Colorado River - November 28, 2014

I had the opportunity to head up into the mountains on Friday with Steffan and fish - the weather was superb and the fishing was even better. I met Steffan a little after 5am at the I70 Morrison Park N Ride and headed up the hill.

We made a quick stop at the gas station in Silverthorne for some lunch, a burrito and a donut and were headed up to Kremmling. The ride was uneventful, but the views were amazing, this picture was just after turning off on the dirt road to Pumphouse.

First cast....bam! Landed this thick rainbow, probably about 16 inches and very healthy.

Then.....nothing. We fished the pool above and below the bridge and then down and around the corner - looked like beautiful water, but we didn't hook anything. So we decided to try our luck further up river. On the way out of the parking lot I saw all these turkeys between the road and the river - so I jumped out (while Steffan filmed it) and chased after them - about 30 turkeys lifted off and flew to the other side of the river.

At our new destination we killed some beers and then dropped in right at the parking lot. The river is flowing high and relatively clear - especially for late November. Steffan hopped in first and on the first cast he had on this sweet brown:

Two casts later and he was into this big rainbow:

All fish were healthy and in the 15 to 16 inch range.

I finally started catching fish - including a brown and a whitie for the tri-fecta. We moved down river and fished lal the usual spots, catching a couple here and there.

At about 1pm we walked back to the truck and had lumch - then hiked up into the Canyon to fish. We could hear a couple of goose hunters shooting in the canyon, and then came upon them as they were leaving - their yellow and black labs getting to swim across the river.  We fished the bend, losing our rigs and basically getting skunked up there.

We finished up and decided to stop at the Outlets to see if we could see the pigs on the Blue River under the bridge. There was a couple of fly fishermen in there so we decided to get dinner - but the Dam Grill was packed - so we headed to Idaho Springs for some Tommyknocker. The food was good, the beer was ok, and we were back in the Park N Ride in Morrison by 7:15pm or so.

Long day, but well worth the time spent stalking fish. Thanks Steffan for driving. I might be done fishing for the next 3 or 4 months.