Ut/Wy/Mt

[BilletHead]

8 hours ago, Devan S. said:

In MT it looks like Elk lake has nice west slopes, grayling, lake trout....no idea how easy or not but its fairly close to where we are going to be. 

In WY Tri-basin is a good base spot. Like you said Salt River/Creek are both "on our way". The map shows a bunch of blue lines. I have no doubt we can simply catch small natives in a lot of spots. We are obviously going to be right in the midst of Yellowstone/Tetons so there's always options there too. 

The nice things is that this trip doesn't have multiple 5-8hr drives to get from spot to spot like previous trips. Lots of ability to go a couple hours and fish. Lots of people say they do the Cutt slams in 1-2 days so we feel like we have more time to explore and less windshield time. 

We just don't want to miss out on something cool if we can keep from it. Maybe even catch some other species....whitefish.

Depending on your trip north if you are going up 189/191 along the hoback river towards Jackson hole there is a smaller creek called Cliff Creek. It dumps into the hoback. I know from our trips in the beginning of August it's not very big water wise but it's full of finespot/snake river cutts. Get this we both caught whitefish in this creek. You ought to try this one on the way by. Just some more FYI Devin. 

[Devan S.]

At this point, I will take what I can get for recommendations. Believe it or not....this trip is harder to plan. Previous trips have had many limitations on when/what spots could be used for various slams. Outside MT this is wide open and it seems as if there is plenty of acceptable options outside the already discussed limitations. 

Here is my first swag at leg 1. I figure it would take us to maybe early mid-day 2 to cover this water and probably get us 3/4 of the way to UT Cuttslam the chief goal here is to get out east for the Colorado CT but check others along the way. 

Target 1 would be the Upper Provo river for Bonneville CT. Seems several miles of stream parallel to the road. Lots of campgrounds. There is also a bunch of lakes in the area...if we wanted to explore something still waterish.

Target 2 would be Bear River for Bear River CT. This is right where the path juts off due east. Again great access area and lots of camping. Mostly likely the "STOP" for night 1. May or may not fish this area on day 1. 

Target 3 would be the East fork of the Blacks fork for Colorado CT. The jut east is all dirt/gravel road so no idea what we will get into but again lots of options for camping/lakes, ect. 

From here we have 2 roughly equidistant choices -

North into WY and onto the next slams(we could theoretically pick up Colorado CT in WY on the blacks fork vs. la barge creek)

A bit north(maybe have a shot at blacks fork WY and then west to UT for Yellowstone CT. 

[Devan S.]

As these things do, we gain insight and species goals begin to develop beyond the existing targets. Here is a some additional lifers we would like to luck into:

Tiger trout-Utah has stocked lakes all over so its really about finding a good option along the way.

Lake trout-Obviously several options in GTNP and YNP. I don't know if it will happen but we are bringing jigs and spinning rods so the ability to fish deeper will be available. 

Whitefish-Seems that they are everywhere. Maybe we can luck into some.

Goldens-I've been scoping some locations in WY. Its likely going to be a time commitment to hike to something so we will see. 

[BilletHead]

            While we know you have a limited time and goals, here is an interesting drive in the high Uinta's Called the mirror lake scenic byway. The lakes are very well stocked with tiger trout. This is where we caught many. Walked into a lake called Star Lake. There is a trail running out of Trial Lake campground. Not too bad of a hike for us in 2017. I am sure if we go again that walk would be harder. You two young bucks would be a piece of cake. Caught a bunch up there. Have hiked in twice. Once just fished what would be the dam. The drainage below has brookies. Second time took lunch and a plan to walk around the whole lake. We did but sure were worn to a frazzle. You have your itinerary figured up, great planning right off the bat. I will attach where we caught our slam fish in case you change travel plans. 

[Devan S.]

@BilletHead sounds like we are on similar paths. Sawmill canyon is on our list. Of course there is others options but not a lot so that is target #1.

