Still Here in South Fork

The Memorial Day crowds have come and gone (not really too many of them as it turns out) and the signs around the lakes and streams indicate their presence -- left over trash and the multi-colored Power Bait at the water's edge (or floating on the surface).  I did make it up to Big Meadows over the holiday weekend where I hiked around the lake on the trail (4-1/2 miles) and even went over the stream that feeds into the lake for the first time.  I stopped and fished occasionally when I found an open and appealing spot but, didn't catch anything I wanted to keep.  A Good Walk Interrupted.

Yesterday, I had hoped to get back up to Regan Lake where I caught those nice Brook trout -- the wind was supposed to be down to half of what it has been in recent days (and it was).  However, the guy that went with me the last two times had some health issues and cancelled in the early morning.  So, I decided to head back to Big Meadows again where I caught a half dozen fish and kept three -- two of them I wouldn't have kept because they were less than 12 inches but, they had swallowed the lure and wouldn't have survived.  I released a few others with no problem.

After that, I decided to head up to Shaw Lake to try for some of those Cutthroats -- only a couple more miles up the road from Big Meadows.  When I arrived there, a couple guys were just coming from the lake and had no luck they said after walking around the whole lake.  I decided to try my luck on the far side of the dam after making my way across the spillway without getting my feet wet.  I only had one hit during an hour of fishing the dam and a corner of the lake on the far side.

I then headed up the road in my Jeep to get a look at the other end of the lake and fished the dam at the other end of the lake -- no luck there either.  No hits.  I then worked my way back over that dam and decided to fish around the little stream feeding the lake just down from the dam and the road above.  I caught a couple little fingerlings (Cutthroats) and let them go and then headed back to the Jeep to get my camera to take the picture above.

Same set of peaks are visible at Big Meadows too as you can see in the picture from the road on my way down from Shaw Lake.  I stopped again on my way down the canyon to fish a little pool below some cliffs where I hoped to catch one more fish -- a Brook trout from the South Fork.  It's not an easy spot to get too and it has to be fished from a six foot cliff unless you have waders.  I had caught two in this spot the other day and released them.  On a perfect cast to a submerged flat rock where I thought a trout should be, the lure fell just over the edge of the boulder and a nice fish took the lure but, unfortunately it spit out the lure about 2/3 of way to me and the cliff.  All I managed to catch was another little fingerling which I released.

Well, that's how fishing goes sometimes.  I gave the cleaned fish to a couple just across from me here at the campground -- she gave me a fresh baked loaf of bread -- what a deal!  Now I can go catch some more fish too -- only that big Brookie left in the freezer.