It was mid-week that I began putting the plan in motion.  Sunday was looking like an opportunity to get out for some trout fishing with some spectacular weather predictions.  I had an itch and it needed some desperate scratching.

Having tied up several nymph patterns over the last week or so.  I was excited to get them wet.  I started to experiment with glass beads.  I fashioned up a dozen or so inspired by Gray Goat Fly Fishing guide Andy Roth.  I also tied up a couple of my own variations of my own patterns.

I met up with a friend not so early around 7 am and we were on the water just after 9am.  We decided to hit the Whitewater area.  I wanted to scout an area before we went to some of my favorite water in the system.  The first place looked very desolate and sandy with not much for fishy looking water, we fished for a short time and come up with nothing.  We went back to the truck to head to our next search and deploy spot.  High up on a bank we found a pretty good grouping of trout.  The sun was not in our favor for fishing these fish.  We decided to give it a try from up high as scampering down the bank would spoke them for sure.  I stripped out my line made a few false casts and let it rip.  Just as my fly was going to make it to my desired location the last free line caught on the grass sending my fly right on top of the school of trout.  Bam they were done and screaming around.  I made a few more casts to see if I could get the right cast and drift if we made it back to this spot later.  We probably would go up and around in the evening  and fish with the sun in our face as it set in the West.

With that we ended our scouting and headed to some fishy water leaving behind the fewer fishy looking sections of the lower river.  We ate some homemade chicken noodle soup before heading out again.  I have become a big fan of the Stanley Food Containers, keeping food hot/warm for about 10 hours as we finished off the rest around 6pm as we were leaving and it was still warm.    We also enjoyed a beer and there is nothing like an ice-cold stream side beer.

I often tote two rods (3-wt. & 5-wt.) this time of year.  It is cumbersome at times but allows me to be ready to fish top-water at the drop of a hat.  We found our first pool and tailout with a good number of fish stacked up.  We both caught a couple fish between 6-9 inches.  We were working a couple of different rigs with scuds, midge pupa, copper johns, and other smallish flies.

As the day went on we encountered fish rising pretty consistently to midges and caught a few on some griffith’s gnats.  Fished a couple of the better spots on the way out with success.  We had fun searching the very clear waters for fish, with barely a breeze the water was like a glass aquarium nearly everywhere we went.

When leaving a stream for the day I relish the time spent and the moments of meeting nature’s occupants.  We saw several deer carcases and were mesmerized with some of the log jams from the floods several years ago.  The stream has changed, holes are gone but new ones were formed, and a new mental map was drawn.  The sun had set and the last of drop of beer had been savored just before the key turned to start our return home.