We have returned from our little fishing foray (and I survived the motorcycle expedition – more on that in the next post).

If you read the route and map from the last post, you would know that we planned on fishing in Idaho on the upper Blackfoot River and some areas around it on day one, then McCoy Creek and some areas around it on day two. Not so fast—things are not what you will expect them to be when fishing with Talking Bull. Day two actually found us in Wyoming, not Idaho.

Kevin (visit him at Coach’s Caribou County Fly Fishing Journal [new window opens]) has been giving me information about fishing around the Blackfoot River and the areas around McCoy Creek. He also gave us great information before our trip to the Portneuf River. Thanks Kevin!

The original plan was to head out fishing as soon as Dan got back from his eight day trip to Ohio. Yes, Dan was willing to suppress his urge to curl up in a ball and rest his weary bones after the long flight and car drive home, just to fish.

Plan: plane lands at 2:00PM. Dan Drives home and arrives at 4:00PM. Dan loads gear, hooks up trailer. Scott arrives at 5:00 and the stalkers are on the road.

Reality: Dan lands at 3:30PM (delay in Las Vegas because of the earthquake in SoCal. Dan Calls Scott and explains there was a delay. Dan gets behind a tanker that rolls over [new window] on the freeway and is one of the last cars before freeway closes and traffic is rerouted. Dan calls Scott and explains. 6:00 Dan calls Scott again because he is still in traffic (sporadic air conditioning, inoperable windows, etc.). 7:30 Dan calls Scott. We decide leaving in the morning will be better.

6:00AM Scott arrives at Dan’s house. Dan is sitting in the truck waiting. Load gear, and get out of Dodge.

8:30AM We arrive at the Blackfoot River Road. The road is paved for quite a few miles. The terrain is gently rolling hills with a few large hills/small mountains surrounding the river creating multiple valleys. There is a lot of ranching through here.

9:00AM Arrive at the Stocking Ranch area. I want to try this section. I head downriver to the white you see on the right side of the picture (that is a backeddy of foam).

I fish to the right of the main current to a fish I see rise. I cast a beetle toward the fish and surrounding water about 20 times with no luck. There are bugs in the air, but no rises. I fish the foam, then the seam between the foam and current with a stimulator. I have a strike. The fish puts up a nice struggle, and I try to be gentle because I have on 6x tippet. The 16″ cutthroat is almost to hand when the tippet breaks and the fish leaves with my best stimulator.

I catch and release a 10″ cutt to the right of the current and then a 12″ in the next stillwater above the foam.

Dan comes around the bend from fishing above me. He has no luck there. We head downriver to The Narrows and fish several sections. We get into a bunch of fish, but nothing much bigger than 6″. I think Dan gets one about 10″

We mosey upriver a bit to check things out. Dan brought along some tasty cherries we snack on as we drive. We cross the river just above the Stocking Ranch where the road splits into the Diamond Creek Rd. and the Lanes Creek Rd. We follow the Diamond Creek Road along some fenced land with grazing cattle. At the end of the fence we find a spot to fish.

We bushwhack through willows, but never come to the creek. We take the truck upriver a ways and turn off at a little road toward Campbell Canyon. We come to the creek and hop out to fish. We walk upstream a bit but can’t find any fish. The water is off-color and it is very brushy. Dan keeps track of my progression by spotting the narwhal (my fly rod poking up above the brush). We drive upstream a bit farther o the Hornet Canyon Rd. A bunch of cows lounge about. (Yes, we brought the wristrocket (actually, Dan bought a new one when we stopped for groceries), but we forgot the marbles. Yes, little pebbles work just fine.) The water in this area looks just as discolored as the rest of the creek. Kevin said the water was crystal clear on this creek, but I forgot to ask him where on the creek he fished. The map I brought doesn’t go upriver any farther, and we don’t want to keep looking, so we head downstream.

We stop a little ways below Yellowjacket Creek, where the road splits. We each get into a couple of little cutts. We decide to head towards our day two spot a bit early since the fish aren’t active and mostly small. We have basically accomplished our goal at the Blackfoot area: see what the area is like and see what the fish are like. As we drive north, Dan brings forth Plan B (also known as “The Wild Hair” or “Talking Bull Speaks).

