FryingPan and Crystal River - Dec 28-29, 2010

Tuesday, December 27, 2010
Fish On!

Cabo, very interested in the fishes.

Maylon with a nice Rainbow.

Fatty McFatterson.

A nice Bow, I think that's D.

This was a beautiful Cutthroat, not big but beautiful colors.

Holy crap was it cold! And I'm complaining and Darren was there over an hour before I even showed up!! D got there around 5:15am, and I showed at 6:30am. He was the first car at the Toilet Bowl, I was the third. Sad part was car #2 was right in front of me - so D had the Bowl all to himself for over an hour. The bank in Carbondale said 12 degrees, I'm sure it was much colder in the canyon.

I got out and chatted with D for a few minutes and then went back to the truck for a nap. Seriously, who the hell fishes that early in the AM in the pitch black? Not me. Cabo and I slept until 7:30, by then it was light and we were ready to fish. D was holding his spot on the Bowl and hooking a lot of fish, most were dinks, with the occassional pig.

The pics above are in no particular order - I was too lazy to order them.

I fished for a while and was skunked. Then I saw a huge pig feeding a bit further down and tried for him. After snapping off 6x and more flies I decided I needed to warm up again. The dog was freezing too and my left foot was a block of ice - my boot was too tight. I napped a little in the car - warming up the dog and my foot. Then around 9:30 we hit the Bowl again. This time we got into fish - I hooked about 8 and landed 5 or so - all were small but fiesty. Darren did hook and land a pig - see above - and that was a great fish. After about 11:20, I lost my rig and called it a day. D was going to stay a few more hours. I hope he did well - he'll have to post his update.

It was a fun day, although cold as hell. I hate the cold weather when you try and fish in it. I spent an hour at the Glenwwod Hot Springs to warm up!!

Wednesday, December 28, 2010
I did manage to get out for a couple hours and fish the Crystal River right here on Avalanche Creek Road next to Avalanche Ranch (where we are staying). The Crystal is known to be blown out after any kind of rain or snow melt, but in December it is very very low. If I had to guess I would say it was flowing around 400 or 500 cfs. The river is relatively narrow - about 20 feet across in most sections, but it gets wider in some areas. The river is heavily silted - lots of the soft stuff around the edges that you sink into. It reminds me a bit of the Ark - off colored too.

With no real time to explore I just hit up a spot I scoped out the past couple of days, a nice stepped up water fall area that dumped into a nice deep riffle stretch. The weather was blowing snow, 20 mph winds and probably about 25 degrees. It was cold, but not nearly as cold as the Pan the day before.



On my first cast I had a take, lost it, on my 4th cast I caught this little guy.



It was a 13 inch whitie - kind of a weird golden color. Never seen one so golden. Maybe I misidentified it, but I don't think so. He took a zebra balck midge size 20.

I went about 20 minutes without hooking up - working faster water and then I finally hooked and landed a small (10 inch) rainbow. He was pretty colorless, but still nice to see something besides a whitie.



I moved down again to a little hole that had a swift section along a rock. I saw a good sized fish come up and nudge my indicator. He looked about 16 inches and I thought it was a brown. I hooked him a few casts later, but he got off. I moved on, fishing down river to some beautiful holes, but no fish to be found. It was almost 4pm - time to head back to the cabin. SO I walked back up to the hole with the big fish in it - I tied on an electric yellow hot wire stone and drifted it through the pool. On my 4th cast I had the bastard on.

I landed this beauty - a 15 inch whitie - and again, he was a golden color.





That is probably the last time I will get out on this trip. I need to hang with the family more. I'm glad I got out during nap time - even though it was cold and snowy.

Tomorrow I have to drive up to Glenwood Springs to the tOyota dealer because Jen's truck won't go into 4X4 - we got the tires replaced last weekend and for the first time tried to throw it into 4X4 and it won't work. Hopefully it is an easy fix. I hope to go to SUnlight Mtn snowboarding tomorrow. We'll see if we make it.