On My Own

{Editors note: post & adventure from James Odasso}

First Lovely Pool on the Hughes River

It was 0530 on a Wednesday morning.  However, instead of going to work, I'm going fishing!  Today was an exciting trip for several reasons including; I'm going to a river that I have only visited once before, it has been raining the past couple of days so the water could be high, and it is the first time fishing for brook trout on my own.  The target river was the Hughes (SNP) which I last visited exactly one year ago under the careful guidance of Matt, my fishing mentor. I felt that I had learn quite a bit from Matt over the past year and saw the trip as a bit of a test.  

section of the Hughes I fished along Nicholson Hollow

I set out to first find the Old Rag trailhead which went much smoother than expected. I rigged up my 3 wt with a dry-dropper combo (Parachute Adams with a small bead head Prince Nymph dropper) and turned to the river.  At this point, I was feeling pretty good and then noticed that the lot was quickly filling with people who planned to head up the same trail as me.  However, I was the only one with a fly rod so on I went up the trail.  I felt a rush of excitement as I turned to the right on to the trail less traveled and crossed the river for the first time.  I noticed that the water was higher than during my first visit and knew it would be more difficult to fish this time.  I figured that walking up stream for at least 30 minutes would see a reduction in flow (or so I hoped). The hike was great! A truly beautiful day and it was awesome to be away from the crowds and hassles of DC. The trail was very wet from a couple days of heavy rain and in several spot it was more a stream than a trail.  But as I walked higher up the mountain the river flow slowly reduced. After about 40 minutes of walking, I figured it was time to give fishing a try since it is the purpose of the trip.  The first pool was stunning, as so many are, and the water flowed through a shoot dropping about four feet into the pool and the far bank had a very strong flow as well.  So, I picked a spot and placed my fly about a foot away from the shoot closest to me and it moved to the right and into the slack water.  I had a rush of excitement because I am seeing my fly do exactly what I had wanted it to do (which doesn‘t happen very often) and was confident that a strike would happen at any second.  But it didn’t and as my fly drifted towards me, I pulled it up and placed another cast to the top of the pool, then another, then another, crap. So, I could here Matt’s voice saying, “make three casts into the pool and move on”.  So I did. The move-cast-repeat process continued through several pools and I noticed that the white froth from the water spilling into the pools was making it hard to see my dry fly so I decided to try a Mr. Rapidan to give me color contrast as a strike indicator aid.  To make the change, I let my fly float past me while standing in the middle of the pool and started to pull out my fly box. Then bam! My first brook trout! It was like reaching the top of a mountain. I finally caught a brook trout on my own. 

1st Brookie!

Sure I had caught lots of fish over the past couple of years, even on flies that I had tied myself, but catching that little 6 inch fish in high water using what I had learned even if a little luck was involved was awesome. I was so excited that I forgot to take a picture of it as proof and as he swam away I thought what if I don’t catch another and was hit with a moment of panic.  That motivated me to work hard move from pool to pool, looking for the slack water pockets, casting into the back of the pool first, then working up closer to the rocks. Before long, fish on! Another nice brookie came to visit me. I took his picture and with positive momentum and proof in my pocket, I had no choice but to continue forward.  The day continued in the same pattern walk, climb over rocks, cast (often more than once), duck under tree branches, remove fly from tree branches, re-rig flies, etc.  I even tried a double dropper combo with a prince nymph and a black copper john under a strike indicator that produced at least one fish.  In total, I fished for about 5 hours caught 6 fish, stayed dry and had a really fun day.  I left the river and started my walk back to the car thinking about how I was going to tell this story.

Amazing colors speckle this last brookie of the day

 Could I claim that my first fish was caught on the first cast? Could the 6 inch fish become a 16 inch fish? Could I say that the river poured down the mountain with a power that Zeus himself would have struggled against! But, in the end, the truth is best and gives me tremendous joy and satisfaction for achieving a personal milestone of using what I’ve learned from my friend to catch beautiful brookies all on my own.

 smile born of a great day on the river

  

Rapidan Homecoming

This little fella never came out of the water

I've been away from the Rapidan for too long and even though the water was close to unfishably high bouncing down the rutted ridge-road toward Junction Hole felt like a homecoming.

keeping low James works the left edge of this run

 In my quest to experience as many little blue lines as I can I've worn out my DeLorme and spent time on some great Va water since my last visit to the Rap, notably the Hazel, Big Run and Laurel Fork but the Rapidan just feels right to me.

