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Finally, after months of anticipation and planning and marking off the days on the calendar, my annual Hairy Man weekend had arrived! My fishing buddy JPL and I arrived at our primitive campsite about midmorning on the Thursday before Memorial Day, primed and ready for 5 days of flinging flies and pitching hardware for mountain trout, both stocked and wild. What a welcome sight! Been looking forward to this sign for a year.
All the lower sites being full, we had to find a site on the DH portion of Big Snowbird. (For those who didn't know, Big Snowbird Creek has been redesignated DH from Junction all the way down to the concrete bridge that crosses the creek just upstream of Chestnut Flats Branch). Wasting no time pitching camp, we donned our waders and boots, strung up the rods, drove to Junction, and began a short hike up the creek of about a mile or so before we bushwhacked down to the creek and finally got the lines wet.
This is what the portion of the creek from Junction all the way to above Big Falls looks like- rough and tumble pocket water with an occasional deeper pool or run to break it up. A little dangerous as it is usually a fair distance down from the trail and often out of sight. A lot of dappling and short flipping (too short for what I call roll casting- usually no more than a foot or two of flyline extending past the tip).
Right off the get go the trout started hitting. We were both using a large stimulator as the dry and small nymphs as the dropper. This day, as with all the days we were here, they preferred the dry. I'd say for 5 days, at least 85% of the strikes came on the dry.
4 hours later, with many trout, all rainbows between 5 and 10 inches, caught and released, we bushwhacked up to the trail and headed back to camp.I'd guess we caught between 20 to 30 trout total- not a bad half day sneaking and stalking wild trout. (Shoot, a great day, considering all the times we've been skunked on the wary wild ones!)
Deciding that we were too wore out to cook and needing supplies, off to Robbinsville and Bojangle's we went. All the way, with no cell signal, a little voice in the back of my head kept chirping "check the weather! Check the weather!" It wasn't until we had eaten and were coming out of the grocery store that I remembered to check the radar. (It was a little late by then- the sky off to the NW was darkening quick with menacing looking thunderheads).
With an audible "huh-oh" and a "hurry!" to Jimmy, we took off headed back to camp. I had made a rookie mistake and left several things out that shouldn't get wet! My back pack, my fishing pack, my dry wading socks, and most importantly, my toilet paper!!!!
All the lower sites being full, we had to find a site on the DH portion of Big Snowbird. (For those who didn't know, Big Snowbird Creek has been redesignated DH from Junction all the way down to the concrete bridge that crosses the creek just upstream of Chestnut Flats Branch). Wasting no time pitching camp, we donned our waders and boots, strung up the rods, drove to Junction, and began a short hike up the creek of about a mile or so before we bushwhacked down to the creek and finally got the lines wet.
This is what the portion of the creek from Junction all the way to above Big Falls looks like- rough and tumble pocket water with an occasional deeper pool or run to break it up. A little dangerous as it is usually a fair distance down from the trail and often out of sight. A lot of dappling and short flipping (too short for what I call roll casting- usually no more than a foot or two of flyline extending past the tip).
Right off the get go the trout started hitting. We were both using a large stimulator as the dry and small nymphs as the dropper. This day, as with all the days we were here, they preferred the dry. I'd say for 5 days, at least 85% of the strikes came on the dry.
4 hours later, with many trout, all rainbows between 5 and 10 inches, caught and released, we bushwhacked up to the trail and headed back to camp.I'd guess we caught between 20 to 30 trout total- not a bad half day sneaking and stalking wild trout. (Shoot, a great day, considering all the times we've been skunked on the wary wild ones!)
Deciding that we were too wore out to cook and needing supplies, off to Robbinsville and Bojangle's we went. All the way, with no cell signal, a little voice in the back of my head kept chirping "check the weather! Check the weather!" It wasn't until we had eaten and were coming out of the grocery store that I remembered to check the radar. (It was a little late by then- the sky off to the NW was darkening quick with menacing looking thunderheads).
With an audible "huh-oh" and a "hurry!" to Jimmy, we took off headed back to camp. I had made a rookie mistake and left several things out that shouldn't get wet! My back pack, my fishing pack, my dry wading socks, and most importantly, my toilet paper!!!!
. )
