Montana Adventure

[mems]

Aloha, went to Montana after baja for some trout action. This is the Westfork of the Bitterroot. It is Luke and my favorite stream to wade in the bitterroot drainage. It was higher water than normal, about 1200-1000cfcs while we were there. Salmon flies were around, and we had fun fishing the big bugs.

This was my first fish, a nice cutbow. I had to land it myself and take the photo in the net, no hero shot. Thanks Luke!
He was busy finding his own trout

He got a nice one up stream. My wife joined us in Montana and she had fun hooking the trout. Landing them proved more difficult.

If you could find soft water you found fish. They liked logs and log jams.

We fished a variety of feeder creeks as well. Black buggers worked well in the high water conditions.

My favorite rod for these little creeks is the TFO 1/2 wt. What a fun rod! I love the colors on the westslope cutts

We headed over to Rock Creek for a couple of days. I stopped in at Grizzly Hackle shop and met Dan Sheppard. Cool guy, we swapped stories from Christmas Island.

My wife got into the fishing and got this little brown on a dry all by herself! Purple haze are the best dry fly to use in Montana.

Rock Creek was high as well, but we had fun fishing for the browns and cutts. Fisherman's Mercantile is an awesome little shop and we stayed in their inexpensive cabins.

All you need for fishing. Notice Jay's koa fly box! The Partagas is a cuban I smuggled in from Baja.

Jay's box in action, nice brookie.

Morning wood. Squirrel's escape route.

Luke's last fish, a nice rainbow. I hooked three fish over 20 inches but with the high water got broken off when they went down stream. Luke would do a River Run's through it and chase them down. I just tried to get em back up stream and lost the battle. It was fun to fish trout again, and we really enjoyed the fishing, but I think I will wait for lower water conditions next time.

I kept seeing these horses in this meadow on our way up the west fork. Last day I stopped to take their picture in a rain storm. It ended up being a fuzzy kinda of impressionist type picture. I love Montana and trout. We will be back, Mems.

[ksbioteacher]

Well done. Looked like great fun was had by all.

[ofuros]

The whole mems clan in on the adventure ! Lovely stuff.