mo' fishing

well, folks, dad and mom did wind up coming up to steamboat so that dad could fish during this incredible little window of opportunity.

after a stop at the best damn freestone river in colorado (the river not to be named), they got here late wednesday night, and dad and i fished thursday morning, friday morning, and saturday. dad caught a couple nice ones on thursday, a couple more on friday, and only one on saturday, but it was the nicest fish of the week for anyone.

here's an account of that day i sent to my buddy paul. check it out:

bruce and dad and i had a great day on saturday, and it wound up being the last decent day for awhile. the cfs (cubic feet per second) was at 700 when we stopped fishing at 2:30. it's at 1,280 today!

golden stone nymphs were still the hot ticket, and we caugh six fish - bruce 3, me 2, and dad one. bruce caught a rainbow and a brown in the 16-18 inch category before we got there. we crossed the river at the KOA campground and went up to a nice plunge pool where dad hooked up with a pretty nice fish for about 10 seconds. it took off downstream and dad lost him. it was then my turn and i caught a fat little 12/13 inch bow on my first cast. nothing else out of that pool so we headed upriver to a really incredible stretch of water.

we shared a rod between the 3 of us and it was such a nice way to fish. dad went first at the next pool. he hooked into another decent fish and lost it as it headed downstream. we rested the main part of the pool and bruce fished the nervous water at the top where he caught a 10/11 inch bow. my turn next. we were giving each other about 20-30 casts apiece before giving up the rod. they started counting me down after about 20 casts, and on my actual last cast i hooked into a 19 inch rainbow. it took me 30 yards downstream and i netted him. beautiful fat fish.

dad was next, and after what was probably an annoying amount of coaching from bruce and me (he was working on location and mending for good drifts), he hooked into the nicest fish of the day on his 10th cast. he did everything right with this one - kept his rod high, moved downstream with it (but didn't walk backwards), and most importantly he had a great hookup in the corner of its mouth. after about 50 yards downstream i was able to net it for him. biggest fish he's caught in the yampa yet - we measured it in the measurenet and it was somewhere between 21-22 inches, probably pushing 4 pounds. a gorgeous rainbow hen. my dad's hands are huge, so the picture doesn't really do it justice, but it barely fit in his net.

it was a fantastic fish, and all three of us were whooping and hollering after we released it.