Adams still in his jaw he awaits release

The road hasn't improved, fortunately it serves to weed out some of the 4x4-less, but we still found one truck parked ahead of us as James and I pulled up to the SNP Gate above the Rapidan Co-oP cabins. I couldn't tell if the truck brought an angler or hiker, prayed for the latter and headed down to the water geared up against the cold and ready with my 1-wt.

We'd tried to out elevate the rain swollen flow but it was running high, clear and cold it looked like blue liquid steel as we made our first cautious casts into tiny boulder protected pockets. This is normally a very productive stretch with fishable pools runs and edys every step. The beautiful but cold quick flow reduced the fishable areas by 2/3s.

Handsome brookie for James

reaching for the sky these trees were spectacular against the blue sky

We began picking up specks at a slow rate and I missed at least half of my strikes. The good news was that where we found fishable water and had some dry fly dwell time the trout were there and ready to play.

high sticking a pool

 We leap frogged fished past some of my favorite memories;  there's where Scott pulled one out from the long axis of the log on the right, there's where Fritz knelt and snuck a dry behind that boulder, there's where Bryan climbed the boulder to make a long upstream cast.  It occurs to me that this is my my favorite river not just because its filthy with brookies, but because of all the great-memories.  James and I made more today, climbing over huge downed trees, casting into tight swirls of water and celebrating each others' 6-inch trophies.

fallen logs frame James as he addresses this pool

this handsome speck took a BH Pheasant tail just below the Brown House

Knees aching but a smile on James' face

It's best to fish with someone else, because it takes shared experience to really understand the effort-earned joy of  catching a native trout while mountain climbing up a river. 

The upper Rapidan pushing the boundaries of its normal banks

A water level view taken from below the falls

two natives came out of the right side of this pool

We were both tired when James spied the roof-line of President Hoover's Brown House.  I fished right up to the foundation and lipped a nice brookie with a parachute adams in Mill Prong in the the pool under the foot bridge.  Feet elevated and happy to have stayed dry for the trek up we shared a few nips of Wasermanns Single Malt on Hoovers Porch as we reminisced about the days adventure.  James caught his share and I ended the day with 28 brought to hand.

in his element shadows and swirls mask this brookie

Come fish with me its easy

James enjoys a satisfying sip

High on the Hazel

An Adams leads a Brookie to hand on the Hazel River

James and I headed out for Jeremy's Run this morning and were thwarted in our efforts to find a parking place or trail head in the 340 corridor, I suspect that the best and easiest access may be from Skyline drive.  After looking at our options and and itching to get on the water we decided to scoot through Thornton Gap, head through Sperryville and try our luck on the Hazel River.  The air was crisp at 43 degrees and the wind was pulling at the remaining leaves on the oak trees when we stepped onto the hiker trail heading up the side of the Hazel.   The water was still running high from the weeks drenching rain.   As we walked I looked at the stream and figured that we could still fish about 40% of the normally fishable water, high but still worth the trip.  We had to work for our brookies today as they hugged the bottom to keep out of the rain swelled current. I enjoyed fishing with my 1-wt as it loads with only a leader and worked well for the very technical fishing called for today.

Oak trees hold dear to their last remaining leaves

James stalks up a long run

Brookie led by the lip

Last trout on last cast of the day

Amazing Colors

fall colors abound

Happiest in the water

In the moment contemplating a hole

a handsome male

We had lunch at this pool

James sneaks into a small pool

on a fall plate of red

Thanks for fishing with me today

Laurel Fork Adventure

Prettiest Brookie of the day

The older I get the more I realize I don't know.   I do know that I've had my eye on Laurel Fork in Highland County Virginia for several years.  This area, oft described by nutty folk like me as heaven on earth, first came to my attention as Scott and I headed west to link up with a friend in Marlington, WVA for another adventure.

