North Fork Lakes

Had a great trip this past weekend to some high alpine lakes with Scott and Justin. It was such a fun trip that I feel motivated to write about it! It's been a while. I've been looking forward to a trip like this that gets me in the mood to write again. It was great to get away from the crowds and do some fishing for ourselves. We've been keeping busy this summer with shop work, classes, and guide trips. A little solitude along with some good fishing for beautiful cutthroat trout was a good recharge.

We put the white buffalo through the paces driving up the jeep trail. Not a hard jeep trail but rocky enough to take it easy going up. She handled it like a champ. Fun start to the adventure.

We decided to hit Island lake first. I soon realized that I'm out of shape. The hike is short and easy but I haven't carried a pack in a long time.... It was good to get the heart rate up though and suck down some fresh air.... lots of fresh air.

Fishing was best when we first arrived on Island. I think it would have been much better early in the morning but we started fishing around 10:30. Fishing tapered off in the afternoon. We caught some beautiful cutthroat.

On the way out we hit a shallow lake along the trail to Island. It was full of eager cutthroat that couldn't resist an ant pattern. The weren't big but they were hungry and some of them came completely out of the water for a fly!

Scott and I headed for North Fork Lake to setup camp and get a little more fishing in. Scott caught a few more cutthroat that evening and I caught some stocker rainbows. Three lakes in one day and we caught fish in all of them. Not a bad day!

We camped just outside of the campground at North Fork ($18 for a tent site was a little too steep) and planned to be up early for our hike up to Arthur the next morning. Scott's siren alarm went off and I must have been dreaming about fishing a tailwater because I thought it was a warning for a water release.... I came to and thought to myself, "why in the hell would you want to wake up to that every morning"! Apparently Scott is a very heavy sleeper. It was raining so the snooze function was used several times. Never got used to the siren alarm...

We finally dragged our asses out of the fart sacks and packed up camp. Up the trail we went. That is after seeing some risers in North Fork and catching a few for a warm up. We each caught a fish and then hit the trial err trail. This trail didn't believe in switchbacks. More fresh air. Lots more. The trail leveled out and we looked ahead and saw what must be the lake above the crest of the next ridge. We're there Man! Well not really... No lake and no trail... and of course no map :-)

So began a few hours of up and down hiking. Scott wasn't phased. I was. I hit my second and third wind. Finally Scott mentioned dropping all the gear while he checked out the last ridge. No arm twisting. Up he went over the ridge. He was back in 10 minutes and he found water! Had my fourth wind and headed up and over the last ridge.

It was a site to see hiking up and over the last few rocky sections to the lake. Scott hooked up almost immediately. I hooked up shortly after that. We caught a few on nymphs but Scott started hooking up on dries so we started focusing on top water. An ant pattern was the ticket. Scott was on fire for a while!

Fishing tapered off again in the afternoon and the weather started moving in. We made it back down to camp just as it started raining. Back down the jeep trail. White buffalo whined a little but made it. One mud flap was hanging by a thread. Acceptable wear and tear for the old girl.

A rejuvenating trip for sure. Really peaked my interest in back country fishing. I've dabbled but have never dove in. Another area to explore in this great sport of ours.