spinnerfall

"there's a fine line between fishing and just standing on the shore like an idiot." -steven wright

Tuesday, April 11, 2006

elk and rainbows (david)

well, folks, i still haven't figured out how to get my profile off this blog, or how to get different logins to show up when different people post. i may create a new, general user profile and move spinnerfall to it. but in the meantime, let me tell you about the weekend.

my dad, geno, flew into denver on friday night and stayed in golden. we had decided to meet in silverthorne early saturday morning and fish the tailwater section of the blue river. for those of you unfamiliar with this river, it flows right through the heart of town, and one particular stretch goes under a pedestrian bridge in an outlet mall. so, while people make their way from the izod outlet over to the nike and polo outlets, they can stop and watch you fish for very, very big trout.

neither dad nor i did very well - dad caught a nice 12 incher and i foul-hooked a little 5 inch fingerling - but for several minutes i did have an audience on the bridge. i hooked a big rainbow right below everyone, fought it for several minutes, then lost it because i was trying to muscle it in. i swear, there was an audible groan from the bridge when i lost the fish. it was pretty funny.

sunday, we drove over to fish the white river. i'm not going to tell you where, because this has to be the best river in colorado - and you try and keep that kind of information a secret. anyway, my day started when i foul-hooked a big 19 or 20 inch rainbow - a real old guy, battle-scarred and not too enthusiastic about the fight. he came to the net pretty quickly, i popped the fly out of his bottom fin with no blood, and he was off and swimming.

it heated up from there - several whitefish in a spot where i caught them last time. my buddy bb is not a fan of these fish, but i love them: they fight like hell, and they're muscular and heavy.

after that we moved upstream to the spot where we had so much luck last fall. i took off my nymphs, put on a bugger (one that i tied), and floated it below a strike indicator. fishing buggers this way has never really worked for me all that well, but bb swears by it. well, on sunday it worked and then some. in about 5 casts i had a 17 or 18 inch beautiful fat rainbow on. he jumped once, which is such a thrill. i brought him in, released him, and 3 casts later i had on the biggest trout i've ever caught - a 22-24 inch rainbow. an absolutely gorgeous fish, and he jumped twice, very high. my heart was pounding, but i got him in on my own, and held him up for a picture (which we managed to screw up). just an incredible fish.

geno didn't have quite as prolific a day, but it was a good one anyway: he caught 2 fish, and one of them was also his biggest rainbow ever, also 22-24 inches. he was stoked, and got a picture of it in the net.

we both hooked other big trout, but lost them. but that's fishing, right?

on our way out, we saw a herd of fifty elk as the sun was dropping below the horizon. what an incredible river valley. once things slow down for pdiddy, i'm taking him over here.

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