“It’s only 3:00. How about driving over to the South Fork of the Snake River, checking it out, do a little wade fishing, then go to McCoy Creek from the Palisades side access.”

“Yeah, sure, works for me,” I say.

By this time the cherries are working pretty good on me and I have to make an emergency stop at the porta-potty on the Stocking Ranch. It’s mostly gas (I know, too much information).

We take the cutoff road to Rt 34 and follow Tincup to Star Valley. We get into Alpine Junction. I show Dan one of my favorite cutthroat rivers to fish, Greys River. I have told Dan about it for years and we always talk about getting there to fish, but we never have. We zip through Alpine Junction and about two miles out of town Dan turns to me. “When are you going to fish the Greys this year?”

“It probably won’t happen,” I say.

(The following is known as “Plan C,” “Another Wild Hair” or “Talking Bull Speaks Again.”) “How about tomorrow?” he asks. “We fish the Snake today, head up to the Greys, camp there tonight, then fish it tomorrow.”

“Sure, that works for me.” (I find it’s best to follow Dan’s wild hair moments because they usually turn out enjoyable memorable.) Final trip route map here [new window]—make sure you zoom in and click on the placeholders (tacks/fish) for more information.

We make our way back into Jackson to pick up a Wyoming license to fish the Greys. At the fly shop we ask about the Snake. The flows are up (13,000 cfs). Dan has fished the Snake here before, but I haven’t, so I have no clue if 13,000 is good or bad.

“Not good for wade fishing,” Dan says. “But let’s see if we can find a place on the far side of the river, a back channel or two.”

We zip north out of Alpine for the second time in 20 minutes. The cherry gas pains are still with me, a sharp pain in my lower abdomen. I just can’t seem to shake it.

At Irwin we stop to find an access point. There is little access here for wade fishing, mostly just put-ins for floaters.  Dan notices the tire on the trailer is a little low, so we put in some air, and I get some Tums. Then we head south. We zip through Swan Valley until we get to the northern end of the valley where Rt 26 crosses the Snake River. We head south on a dirt road on the west side of the river. We keep looking for a spot to fish, but don’t really see anything too promising in these flows. Somewhere near Indian Creek we turn around.

Dan wants to show me Fall Creek Falls so we stop at the overlook turnoff. When we hop back in the truck, Dan notices that the tire is almost completely flat. Luckily he has an air pump that plugs in to the lighter. He has to unhitch the trailer and move the truck closer to the tire so the hose will reach. He fills it up, hooks back up, and we take off.

In Swan Valley we stop at Rainey Creek Country Store and gas station (home of the famous square ice cream cone [new window]) to check the tire. Dan puts in some stop leak stuff and fills up the tire. And notices that the adapter between his truck’s electrical mount and the trailer is missing. Oh boy. We don’t worry about it now, but instead head back toward Alpine Junction and Greys River.

On the way to our camp site (I won’t disclose where on the Greys we camp and fish) we stop at one of my favorite fishing holes. We get into a couple of nice fish that are rising. I Want Dan to catch a larger fish here since I’ve been talking it up for so many years. We each catch a couple of decent-sized fish (13″) and Dan misses a couple of bigger ones. It’s nice to finally fish to rising fish. I have had very little chance to do that this year, so I’m pretty excited at the prospects.

We continue upriver and someone is in my usual camping spot. In fact, since the last time I was here (about five years ago), it seems like there are a lot more people. I fished the river about three times a summer for six years straight, and have never seen so many people.

We make camp about 8:00 a little farther upriver at a place i have camped at a couple of times. A nice little hatch is going on in the hole behind camp, so I fish while Dan sets up the trailer (thanks Dan!). I get into a couple 10″-12″ fish. I notice a larger fish tracking the elk hair caddis I have on and decide to switch to something larger—the Struggling Salmonfly! (For you faithful blog reader, all one of you, you would know this fly from before as the “Foam Cross.”)

I immediately had an 8″ fish on. Then another 10″ fish. I finally hooked in to the bigger fish (about 16″) but he threw the hook after 5 seconds of fight.

