float with a guide on the bow river downstream from calgary. the fishing is tremendous and one of the best streams in the world for decent sized browns and rainbows. you should land many fish over 18 inches with some 24 or so.
lots of great rivers near that area and good small lakes. floating the elk river right near fernie british columbia is some of the best cutt fishing in the world. also can go for giant bull trout around ten pounds and expect to catch them.

ask me later on questions as i spend time around there every year. plus you want to play poker in calgary if you like money..

I will definitely post questions once our itinerary is laid out. We tend to do day hikes, so any fishing opportunities will need to be "on the way" for the most part.

We are flying in and out of Calgary, but I doubt there will be time for poker.

Brag post. ~15 lb Chinook Salmon caught last Christmas, using large black and orange fly (can't believe how old this thread is):



-Zeno

Damn - forgot to follow up and am now sitting in a motel in Calgary, getting ready to head up into the mountains. Oh well...we'll see what happens!

hahaha...I really do suck. I think I'm at the point where I can sometimes put the fly where it needs to be. To recap, I've bait fished in trout streams a lot growing up, so I can usually identify a good holding area for a fish. At least I've got that going for me, I guess...

Anyway, the MO for the last couple times I've been on the water is, I'll see a likely spot, approach from the downstream side, drop the fly in, get a strike, and I cannot for the life of me get a good hook set.

Last weekend, I was on the river at sunset and there was a nice caddis hatch going on...solid strike and I finally hook a fish in the failing light! Nice fight, and when I get it to shore, it's a smallmouth.

so give us a report on your trip even if it didnt have any fishing.

The Canada trip was terrific (although the first day and the last day were smoky due to fires.) We did a short hike at Sunshine Meadows before crashing at Bow Lake in Banff NP.

After that, we hit all four parks, highlights included walking up Parker Ridge to view Saskatchewan Glacier, walking with the rest of the tourists on Athabasca Glacier, walking in the ice cave at Mt. Edith Cavell, plus some longer loops at Lake O'Hara and Twin Falls.

I did wet a line at the Maligne River, downstream from the lake. I was able to get a couple of trout to come up and smack the fly, but I couldn't set the hook.

We also tried fishing in the Kootenay River...we each caught a small trout on spinners, but no luck on the fly for me.

This was back in August...last weekend, I went to check out the October Caddis outside of Yosemite. Big, juicy looking bugs flying around in the evening. My limited selection of flies didn't include anything that big, but I did get action on a PMX Yellow (yay, Orvis special...20 flies for $10.)

sounds like a great trip.i love banff and jasper parks as well as yoho and revelstoke over from there.

The road in Jasper going up to Lake Maligne was really cool. Great views of the mountains, and then when you get to Medicine Lake, the "inlet" is this huge flat section of river. We were hoping to see caribou (or anything, really) crossing that part, but no luck, just tracks.

I'll take a smallmouth fight over a trout fight any day. once I figured out that smallies were int the water, i'd have cut down to a 2x or 3x and put on a beadhead wooly bugger.

as you found out, there's a fine line between enough slack to get a good drift and too much slack to make a good hookset. keeping your rod tip low helps some. throwing a short line helps, too, but you have to work on your stealth wading skills to get close to the fish.

sounds like a great trip. beautiful country.

This is a different matter (and I agree, BTW). I was focused on trout, though, so I finally thought I'd broken through, only to be disappointed.

Your statement reminds me of when I was throwing spinners with a very light spin outfit at Hamilton Branch in Lake Almanor a couple of years ago. The difference between a 14" smallmouth and a 12" rainbow is like night and day.

I don't wade, so tough to be stealthy. In particular, last weekend (Merced River) is low and gin-clear, so getting close would be tough.

lots of elk around jasper park. especially around the lodge. most times they are easy to find.

This thread is making me want to fish. Parents are building a place on the ski mountain in Durango and there is so much fishing there. I am going to take a week next summer and probably backpack and fly fish the whole time.

I seem to always get the bug when the end of the year rolls around, assuring that I get minimum value out of the fishing license. I think I bought it this year in August.

this is the time of year the big browns move up river to spawn. they are aggressive and easier to catch. below the dams on the missouri river is good for browns up to ten pounds.

So, a couple of things:

- Went back to the river, same place, just outside of Yosemite. We had a big storm roll through about two weeks ago where it rained in the Bay Area for pretty much a solid 24 hours. I was shocked how much higher the level of the river was. Also, a bonus for park visitors because all of the waterfalls were running!

- I fished for a couple of hours on Saturday and Sunday morning, and actually managed a fish each day! I'd like to focus on process and not be results-oriented so the question I have is this: There was no hatch going on, but I was prospecting with a caddis dry fly because I know they are all over the river, especially at this time of year.

Each time I hooked up, I'd cast across current, and as the line straightened out downstream and I started stripping line in to recast, the fish hit the fly...this had to be slightly below the surface because I did not see either strike. This means I should be using some kind of caddis-imitating wet fly, correct?

Anyway, here's the smaller of the two:

rainbows especially like to follow a fly and hit it after it straightens out in the current. caddis move around on the water so it worked for you. but perhaps you should have been casting wets or nymphs.

beautiful bow. did you fish much after those fish? they could have been on emergers because the full hatch hadn't yet started.
they could have also been on boatmen, which kinda look like caddis and like to hang in the surface film area.

or, fish being fish, they could have been just screwing with you.

First day, I tried about 15-20 minutes more and then switched to a couple of different nymphs with no success.

Second day, I tried for about 15 mins more and then started moving upstream. In particular, I wanted to try this spot before the sun hit it...I tried to be as stealthy as possible (heh), but didn't even see any fish here.

there is fish along the far bank in that run that is shaded.

Running up to Lake Tahoe this weekend to generally kick back, gamble a little, and if I work up the gumption, I'll run over to the West Carson River. I've been a little sore-throaty the last couple of days, so we'll see.

Blah-de-blah update this time. There is quite a bit of snow on the ground already, and the water in the West fork is quite low. I had to head down the valley from the 89-88 interchange to not have to tramp through a little bit of snow to get to the water.

I had to sneak around pocket water, and had made < 10 casts when I suffered some equipment failure...if you look at the picture upthread, you will see a very old Shakespeare fiberglass fly rod.

The ferrule is shot, so about 25 years ago, my dad cut a groove into the male side and placed a little rubber washer over it to create enough friction to hold the rod together. That washer finally disintegrated, and I found it difficult to continue with a rod that is > 75% likely to come apart on the forward cast.

ETA: Props to my wife for getting me a high-octane vest for a birthday gift! I feel a little sheepish going out in public with some gear that far exceeds my ability, but it sure beats throwing everything into an old fanny pack which is what I'd been doing.

nowadays even the cheapest graphite rods are far superior and much easier to cast than an old fiberglass rod. up grade if you like fly fishing. try cabelas for a package deal.

I think I will do just that, after scouring several websites! Gotta love buying gear!

get a nine foot rod for a five weight line for trout fishing from boats and relatively open areas. got to eight foot for more brushy area where you have to carry your rod around in the bushes alot.
use a nine foot tapered leader 4x(6 lb. test) with a nail knot to your line. and add tippets to make it smaller or cut it back to make it larger x. add and subtract tippets with a surgeon knot and one leader will last a long time.