Clear Creek in the Snow

     Sunday the skies were bright and sunny. The thermometer rose from ten degrees to a balmy thirty. The sun felt warm. I hesitated to fish and hunted instead. Today, the weather was supposed to warm to the upper forties. A front was moving through bringing moisture from the South. Today we would fish! It was the coldest forty degree day I have fished in a long time!

     Neither of us had much time so we opted for Clear Creek. It is close to home, the scenery is pretty and we can always find a few willing fish. We parked at one of our favorite spots and fished a good stretch of the river. There was still plenty of snow in the valley and the water was quite chilly and very clear. The rain had begun to fall and my hands and toes were instantly aware of the fact that they were no longer in a heated environment.

     Mike and I tried different tactics in an attempt to find some sort of pattern. I dragged an ugly nymph through the promising pools and riffles while Mike bounced a bugger of the rocky bottom. He was the first to hook up and landed an energetic eight inch fish that came with a smile and the pride of getting on the board first. I soon switched to a bugger and lost a fish that followed almost to my feet. This would be a recurring pattern.

     We slowly worked our way down stream casting to all the promising water while losing the feeling in both our hands and toes.  We had several follows and both managed to miss a few fish. Finally, after losing my fly to a fish, I decided to go back to dredging a nymph. On my next two casts, I managed to land two small browns and rid myself of the skunk like smell that was beginning to fester. I would have never heard the end of that!

We ended just as darkness was ready to set in and walked gingerly on our frozen feet back to the car. It was a struggle to get out of our waders while working with such cold fingers. The car gave us the welcomed warmth that our fingers and toes had been craving. It was a pleasant ride home after the pain of my thawing hands finally subsided.

I forgot my camera. The stills here were extracted from the video footage. We filmed quite a bit as well, but we only took the GoPro today because of the cold and rain. It will be a few days before Mike has time to edit the footage, but I am not sure he has enough for another short video.