Rocky Mountain Fishing Stories

The Spruce Lake RV Park in Estes Park is right on the Big Thompson River. We stayed there for two nights, and each morning I got up around 7am and fished the river for an hour.

The first morning I caught a 12-14" rainbow within about 15 minutes. A nice fat guy, he made me work to land him. I had to follow him down river about a hundred feet, which included wading in my tennies, and I had to coax him continuously to keep him from going down the swift water and breaking loose. I didn't have my camera or a net with me, so I had to land him by hand and wanted to carry him back to the motorhome for a picture. This, of course, would mean we'd have to eat him for breakfast rather than throw him back which I usually would rather not do. So as I was picking him up he gave a last great shake and fell back into the water, breaking off the light tippet I was using and swimming to freedom. Good for him and bad for me, as I like to have photograhic proof. There was another guy from the park who witnessed the whole event, but I didn't get his number, so you'll just have to trust me on this.

The second morning Kevin got up with me and we marched off again, this time with a camera in hand. (When my buddy Tom and I were in Alaska they made a big deal about handling the fish gently to return them to the water - nets were forbidden as they damage the fish; so I opted for the soft hand landing rather than a net this morning, too.) We went downstream this time, and Kevin spent some time perfecting the flycasting he learned the day before. After about half an hour it was my turn to fish and I ended up hooking into the brother of the fish from the day before. I gave Kevin the rod and he did an incredible job fighting the rainbow and bringing him to shore. Alas... as I was picking him up he gave a last great shake and fell back into the water, breaking off the light tippet I was using and swimming to freedom. Kevin learned new words that will help him with future fishing frustrations.

Two great fish, no photos.

We got the net, and Kevin and I headed back upstream and he continued to fish. He hooked and landed (with the help of the net this time) his first fish from flyfishing. As I was taking the picture the beautiful brown trout flipped out of Kevin's hands, missed the net and fell back into the water. Kevin was as disappointed as I had been twice earlier, but opted for a stoic silence rather than exhibiting his new fishing vocabulary.

We then packed up the motorhome and headed into Rocky Mountain National Park. The page following this shows the non-fishing part of the journey. Sarah and Eric weren't interested in fishing, but they were patient while Kevin and I tried our luck throughout the park. We started by going back to the Big Thompson, this time further up in Moraine Park where the river meanders through an enormous meadow.

The river here is much smaller than down in Estes Park, and is populated by smaller brown trout. The fish were rising for bugs, so we got to do some dry fly fishing. They were hitting frequently, so Kevin and I took turns catching fish. Kevin caught and landed his first fish on a dry fly, and we were successful at getting a photo.

After and hour and a half on the water, we drove over to the Fall River. It began to rain, so we had lunch before heading back to fish. The fish didn't mind the rain, and we landed a few more small browns, plus got some more experience with rapids and pools rather than meandering meadow streams.

We ended the day on the other side of the Continental Divide fishing the headwaters of the Colorado River. We last saw the Colorado over a week ago as it was shooting out the bottom of Hoover Dam. It's fun to imagine this small river eventually growing in size and carving out the Grand Canyon.

The river still hasn't cleared, so the fishing hasn't been good. We enjoyed the scenery, but the river wasn't going to share its bounty with us today.