Scott: Just returned last night from Project Healing Waters guiding (and some
squeezed in fishing) on the North Fork of the South Branch of the
Potomac in West Virginia. Water was much lower than last year, but fish
were there -- you could see them in several spots, but that made them a
bit weary. Fished a bit on Friday afternoon before the wounded
warriors arrived Friday night to scout out the river. I caught a half
dozen rainbows in the 14-16 inch range on an olive woolly bugger, golden
retriever, zebra
midge and copper john. Saturday I guided for a
wounded warrior named Sam and unfortunately we couldn't get a bite on as
we threw everything but the kitchen sink at them for about 5 hours.
Sunday morning I guided for another vet named Steve and he hooked into a
monster rainbow using a #22 zebra midge. That fish leaped, ran upstream
& downstream and after about 10 minutes finally broke off... but it
was a heart pounding adrenaline rush for both of us for several
minutes.
The Quantico and Fort Belvoir Project Healing Waters Chapters are led by Marty Laksbergs and Bob Gartner, and those folks do an absolute terrific job establishing fly fishing programs for wounded warriors and service veterans.
Scott and I were looking to get in a pre-holiday fish as we hadn't been out in awhile so we headed for the Rose River. It was cloudy and foggy in NOVA, but the fog broke in Culpepper and as we broke west from Rt 29 it was sunny and clear. We parked at the end of the road in the cul-de-sac beyond Graves Mill, rigged up and set off. We were fishing at 0830. Instead of walking upstream and then heading to the river where the fire road towers over the river 3/4 of a mile up, we headed down to the river almost immediately. The water was clear cold, seemingly fine, it was running about 6-8 inches lower (it seemed) than we remembered it and the fishing was slow. I was using a new-to-me TFO 8' 2-wt and after getting the hang of the action, load and tempo it worked great. We fished all the way up to the iron bridge ending at where the river splits at 1445 and returned to the truck. We didn't have much luck and are unsure just where the fish were/are. We frequently will spook pools and see fish that we can't catch, not
today, the river seemed barren. Scott ended up bringing 8 2-4-inchers to
hand and I BTH 3 to include one respectable 6-7 inch brookie. We had a
great time being out on the river, but it was a tough, slow day for
catching.
