Day Three - the best for last?

On Day 3 we decided to go to Larry Harris' favorite river (Larry is a flyfishing guru who taught our tying class this winter and has had much experience fishing out here); the Gardner River.

Reading the Matthews guide and Larry's recommendation, we decided to drive to the Mammoth-Tower bridge over the Gardner and hike down, fishing the stretch below the bridge (toward Gardner, which lies just outside the park). This part of the park is much drier, and you feel it as you walk through dusty sagebrush vegetation down to the medium size stream.

It didn't take long for Bill to find the 'fly of the day'; a Dirk's tarantula (?) pattern that looked like a gangly spidery thing. Little rainbows were fairly jumping on this beast with every other cast. Jamie and I quickly followed suit and started having success as well. At one pool, Jamie and I hooked fish at the same time. Mine was a nice 12" gorgeous rainbow trout, while Jamie's was a huge brown or cutthroat. We're not sure which because the fish first headed upstream, dragging a bunch of line out of Jamie's reel, then headed downstream where it wrapped the line around its body and combined with the current's pressure, snapped his leader. Alligator tears were shed (not really...) about the one that got away; we think it probably was one of those 'lunker browns' described in Matthews book. It seemed like it could have been ca. 20".

As we moved downstream, I switched to a grasshopper when I stopped getting hits on the tarantula, and lo and behold, the rainbows loved it! I caught the nice rainbow shown in the picture above, which for me was the prettiest, though not the largest fish, of the trip. I don't know; this fish was the essence of fly fishing success for me; it was a hefty 12 or 13" with gorgeous coloration: the photograph just doesn't do it justice. And that fish fought like a demon for several minutes. I even have video. I was so thrilled at having caught this fish that I reached over and grabbed the video camera to take some footage, then grabbed the digital camera to take a still or two before finally landing it and letting it go. Each of us caught some nice fish on the Gardner, and we each began to understand why it was Larry's favorite river!

We spent the rest of the day sightseeing because the river 'closed' at 12. We enjoyed this immensely, despite the peak season crowds. Gorgeous vistas of the yellowstone, nice drive by the thermal features. At one stretch of the road between Canyoh and Yellowstone lake, there was a crowd of cars stopped. We knew what it was because the same crowd had been there 2 days before - WOLVES! We saw 4 pups and a parent across the yellowstone through our binos. What a thrill and a privilege to witness such a family, and to think hundreds if not thousands of tourists have and will experience that thrill as well. The den must be nearby that spot. Anyway, what a charistmatic animal!!!