Eastern Sierra road-trip – part 1

In this Fish and Fly exclusive, Jim Brown, former manager of the San Diego city lakes system which are famous in the US for breeding exceptionally large black bass, and a well-known angling writer himself shares with us the story of a recent trip to the Eastern Sierras from his home in sunny San Diego, California in search of early season trout. This was originally part of his emailed report to a close group of friends that are lucky to receive this valuable on-the-spot information. We are very happy to have been granted permission to adapt it for your viewing pleasure!! To get the most out it we have broken it into two sections with the first published below and the second to follow in a couple of days so make sure you check back here soon! Take it away Jim...

On Monday last, I departed San Diego for the purpose of performing a reconnaissance report on the Eastern Sierras. My hosts were Brandon Parker and his fiancée Julie who live in Paradise (Ed – yes there really is a place called Paradise!). Brandon has been instrumental in setting up some of the fishing related websites I have worked with through his own business. My report follows:

Water Conditions - Most observers are reporting that they have never (or rarely) seen the streams as low as they are at this time of year. Crooked Creek which is normally chock-full of spring spawners was devoid of same. Deadman Creek appears to be at fall flows.

Fishing - Overall, I think most people regard the fishing as being off significantly at the present time, with a few notable exceptions. Those exceptions seem to be dead-stick strike indicator fishing with midges at Crowley, the Wild Trout section of the Owens below Pleasant Valley, the Owens above Crowley, Hot Creek and most notably the East Walker.

We spent all of Tuesday trolling, a method that has always been deadly in the past. Four hours in the morning on Crowley produced one 10 inch rainbow. Four more hours on June Lake produced one rainbow and two cutthroat, all around ten inches. Tuesday we decided to devote to fly fishing the entire public stretch of Hot Creek. Upon reaching the bottom of the upper trail, we spoke to a fisherman who reported fair fishing, but extreme disappointment that he had not returned to the East Walker where the day before he had caught ten brown trout including two three pounders and a lifetime best ten pounder, all on Parachute Adams, except for the ten pounder which hit a hopper pattern. Even if this guy was exaggerating his exploits by doubling the weights, fish from 1.5 to five pounds are plenty big enough to attract my attention.

With hardly a word spoken, and without making a cast at Hot Creek, Brandon and I turned and ascended the trail back to the truck, destination Bridgeport. A little after 1 p.m., we entered Ken's Sporting Goods for some advice and so that Brandon could pick up a net and some flies. We were told the East Walker was "on fire," and that the fish were taking Parachute Adams, Stimulators and Hopper patterns. As we left the store, two of the locals chortled, "you're going to need a bigger net than that on the East Walker." A short time later we were parking in the upper stretch that begins below the dam and runs to the road crossing. An angler returning to his car told that the fishing had been good earlier in the day but was now slowing down. Brandon and I picked our way through the sage and then across a small meadow to the river. I walked upstream a short distance to the spot that Norm and I fished together a few years ago. The condition of the river was perfect in my mind in that the flow was low enough to fish and wade easily.

Before Harlon Bartlett died, he gave me his fly fishing gear in return for the promise I would fish (for him) with it whenever the conditions were right. A five weight Winston rod and Lamson reel that he gave me are pretty much an all-round outfit for trout and I was armed accordingly when I picked out an open spot with a shallow gravel beach. A rock 2/3s across the stream was a tempting target for my first cast, but there was also a nice little seam ten feet closer that I'd screw up if my first efforts were aimed around the rock. My first cast was a measuring cast that allowed my second cast to place a buggy green hopper on the edge of a seam. A minute later, I was landing a nice 16" brown. More importantly as it turns out, I spotted the rise of a large fish against the opposite bank. The rise seemed to be in slow motion and take several seconds in which his nose came out of the water, followed by his dorsal and finally the top of his tail. While I could no longer see him, I could see the position he rose from and it was flat out impossible to reach with a decent drift. He was just downstream of an overhanging bush that prevented any kind of drift from upstream. Being in a notch of the bank, there was a swirling upstream eddy below him that was impossible to fish because of the faster speeds of the stream's basic current(s). It’s not that I didn't try repeatedly. I even got the hopper in the right spot numerous times before the river's current ripped it out of the spot which was not bigger than a TV tray. Despite not seeing the fish again, I probably spent an hour fishing the general area, coming back every ten minutes to try to get lucky with a cast, before heading downstream...

Will Jim ever hook into his big brown or is it destined to remain “the one that got away”? Tune in again in a couple of days time to Fish and Fly for the second and final installment to see what happens next!