My gas pains have finally subsided but I’m not interested in dinner (Dan picked up some nice steaks, asparagus, potatoes and onions for dinner—Drats!). I have a piece of bread.

Dan pops in “A River Runs Through It” and we watch until just before Paul’s big fish scene, when the battery dies.

It’s a cold night and sleep is a bit sporadic because when my head is out of the sleeping bag, it’s too cold, and when it is in the sleeping bag, it’s too hard to breathe. There is a bit of frost on some of the items in the back of the pickup in the morning.

Dan starts breakfast and I check to see if there is a caddis hatch (there often is a nice early morning hatch in this hole). No such luck this morning and I only bring one 6″ fish to hand.

When I return Dan is working on breakfast. My stomach is much better so I eat my fill. We tie up a few dark caddis flies.

We decide to head upriver to one of my usual holes. I see a small rising fish. Dan casts a couple dozen times but comes up blank. He heads upriver. and I stay behind. I catch 8″ triplets in succession on the Struggling Salmonfly. I catch up to Dan and he has got into some decent fish.

We fish together for a short ways. We each catch a fish or two.

Not sure what’s up with this guy’s bottom tail fin.

We take tturns fishing every other hole or sometimes fish together since Dan has switched to a nymph for the time being. We pull a few more from some of the holes. I hook into a nice 16″ but lose it when it heads downriver.

I love the look of this river with the gold riverbed, the cutts in here really blend in well:

We drive back to camp and have some lunch then head downriver to where we fished last night, but somebody is fishing there. We stop at a few other spots and pick up a couple of fish here and there. We scope out last night’s spot again but the bloke is still there.

We find another likely spot I haven’t fished before. Dan heads upriver and I head toward a side channel. I toss my fly into the slack water where two channels meet. My fly swirls under the surface and into the current. I see a flash and feel a tug. It’s a nice 15″ fine-spotted cutthroat. I decide to toss the fly in the water and let it sink a bit. Another fish, same size. I drop the fly in a third time, let it sink, and have a third fish, barely smaller. So, the Struggling Salmonfly also works great as a streamer—who would have thought!

I go around the bend and see a small pocket on the far bank. This is a 12″ wide by 20″ long piece of water that has a couple of roots dangling at the head and tail of the pocket. It is hard against the outside bank, but enough of the banck prtrudes fore and aft that it creates a small bit of holding water. I see a dark shape moving in it. I reach across six feet of current and dab my fly at the head of the pocket. A violent strike and this 16″ beauty comes to hand.

Another little pocket is right below the first and I see another fish working it. The Struggling Salmonfly plops in the hole and out comes this 16″ lovely.

So in 15 minutes I bring in five fish 15″-16″. When I catch up with Dan he says he has also caught a handful of fish and has one on. I take a 12″ cutt then proceed to take this 15″ golden-hued fish. I like when they have this color about them.

We head back to camp and take everything down and hitch up the trailer. Dan checks the tire and it looks good.

Heading downriver we see that the fisherman who was in last night’s spot is finally gone. We go ahead and give it a try. We pull several more nice fish out of a 200′ stretch of river but I forgot the camera so we can’t take any pictures.

It’s about 5:00 and we figure it’s time to head home, although we would love to stick around for the evening hatch. We decide to stop at a few spots that look nice on the way down, although I have never done well in those places. Dan does have the opportunity to practice his trailer backing skills when we zip past a place and have to back up to it.

We make it to Alpine Junction about 6:00 and stop so Dan can get some wiring (an extension cord) and masking tape (where’s the duct tape, Dan?). Dan checks the tire when he is heading into the store and it is looking low. By the time he returns from the store, the tire is completely flat.

Dan works on the electrical while I try to figure out how to change the tire.

Unfortunately, the lug wrench on Dan’s truck is different than the one required for the trailer. I purchase another bottle of Fix-A-Flat and pump it in. Dan has all of the lights working except the running lights. We fill the tire up with air and leave Alpine at about 8:00. The remainder of the trip is uneventful and I make it in my door at 11:30PM. In a few hours I will be heading right back in this direction for a motorcycle trip to Jackson Hole for two days.