This pristine area of ridges and valleys is home to the headwaters of the Jackson, Cowpasture, Bullpasture and North Fork of the South Branch of the Potomac.  In one valley nestled into the VA-WVA border forest is the Laurel Fork Special Management Area about 15-miles north of Monterey, VA if you look at it on a map and can fly like a crow.

This is high country for the East Coast, just east of the Eastern Continental Divide, Spruce Knob at 4863' the highest point in WVA is just north-west and the elevation of my camp was 3,000 feet. The stream itself gets its name from the rhododendron bushes (mountain laurel), that line its banks. As I unpacked my sleeping bag at Locust Grove Camp Ground the insistent wind, crisp air and star filed sky zipped my sleeping bag up to my chin.

lighting the way down the trail

standing watch above Buck Run Trail

Laurel Fork meanders southwest to northeast picking up volume as it runs north.  If you're into tracking water, Laurel Fork merges with Straight Fork in Hardscrabble, VA forming the North Fork of the South Branch of the Potomac. It's not a boulder-strewn high gradient Shenandoah stream but a sandstone ledge-bottom, valley-tumbler that collects flow from numerous ravine-runs that drain the ridge lines that parallel the fork. These runs {Cold Spring, Christian, Knotmaul, Buck, Locust, Slabcamp, Lost and Bearwallow) can be fished for natives themselves. I flipped dries at fat brookies finning in jacccuzi-sized pools on the hike down and up but these trout were wary of danger from above and invariably skittered into their under-ledge hidey-holes at the first sign of my approach.

wary trout were everywhere

The hike down Buck Run Trail just after sunrise was 2.9 miles of fall splendor, a moderate gradient trail tracing the descent of a finger to my right and Buck Run to my left as I descended about 1000 feet to Laurel Fork.

Sun sparkles into Buck Run as it opens into Laurel Fork valley

view downstream emerging from Buck Run trail

The morning sun pierced the hollow as it rose and made the fall colors explode providing great contrast with the bright sky in the background.  Slowed by the beauty of the trail and by marveling at the fat brookies who somehow exist in the little plunge pools of the run I made it to Laurel fork at 0830.

mature male finning on a redd

 I approached the stream and as I was taking a seat on a convenient ledge two swirling splashes greeted me about 5 feet away.  I thought I'd stirred a water snake but for the red and white that caught my eye as I oriented on the commotion. As I stood still two fat spawning brookies returned 15 seconds later to their shallow redds in the cobble.  I knew that this was spawning season and this reinforced my 'step-carefully' mode for the day.  This wasn't hard as the fork's bottom is predominantly sandstone shelf and the spawning grounds in the cobble were obvious and on the edges of the stream.

3 sisters falls

these under water paw prints let you know that you share this special place

To my relative disappointment the trout were feeding actively and I really had to work for each strike.   I fished downstream from Buck Run for about 300 yards with little success only bringing one trout to hand using a variety of dry dropper combinations. I turned back up stream and began fishing my favored upstream presentations when a fly landed on my glasses and as I grabbed an apple I decided to mimic it with a size 16 yellow-humpy.

I matched this hatch w a yellow humpy

dark brookie takes a humpy

whirlpool sucked .5 the flow of the rover into a cavern

This didn't blow the doors off my catch rate but  with my upstream approach and the matching the small hatch (see photo) I started picking up natives on both the humpy and a #18 prince nymph.

The colors were amazing today, the sun dancing on and through the water

I worked up to Locust Spring Run and then came to a magnificent pool and decided ala Scott that if I caught a trout I'd make it my last fish on my last cast of the day.  I worked the tail (see below) of the pool and saw a rise 2/3 of the way up on the right.  I checked my backcast (all clear) and looped a cast to the edge of my 1wts' range, nothing on my first cast, but two casts later I had a 7-inch trophy to end the day.   The walk back out was beautiful but long, a full 3.5 uphill miles later I slogged wearily into camp, dropped my gear.   I was super happy the van started and that I had saved (forgotten) a Twix bar.   This is an awesome place its a hike to get here and a hike in but I'll come again.

final and finest pool of the day I caught my last trout 2/3 up on the left casting from this position

last trout of the day

The hike back out

Thanks for looking