banner day

The boy and I were hosted up in Colorado this weekend.  My brother and nephew were in Elk Camp for a few days and invited us up to wet a line.

We jumped at the chance, despite the fact my best bud is still mending a broken ankle (who says soccer isn't a contact sport?!)  :-o

bluebird day

Although we get together once or twice a year, with both families separated by 500 miles, fully engaged in work, soccer, baseball, elementary + mid + high school, it's been a few years since my brother and I last fished together, the kids not at all.

So it was good to finally break that drought, enjoy our time on a stream together, fly rods in hand.

Two generations!  Awesome.

We came prepared for most anything, including in our arsenal a fully loaded streamer box, two boxes of pocket water dries, nymph boxes large and small.

See that ruggedly handsome ne'erdowell there?  Ya, I'm the other guy.

We started our day low in the drainage in the hopes of finding more active fish.  I got one solid short take on the streamer in the AM, my nephew reported one on and lost nymphing.  A bit discouraged by mid morning, we jumped up high to sample some meadow water my brother wanted to take a run at.

gift of the river gods

Gorgeous. With bluebird skies, temps into the 60's, the day's fishing was proving stellar.

 Got even better when my boy came wandering up, beer, yes Rolling Rock Premium Beer, in hand, asking me to look what he found- whaaaaa?!

Never one to look a gift horse in the mouth....ice cold too!

The catching, well, not so much:  one more short take on the streamer around lunch, no other action to be had between the four of us.  

Huh.

Oh, there were fish in there allright, as evidenced by yours truly spooking a nice 17-18 incher wading out to free my boy's snag in midstream.  Whoa, nice fish!  Just not biting, bummer.

two

Early afternoon, sensing the day's peak time quickly approaching, we decided to jettison the meadows in favor of that downstream pocket water we bypassed earlier in the day.

one

three

A bit of a scramble, bushwack to get to the stream, we huddled together to lay out a Gameplan.  Simple enuf: hopscotch thru the streamside brush to set the boys up in likely runs and pockets, get after it while the afternoon warmth lasted. 

I tried the Autumn Splendor in one more pocket, futilely, realizing the close quarters were no place for chucking & ducking.




Acting on a flash of desperation intuition, I bummed a SJW (yep that's a bright pink San Juan Worm #14) from my brother and BAM! promptly got us hooked up on three middling browns in like 10 minutes. 

 

And just like that we were off to the races, the fish left wondering at the pink san juan worm hatch filling every likely run and pocket.

master and apprentice

Now normally, that last trip of the season is tinged with a bit of melancholy, but there was none of that this day.  Sharing the water with some of my favorite people, two fathers reveling in their boy's growing skills pursuing the art of the long rod, it was a banner day indeed. 

river rogues

Thx fellas, it was a great trip!