Casting for Recovery is an organization that takes advantage of our planet’s natural healing powers by providing women in various stages of breast cancer with a weekend of relief. It is a 2 ½ day retreat for 14 women into the mountains. An opportunity for the women to not only learn to fly fish, but to form relationships and find the physical and emotional relief that comes along with a weekend retreat into the Colorado Rockies. Alternative forms of medicine are growing in popularity and I cannot imagine an activity with more healing powers than fly-fishing. This past weekend Cooper and I were lucky to share the therapeutic values of the sport that we love with women who have been directly affected by this life changing disease.
The ladies as always were full of smiles and it didn't hurt that the trout were willing to cooperate. Dana was the lucky lady who had me for her guide. She had an incredible outlook on life, which translated into having a great attitude on the river. Dana is an experienced spin fisher along with a quick learner and good listener. It didn’t take her long until she was getting into fish and we landed the hog below!
CFR is an incredible organization, completely powered by volunteers, that can truly result in a life-changing weekend. The combination of making new friends and having cookies delivered to you while you fish means I will definitely be back for September’s retreat! For more information on Casting for Recovery, check out their
website.
It has been a busy couple of weeks over here on the DTF front. Employment issues while constantly fighting for time on the water has been the norm but hey, you gotta play the hand your dealt right? DeltaTroutForce Hall-of-Famer Parker has been doing his best to adjust to everyone of life’s many curveballs and has successfully found a way to wet a line during his lunch break.
For the full story of why Parker was rocking some shined up loafers while hanging out with a carp and a Jamaican chick you should check out his friend
Charlie’s blog.
After being forced to see a fish as pretty as a carp, I have to include some pics from recent missions Cooper and I have been on to remind you that with trout, the fish usually look better than the fisherman.
After quitting my job on Tuesday, I knew the only way to fully realize the freedom and appreciate the newly found time was to get out and fish. After enjoying my first weekday spent sleeping late in god knows how long, friend of DTF Jack (a Bainbridge Island native no less for all you Sage junkies) and I mounted our bikes and cruised along Denver’s South Platte River in search of Carp. Being only my second time pursuing carp and equipped with only three flies between the two of us, I’d say we fared pretty well.
-Cooper
Have you ever found yourself waking up an hour late for fishing with the previous nights’ bar stamp still on your hand? Well yea, that was us on Saturday. Calling it quits would have been too easy and regretted for the rest of the week so into the car we went.
Trip was worth it.
-Note the stamp on my right hand.
Had a pretty awesome holiday weekend with my “Colorado” family. I didn’t see any dead people rising but there were plenty of fish willing to rise. I even experienced my own little holiday miracle and caught this nice bright pink rainbow that had recently been teasing me. Cooper also was feeling the holiday spirit and got into his fair share of nice fish as well. A couple photos from the weekend are posted below and the GoPro was rolling the entire time so once our new movie is finished you’ll be able to get caught up with all the Easter action.
R.I.P Net
I broke my net when chasing down that rainbow. Totally worth it but we did have some good times and you will be missed. I’ll pour some of my next PBR out in your honor.
I know many rivers are fishing well right now but Cheesman and Deckers have just been killing it for Cooper and I recently. Because of this I am finding it hard to go much further than my favorite area—which now may smell a little smoky. I was fortunate to fish it a couple times before they started the “controlled burn” and it was on fire (honestly, no pun intended, that's just how I talk). For my last trip they had bumped the flows a couple days prior and I was hoping to catch it up near 200 cfs again but the night before I left, they dropped it back down to 130 cfs. Surprisingly the fish were not all that spooky for Cheesman norms. I could only get a few on the bigger bugs that were working for me the week before but did real well with little stuff. These fish wintered well. They were strong and on the feed. The warm weather had them in the riffles allowing most to be sight-able (word?). No fish to write home about and I didn’t really take any scenery shots so I included some other fish pictures for you.