Mirror lake scenic byway is the route I had selected out of SLC and eastward along the upper provo. Lots of lakes and best I can tell several stocked with tigers. I had not stumbled upon Star Lake. Will add it to the list. My concern with the Washington/Trail lakes campground area is use and harvest of tigers. I had some numbered bear lake watershed lakes just down the road along the mirror lake scenic byway. They had been stocked in the last year or 2 and show to be bushwhack hikes at best. 

[BilletHead]

                       You are very correct about both Trial Lake and Washington lake campgrounds. Very busy and both are water catchment lakes that are for supplying water to the upper Provo River. The two years we were there one-year Trial Lake was drained to almost nothing and the other year Washington lake was the same way.  Quite a bit of pressure. Stocked by truck. Fish turnover is high with catch and keep fish are smaller.  One thing about walking in we seen no fishermen in Star Lake and no fishermen on Cliff Lake either. Cliff Lake is close to Star with Star being a larger lake. These lakes are stocked by aircraft and fish survive and get much larger in both. One thing about Cliff Lake we caught both tigers and cutthroat, while just Tigers and Brook trout in Star. 

   Devin you guys are going to have some fun out there. Will be neat to read your reports. Looking forward to it. 

[Devan S.]

Well we got back home today. Started out with a change of plans. 

We landed in SLC and headed directly for the northern side of the Raft River mountains. We decided with short time to try and check off the "hardest creek" first. @BilletHead instead of stopping right at the bridge over onemile, we went up farther and packed over the ridge directly down into Sawmill Canyon(flatlanders at elevation right away). We instantly started spooking fish. Tight quarters but I like this style of fishing. If you can handle the frustration of weaving a rod through the brush without spooking fish. You dip anything around these fish and they hit it like they are starving.

We had a little bit of daylight left so off we raced to another stream before dark. We can worry about places to sleep and rations later. 

 

[Quillback]

I used to fish little streams like the one in Devan's pic when I lived in Washington.  Find them on a map, walk in, and you'd have fish that had never been fished for.  You'd have to be stealthy, but like Devan said, if you did not spook them, they'd crush a fly.  Only drawback was they were little fish, a 10" fish was a monster.  

[BilletHead]

10 hours ago, Devan S. said:

Well we got back home today. Started out with a change of plans. 

We landed in SLC and headed directly for the northern side of the Raft River mountains. We decided with short time to try and check off the "hardest creek" first. @BilletHead instead of stopping right at the bridge over onemile, we went up farther and packed over the ridge directly down into Sawmill Canyon(flatlanders at elevation right away). We instantly started spooking fish. Tight quarters but I like this style of fishing. If you can handle the frustration of weaving a rod through the brush without spooking fish. You dip anything around these fish and they hit it like they are starving.

We had a little bit of daylight left so off we raced to another stream before dark. We can worry about places to sleep and rations later. 

 

                Well done young man! Fun place :). 

[WestCentralFisher]

40 minutes ago, Quillback said:

I used to fish little streams like the one in Devan's pic when I lived in Washington.  Find them on a map, walk in, and you'd have fish that had never been fished for.  You'd have to be stealthy, but like Devan said, if you did not spook them, they'd crush a fly.  Only drawback was they were little fish, a 10" fish was a monster.  

One of my favorite ways to fish in mountainous areas is find a decent sized stream that is known to hold trout, then look for any solid blue lines on the map feeding into it. I'll usually make a list of 5 or 6 to check out, and a couple will work out. The rest will be raging torrents or impossible to get to.

I've had this save trips before. Once I planned a 3 week trip to Vermont and the Adirondacks to fish for trout. Then the heat wave of the century came in. All the famous rivers were well above 70 degrees, but the little hop-across creeks high in the mountains were in the low 60s and the brookies were happy.

Alternatively, I've had it fail completely. Once in Colorado, I planned a trip around fishing the high mountain tributaries of a famous trout river. I caught one 6" cutthroat in like 4 days of fishing before bagging it and hitting the main river. Turns out most of the high mountain streams there are fishless or nearly so because of issues with past mining.