Days like today are a great reminder that those words should be reserved for truly mind blowing experiences.
Fished today with the best company money could buy (with the exception of a last minute cancellation...uhhh...hello Mr. Gossage!). Sharon, Kate, and I guide and work at and for Anglers Covey. We're trying to challenge each other to one day a week of fishing "selfishly" through the season. It's all too easy to guide every day and forget that fishing is also fun. We're justifying these as "scouting days". Opportunities to learn new water to take our clients to when our normal haunts are too pressured.
We (Sharon, Kate & I) started above Spinney today. It was blowin and goin and cold as a witches tit. Before we even discussed possible rigs for the day (winds high enough that we were considering 7wt rods!), we decided that we would back track to 11 Mile and scout some of the "bait" water.
Sharon's first cast produced a nice rainbow! Right where you would expect him! Do yourself the favor of fishing lower in the canyon!
I was blanked down low and although my goal was not go fish top runs, I became Henry Kissinger to myself and talked Kate and I into driving to the top and fishing down.... Kate was game and Sharon was easy enough to bend to our will.
An inconspicuous run, punctuated by less fishy but better 'looking' water was open so we decided to take a few drifts.
3 casts, 3 fish! NICE fish! 5th or 6th drift moved a big cuttbow and I broke off. (remember: it takes 30 seconds to retie after a few fish...don't be me! don't be so eager and not tend to your rig!). Kate was pumped! Sharon made her way down and she started moving fish as regularly as I was. I meandered to the far bank so we could better share the run, and we caught and missed several dozen (we think we stopped counting at about 50!) fish! All big, bright, wild trout! A new to the sport angler approached, we offered him the run and a few flies and decided to commit to a few casts downstream before it got too close to beer-thirty.
Moved (and missed!) several more on dries! Picked up a few swinging emergers, and ended on a 20" Rainbow on Neil's BWO that my best girl just had to kiss! (Don't worry...she's still committed to George! In their own weird way they have made peace with kissing fishes!)
Thank you Shea Gunkel, Neil Leuhring, and Steve Gossage (well...only sorta thanks to Steve as he wimped out...)! All your bugs brought many, many trout to hand! Good enough day that even many of my own bugs produced! (Steve...you F'n missed it! Hope Spinney was fun yesterday! :-)
So many days are fun, all days spent on water are a blessing...but some days are truly EPIC
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