A trip through Southwestern Colorado in August, 2000

Sometimes it's better not to have high expectations based on past experiences.   Sue & the dog & I & the vanagon took a very long and fairly difficult trip fishing & camping our way around the Southwest corner of the state and then all the way to Pueblo & back to Glenwood Springs.

It started out great.  After leaving Glenwood on Wednesday, we spent an hour casting on the Crystal near Redstone & really killed the trout again (figuratively speaking).  The same caddis/copper john combination worked for both of us, and we must have released a good dozen & a half fish in the time we were on the water.   Before stopping for the night we traveled up over McClure Pass & spent the night near a friend's fishing cabin on Anthracite Creek.

The next morning we drove down the North Fork of the Gunnison and encountered the bane of our existence on this trip - the stream swollen by mud from a thunderstorm.  This weather feature was to plague us for the next several days.

But after passing through Hotchkiss and pulling off at the junction of the North Fork & the Main Fork of the Gunnison, we walked upstream & cast on the latter stream for a half hour.  Didn't land anything but did have a couple of very nice rainbows take the flies and would like to do some further hiking and wading on this beautiful water.  It's very Deschutes-like in appearance and apparently holds wonderful populations of large trout.

At Delta we turned South and headed up the Uncompaghre River.  Below the Ridgway Dam we tried to get on the tailwater, but balked at paying a $4 entrance fee just to cast for an hour or so.  Continuing upstream we ran into more storm muddied water near Ouray but still had a few strikes in that stream.

The trip beyond Ouray was beautiful but stormy & that weather continued as we headed in towards Durango.  Unhappily that town proved to be an utter disappointment.   Many of the highly touted tributary streams were virtually dried up - Hermosa Creek and Junction Creek in particular.  The Animas in town which was a favorite spot last year was also disappointing.  Water was high & roily, full of tubers, and only marginally fishable.  We did land a few smaller browns & rainbows near the medical center, but decided to leave & head East due to crowds & poor water conditions.

The area around Durango is chock full of nice water, but unfortunately, most of it is privately held and difficult to access.  We tried to get on the Las Pinas & had no success.  But where we camped by Bayfield, we did manage to connect on a couple nice rainbows on the "Little Pine" River before heading on the next morning.   Another favorite stream of the prior year - the Piedras - was also out of shape when we arrived.  Water was way too warm, too low, & too murky.  We again caught a few smaller browns on surface caddis, but it too was a disappointment.

On we went.  We tried another highly publicized stream - the East Fork of the San Juan - with no success at all.  It too was murky & the fish simply weren't feeding - at least on that which we offered them.  The West Fork a couple of miles further up towards Wolf Creek Pass probably was the most fun of the whole trip.  It was running clear when we arrived and some mayfly hatches were in progress.  A tiny stream perhaps flowing at 10 or less c.f.s., it nonetheless gave us some good fun on rainbows to 15 inches which took either a #20 PMD, a #18 hair wing generic, or a #20 copper john.

After that we basically were shut out with some minor exceptions.  It's worth trying some of the tributaries of the Rio Grande, and while we loved the look of this named stream above South Fork and below Creede, the water conditions were less than optimal & we were shut out again.

Traveling over Slumgullion Pass we had some fun with brookies in a small impoundment on a stream called Ramboullet Creek.  Heading downstream on the Lake Fork of the Gunnison we had difficulty finding public water & had limited success there.   Then after passing by Blue Mesa Lake we stopped and fished some nice braids on the main Gunnison where it enters that reservoir and finally had some decent success on both the surface hair wing & trailing copper john.  None of the fish were large, but at least there were lots of them and they seemed to like us.

We passed fishing the South Fork of the Arkansas after traversing Monarch Pass, but after camping near Salida that night, we did catch a number of decent browns on the main Arkansas right in the town of that name.  Best fly was a dark caddis hair wing.   The trip downstream to Pueblo was our first experience on the lower Arkansas and it again was muddy, so no fishing ensued.

While in Pueblo a couple of trips to the riprap on the dam of Lake Pueblo provided us with an hour of catching & releasing dozens of juvenile smallmouths & bluegills.   That would be a great place for a kid's first fly casting experience.  It's a no miss situation.  The tailwater of the dam is interesting.  I had good success on better sized bass in some of the faster runs & a wormer fishing nearby indicated that he often takes out good brown trout, so this section of the river would be worth exploring further.

On the drive home we retraced our steps up the Arkansas & spent a couple of hours fishing our favorite waters near Buena Vista.  It wasn't up to snuff this year, but we both caught a number of under 12" browns primarily on a #16 hair wing fly.

That was pretty much it for this longish journey.  Unfortunately the weather really go the better of us from a fishing standpoint & while it's good for the forests & streams, I just wish the rains had held off for another week or so.