Nanda
Member
- Joined
- Jun 30, 2013
- Messages
- 282
Last thursday I had plans to drive up to Wyoming and float/fly fish bighorn river. But at very last moment trip got cancelled due to overflowing river and prospect of poor fishing. I had already days off from work and already boarded one of my dogs at the camp. I had already almost reached Evanston when I got the news of cancellation, then decided to drive back and pick up my other dog and go down to flaming gorge dam area. This would give me chance to test out bunch of my gear(water filter, backpack) and also first solo backpacking experience. Leaving SLC around 1pm, we reached the destination(Dutch John) around 5pm or so.
Almost there, passing the gorge.
There are several river side campsites with picnic tables, fire pit and all. I picked out a nearby campsite(only 1.1 miles from the little hole area), paid the fees and took off with camp maps leaflet. Finding the campsite however was another thing. First I walked along the river but then reached a dead end with a deep pool of water below huge rocks. Some guy told me trail goes over the hill and ends up on other side where the sites are. Taking his advice, we hiked up the hill and it was painful slow hike up.
View from the top, too bummed out to take more pics. I didn't see campsite anywhere as shown in the map. Kept on hiking up and down and it was getting dark and not another soul in the area. Finally reached a spot by the river that had picnic table.
Finally there. I only realized I had ended up at campsite 5(2.2 miles away) and not the one I had booked for. Oh well, at least the views were nice and river was 10 steps away.
Setting up tent quickly, rigged up the fly rod to explore the water. Saw few rises but fishes were huge. Light was fading so only fished for a bit, but no bites and wind gusts were killer. The dog was getting pretty anxious so we went back to camp and made some quick dinner and off to bed. My first night solo was pretty uneventful, but I was so anxious I couldn't sleep even though i was so tired. I probably got like 3 hours of total sleep, woke up around 6:30 in the morning.
Scooter deals with cold while coffee is brewing.
Camp visitor.
Packing in everything, I decided to give that section of river another go for fishing. But it was too deep for wading and fish were far and few from the shore. Again, no bites and pretty disappointing affair.
One of the fishig spots. We moved on, hiking back out the way we came in.
Another view from the top.
About half a mile from little hole, we stopped a nice section for river for some serious fishing. Scooter basked in the Sun while I tried various flies, different approached. Unfortunately, the fly reel broke apart in 2 pieces and 1 fell in pool of water. Luckily it wasn't deep and I realized reel had completely malfunctioned, I couldn't spool out line without having it come off again. I wasn't going to give in so easily so decided to play the fish(if I caught any) in hand and spooled out bunch of line before trying out some tight line nymphing.
Sure enough, I felt a tug a fish took the fly. But the line I had out wasn't enough and as fish made a run for it, line reached the reel and reel refused to let it any line out, that was the end of that, fish broke off the tippet. I was so close to my first green river trout but failed to bring in partly due to bad reel.
Shore lunch while the dog rests.
On the way back to parking lot I saw few people fishing the river. Decided to give it another try, even with bad reel and all. One guy took my cicada fly but I took it right out of its mouth, didn't know I had to wait a bit with these huge flies.
Wanting to avoid deer on roadways in dark, we went back to lot and drove back to SLC. I was tired and sad for not having landed any fish, but glad to get the first night out out of the way. Scooter couldn't have been more cooperating, never complained and always was in vicinity when I fished.
Almost there, passing the gorge.
There are several river side campsites with picnic tables, fire pit and all. I picked out a nearby campsite(only 1.1 miles from the little hole area), paid the fees and took off with camp maps leaflet. Finding the campsite however was another thing. First I walked along the river but then reached a dead end with a deep pool of water below huge rocks. Some guy told me trail goes over the hill and ends up on other side where the sites are. Taking his advice, we hiked up the hill and it was painful slow hike up.
View from the top, too bummed out to take more pics. I didn't see campsite anywhere as shown in the map. Kept on hiking up and down and it was getting dark and not another soul in the area. Finally reached a spot by the river that had picnic table.
Finally there. I only realized I had ended up at campsite 5(2.2 miles away) and not the one I had booked for. Oh well, at least the views were nice and river was 10 steps away.
Setting up tent quickly, rigged up the fly rod to explore the water. Saw few rises but fishes were huge. Light was fading so only fished for a bit, but no bites and wind gusts were killer. The dog was getting pretty anxious so we went back to camp and made some quick dinner and off to bed. My first night solo was pretty uneventful, but I was so anxious I couldn't sleep even though i was so tired. I probably got like 3 hours of total sleep, woke up around 6:30 in the morning.
Scooter deals with cold while coffee is brewing.
Camp visitor.
Packing in everything, I decided to give that section of river another go for fishing. But it was too deep for wading and fish were far and few from the shore. Again, no bites and pretty disappointing affair.
One of the fishig spots. We moved on, hiking back out the way we came in.
Another view from the top.
About half a mile from little hole, we stopped a nice section for river for some serious fishing. Scooter basked in the Sun while I tried various flies, different approached. Unfortunately, the fly reel broke apart in 2 pieces and 1 fell in pool of water. Luckily it wasn't deep and I realized reel had completely malfunctioned, I couldn't spool out line without having it come off again. I wasn't going to give in so easily so decided to play the fish(if I caught any) in hand and spooled out bunch of line before trying out some tight line nymphing.
Sure enough, I felt a tug a fish took the fly. But the line I had out wasn't enough and as fish made a run for it, line reached the reel and reel refused to let it any line out, that was the end of that, fish broke off the tippet. I was so close to my first green river trout but failed to bring in partly due to bad reel.
Shore lunch while the dog rests.
On the way back to parking lot I saw few people fishing the river. Decided to give it another try, even with bad reel and all. One guy took my cicada fly but I took it right out of its mouth, didn't know I had to wait a bit with these huge flies.
Wanting to avoid deer on roadways in dark, we went back to lot and drove back to SLC. I was tired and sad for not having landed any fish, but glad to get the first night out out of the way. Scooter couldn't have been more cooperating, never complained and always was in vicinity when I fished.
