do was to go back up there and look for it. I looked over at Alica, "You wanna go fishing"?

Rigged Alicia up, threw the rods in the Jeep, came to a rolling stop in front of Marty's place, and were looking for the ring in an hour. Started retracing our steps below the falls. We looked for about 10 minutes when Marty said, "Hey Jamie you got your camera on you"? I'm not sure what kind of question that was but I replied that I did in fact have several cameras available. "We can look at the pictures from last night to see if I had my ring on". "Look at the big brain on Marty"!

That's when we discovered the evidence shown above. Time to move down the creek. Ran into a fella fighting a fish at the next run on our search. We explained what was going on during the fight and the gentleman was nice enough to let us look. We waited till he landed a nice 17" bow he had hooked but still no dice.

Next stop Cougar Lake. I wanted Alicia to get fishing so I set her up on the creek below Cougar. There is some really good water in this section that isn't fished as often as some of the other stretches. This section during a caddis hatch is just silly. Too early in the day for caddis so we switched to a small black beauty. Alicia did great!

We had run into Ben Wurster from Steel City Anglers up at RF earlier in the year and he had given Alicia a really great piece of advice for fighting fish. Alicia keeps the rod right up against her mid section with the rod tip high in the air. She never loses contact with the butt of the rod and lets the reel do all of the work. Really good advice for a beginner! Works like a champ. Alicia hooked and landed several nice bows completely by herself. Three or four trout later we decided to head to Elk Lake since our search at Cougar came up empty.

We pulled up to Elk Lake and were getting ready to fish. Marty said, "I'll just walk all along the bank here where I was last night and see if it turns up". Three steps later, "There it is". Saweet! It's a great feeling when a plan comes together. Little did Marty know of yet another, bigger plan that had been hatched even before he had hatched the ring idea.

We could concentrate on fishing now! I was getting a few bumps on a ridiculous chartreuse Meat Whistle when I looked to my right and saw a dark green back with SHOULDERS coming up the bank about 50 feet out. I told The Mart to drop the dry he was fishing with about three feet in front of him.  He got it in front of her but she just kinda shot a quick glance at it and kept coming, directly toward me. There I was holding this god awful chartreuse monstrosity of a Meat Whistle with huge dumbbell eyes and way too many legs. I was a little embarrassed actually. Not embarrassed enough though to keep me from swimming it right in front of her. I think I actually saw her pupils dilate. This thing is BRIGHT! She just opened her mouth and gulped it down like she knew she was wrong. Ha! My delicate presentation paid off!  I had the rod tip right over her head. She couldn't get an angle on me and I had her in in 30 seconds or so. Crazy!

Remember I hadn't planned on fishing twice last weekend? I really hadn't but things just worked out that way. That kinda made the plan I hatched early Friday afternoon to fish on Monday with my Folks seem a bit overkill. But what was done was done. 

I actually overbooked my guest limit to RF on Friday. Joe, Marty, and my Folks all said they were down to fish that evening. Crap! Didn't think that was going to happen. I felt like a friggin airline. The Old Man was more than cool with it and actually got a laugh out of it. We planned to hit it up on Monday evening. So I wasn't going to fish twice last weekend but had the next best thing planned.

Anyone wonder if we looked in the truck before going up Sat morning? We were wondering the same thing as soon as we got up there. I told Alicia, "because if we found it we wouldn't come up here". Alicia's mind bullet scored a direct hit. "Just kidding babe"! Or was I?

Rainbow Falls with Joe V and The Mart

Is the wedding ring still on in this pic? No, not what you think.

Wound up talking fish a bit at work this week. Not necessarily a rare occurance I'll admit. You run into someone you fish with and it's going to happen. Law of physics. This weeks victims were Joe V., a good friend of mine and one of the best Network Engineers I've worked with, and veteran fishing buddy The Mart. Joe lives up the pass so we decided to hit Rainbow Falls after work. Joe has been to RF before but I've never got him just below the falls. I don't like to crowd in on people and we haven't been up there when those runs are open but our luck changed.

I had rigged Joe up a 9' 5wt setup in the garage before we left and threw out the offer as soon as we jumped out of the trucks. Joe was down and he hooked up pretty quickly. Great feeling when you can help someone catch a fish. Joe and I are in the trenches at times during the week and RF is a sweet way to end a week and kick off a weekend. Especially when you can catch fish like this.

We fished most of the Creek and did really well in the lower stretch. Decided to go hog hunting for a while in Cougar but didn't have much luck. I did have a follow by a nice brown but he wouldn't eat. In a month he'll eat it :-) . We hit Elk on the way out for a few more before sunset.

We caught somewhere around 20 fish between the three of us in two hours or so. That my friends is the remedy. Joe is down for a membership next year Richard. You ever think about starting a referral program? :-) Little did I know that Marty had hatched a plan. I didn't think I'd be back so soon.......