I had my first real saltwater experience this past week and was not let down. I was fortunate enough to
be invited on my family’s vacation to the Maya Riviera and no vacation in my life will ever be complete without a little fishing.
I went to the
Pesca Maya Lodge where they offer day trips or lodging in Ascension Bay—the best fly fishing in the Cancun area. Just a couple hours from the tourist mecca lies a fishing paradise begging for me to explore. It was a welcomed advantage to have been paired up with Henry who has been a saltwater guide there for over 7 years and could help my rookie self out. I originally had my sights set on chasing some baby Tarpon or possibly taking a shot at a Permit but Henry informed me it was bonefish season and they would be our targets for the day. Using much better English rhetoric than I imagined, he asked me if I “wanted to catch them like the men do” and I knew there was only one answer to that. I soon found out that this meant wading/stalking the bonefish on foot as opposed to chasing them from the boat.
I must admit, at first it was a little uncomfortable walking barefooted through the mangroves, every third step sinking in the mud only to be greeted by something
pointy but it became a very exciting and successful way to fish. We would wade slowly until discovering some
nervous water then do our best not to spook these fish that seemed to always be aware of everything going on around them. Henry explained to me that nervous water meant tailing fish.
If you enlarge the picture you can see a bonefish’s tail, digging up crabs or whatever it is that bonefish eat.
The bonefish were more than entertaining. After I got used to casting a 9 wt, we were constantly hooking into fish and had a dozen on the bank before lunch. It was a pretty awesome routine—sneak up and hook a fish about the size of a trout with the tug of something twice its size. These fish felt as if they were solid muscle and had what Henry called a, "Mickey Mouse Face" consisting of two oddly shaped black dots on their nose.
Henry could tell after awhile I was starting to wonder what else the ocean had to offer and told me that if I wanted we could try for some Barracudas. Although I had very little knowledge of saltwater fish, I was familiar with Barracudas and knew them as basically big Northern Pikes. After the longest battle I’ve ever experienced with a fly rod, the fish (and Henry’s dinner) was on the boat.
I am now back to chasing trout in the sweat water but continue to be intrigued by saltwater fly fishing. I learned that in the world of saltwater fish, it is either eat, or be eaten, causing the fish to become much stronger and faster than anything I have experienced. At the end of the day I will always be a trout fisherman but an annual saltwater trip might soon need to become a tradition of mine.
I cannot believe it is almost March. Weeks have flown by and hints of spring are already in the air. I do not dare say winter is over but a rising river has always been an indication of a season switch to me. I know we are still in for more snow and cold weather but I am okay with that. I recently got to experience one of my favorite features of spring—a raise in the water level beneath Cheesman Reservoir. Below there are some pictures from this trip that Cooper and I enjoyed along with various shots taken throughout this winter season, which may, or may not, be ending. I’ve always found winter fishing to have a what you see is what you get, type of approach so I’ve only included a brief caption with each.
Chris Smith can catch big fish on a 1 wt.
Cooper has been working hard on our new movie.
…and Cheesman can be nice if you pay your dues.
The fish from the previous post are circled above. For all I know there could even be more but these were the ones that I was able to make out. New Zealand is infamous for its low number of fish per mile but this pool definitely was an exception. For another view of the pool check out 1:11 into our New Zealand video (found under the “flicks” page or on the home page), this shot shows the one landed fish from the pool and was filmed just upstream from where the picture was taken. In the shot you can make out a couple of the other fish feeding towards the bottom of the screen as I am casting. This will always be a favorite pool of mine. Not only was it stacked up with fish, but our kiwi friend Gordy had a tent and a bottle of whiskey stashed under some fallen trees along the bank, earning it the name, The Camp Pool. Not to rub in how awesome this pool was but the picture below is of the upstream part of the Camp Pool—literally a section of river forever engraved in my mind and one that I promised myself I will return to at some point.
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