The Johnsons: August 2008

7.19.08
We found the camera! I lost it but Brad recently found it hiding in a bag of crayons...so I am able to post some fun photos of our Dodge City trip earlier this Summer. We met Aunt Kim, Uncle Dave, cousins Alex and Andy, and Grandma and Grandpa Susie!

Brad had already planned a fishing trip that weekend so Ben and I went solo. The 7 hour drive was tough, especially because Ben had diarrhea on the way there and I got the stomach flu on the way back. Yikes!

We went on a stagecoach ride, visited a wax museum, saw a gun fight (Ben wasn't too thrilled with this and screamed "Don't shoot me!" - we had to make a fast getaway), toured Boothill Museum & Cemetery and had lots of fun hanging out!

this old jail cell was a major attraction!

A co-worker of mine invited me to spend the weekend at one of his family's cabins and fish a private section of the Taylor River. As many of you know I have a hard time passing any fishing trip down, especially on one of my favorite rivers in Colorado. We headed up on a Friday in hopes of getting up there before the unique early afternoon hatches and rising fish.

We pulled into Gunnison around 1pm and opted to forgo lunch and head straight for the action. Just a mile up from the town of Almont, the property was awesome with mountains all around and a great section of river running through it. I had fished just a couple hunderd yards downstream from his property last summer with my brother and dad and landed the largest fish I had ever caught on a fly rod (22 inch rainbow). Needless to say, I was ready to have another go.

We quickly hopped out and imediately suited up for what would end up being a great green drake (mayfly) hatch that the Taylor and Gunnison rivers are known world wide for. Green Drakes mean one thing, HUGE flies and top water action two of the best things in fly fishing.

Approaching the river with rod in hand and net on my back, it was apparent the river was still running high (700cfs+) for this time of year. This past winter, the Gunnison valley and surrounding mountains received record amounts of snow. Combined with a slow spring warm up, the rivers would be running high almost all spring and summer long. The wet spring snow melt also made for an unbelievable wildflower festival in Crested Butte from what I heard http://www.crestedbuttewildflowerfestival.com/.

We headed upstream to a section of river that had a nice deep run along side a steep rock wall. As soon as we stepped in, the fish started rising to take bugs off the surface and in some cases, a foot off the surface. We quickly got into several nice sized brown and rainbow trout averaging 14 inches with the largest being a 20 inch brown with awesome yellow color. After a couple of hours the afternoon hatches died down and so did the fishing. We decided to head back to the cabin and unpack.

The cabin on the property was pretty rustic. Basically just four log walls and a roof. The living space was divided into two rooms - an all purpose kitchen, dining room, living room, and spare bedroom. The other room was the master bedroom if you want to call it that. It was plenty comfortable to just lay your head at night. No TV, running water or bathroom. That ment being cut off from the rest of the world and showerless for the next three days. Oh well, when you're fishing who cares about that "other" stuff. As far as the bathroom goes, we had two choices. Behind a tree or go in the outhouse from hell. The outhouse was around 70 feet away from the cabien. That ment hoping that a bear or mountain lion wasn't hiding hiding behind a tree at night waiting to pick you and your stuffed blatter off. Even if you made it past the bears and lions, there were still the huge spiders like something out of the Hobbit that were waiting inside the outhouse. One look inside and I quickly decided no spider was going to take a chunk out of my fleshy white butt.

The next day we got up and headed straight for the water. Fishing was slow through the morning but again picked up around 11am. Besides the occasional kayaker, rafter, or fisherman drifting by on a boat, the fishing was awesome. In Colorado, the water in rivers is public and can be enjoyed by all. However, water that runs through private property is still public but you cannot stop or get out of your boat. Again big bugs and tons of surface action. Most of the fish averaged around 16 inches with an occasional big brown measuring 22 inches plus.

We called it quits around 4pm and headed into town to find a great place to eat dinner. Decided to try out an Italian place right on the Gunnison River. Food was awesome and the scenery on the back patio was excellent.

The next day we decided to head up to fish Spring Creek, a smaller stream that flows into the Taylor before heading home. We were going to fish East Creek just down the road but like the Taylor, East Creek was flowing nearly out of its banks and just too high to enjoy.

The Taylor prooved again to be one of my favorite rivers to fly fish. There's just something magical about that river that the other hot spots in Colorado just don't quite have. Can't wait until next year.