{Tidal Potomac Fly Rodders} Re: Rocky Mountain National Park July 2-8

On Wednesday, July 11, 2012 10:50:57 PM UTC-4, Dalton Terrell wrote:

T. Jones, Damon, Ziman and I have been planning on taking the annual national park trip since February with the destination set as Rocky Mountain National Park. We met up with the author of Fly FIshing Rocky Mountain National Park, Steve Schweitzer, at the Somerset Fly Fishing Show who sold us his book and gave us some pointers. T Jones and I put in a few hundred calls on March 1 to reserve our backcountry campsites, Trent's persistence paid off and we were rewarded with 2 nights on the East side of the park and three on the West. Fast forward a few months and we were frantically trying to get to the fly shop and REI for last minute gear before our early morning flights on July 1. We flew into Denver, rented our SUV and then went by REI and Orvis again to get fuel, food and more last minute flies. By 7pm, we had our tents set up in a family campground and had pulled a couple brookies from the nearby stream. 

The next day we were going to try to get used to the elevation and were able to meet up with a former Montgomery County resident who had retired to Fort Collins to fish a largish freestone creek with browns, brookies, cut bows and a few greenbacks thrown in. We all hooked a ton of 12" browns and 6-8" brookies, needless to say I'm not sure we will be able to fish the Gunpowder again.

Tuesday morning it was time to hit the trail for our backcountry portion on the east side of the park. It was a 7.5 mile brute of a hike with 2,000 ft of elevation gain, which crushed us all. On one of our breaks, this Kingfisher decided to see what we were up to, hanging out only 5 ft away.

Once we got settled in, it was time to fish our first alpine lake and catch the first Greenbacks. FIsh were rising steadily but it was hard to pay attention with the gorgeous back drop. We picked up quickly on the actions of cruising and rising fish to catch a few.

We settled in early the first night to get prepared for a three mile bush whack up 1000 more feet into an epic alpine lake. This lake sat close to the continental divide, above the tree line. In a few hours of fishing we began catching so many that we started experimenting with all types of flies to see what could work. Nearly all fish in the lake were 10-12", with nothing under 8" caught and only a few bigger than 12".

  

The next morning it was time to hike out and check out the watering holes of Boulder and take a well needed shower. Thursday morning we rolled out of Boulder to the Western side of the park with hopes of catching brookies and Colorado River Cutthroats. We hiked in a few miles and split up, with Damon and Trent hitting a creek and Ziman and I hitting a lake we found to be tough and silty. This is when the daily thunderstorm hit, but didn't stop after 5 minutes like it had in previous days, it continued into the night soaking us and all of our gear. The next morning we put our wet shoes back on, moved the tents and layed into more brookies. The first two days on the West, we caught mostly brookies, and did our part to help eradicate this Snakehead of the West. 

  

Sunday happened to be our last day in the park, with another long bush whack to a lake rumored to have huge Colorado River Cutthroats. This was probably true, but we had the humbling experience of a knee injury on the way up and fished for over two hours without landing a single fish. The lake did happen to be next to other lakes and a creek with large brookies. 

On the way back to camp, we made the call to pack up and turn our already tough day of bush whacking into a 12-mile bruiser. We made it out before dark just in time to put back a few soda pops and rocky mountain oysters.

It was a great trip amongst friends, I'd highly recommend taking a trip like this if you get a chance. Look out for more pictures and a report from Trent. 

Dalton

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