5/17 to 5/20 Courtois

[steve l]

With the JF closed the wife & I needed a back-up.  We decided the Courtois as Plan B, and we were pleasantly surprised.  Echoing Oz Hawksley, a clear water gem.  And only 100 miles from St Louis.

Rented from Bass River Resort - I give very high marks to the service.  Traveled Berryman to Scotia over three nights.  A bit short for that time but we slowed the trip down to account for it.

Saw very few people, which was unexpected.  I thought we would see many.  I suspect had we gone a week or two later the number of people would have been higher.

The river was flowing nicely.  Fishing in general was good and one stretch we paddled back up we caught or had hits on every cast.  I really enjoyed the top water bite.  My wife caught her personal best 17 inch 2.7 lber.

Had to portage around two trees - I suspect they will be cleared before long.  Add the two low water bridges and that meant a lot of loading & unloading the canoe.

A lot of trees in the water meant we lined quite a few times.

Overall reminiscent of the upper JF in spots.  A bit too many dirt/mud banks in my eye to give really high ratings for scenery, but not every stream can be the JF.

 

[Al Agnew]

Glad you had a good trip.  I really love the Courtois and Huzzah.  The only thing they lack is a lot of high, impressive bluffs, which the upper Jacks Fork has in spades, and they do have a lot more alluvial bottomland along them, with some of it having been misused in the past.

They are going to be tricky to paddle for a while with all the new downed trees.

[DownStream]

Thanks for the report Steve. Went down the C.A. today with the lady. Water was running a little high. Not much fishing, but cleaned up a couple trash bags worth of cans and whatnot. Beautiful day to be by the water.