Day 1

We parked under the I-70 bridge and started working our way upriver. Right away I came across a pod of rainbows and I was soon hooked up with my first fish. It was a nice 20 inch male, with the golden sides we've come to know on the Blue. We continued working upriver and I spotted a pair of cutthroats in the 20 inch range. These fish spooked easily and would continue to taunt me every time I returned to the run. After a while, we decided to cut up to the dam and work our way down. It was already getting late, so it was pretty tough to spot fish. We ended up back where we started, as it seemed to have the highest concentration of fish around.

Right before we were ready to call it a day, Tim hooked into one of the cutthroats I was after. It was a beautiful fish close to 20 inches. We took a couple of photos before sliding back in to the water.

Day 2

We hit up the same run in the morning and again I managed to spook off the cutthroat before getting a good drift on it. Tim was having a good morning, landing a couple of fish in the 16-19 inch range. We found a lot of fish down in the Nike Hole, but there was a guide with a client in the hole and we decided to give them plenty of room. We returned early afternoon to see if the cutthroat was back in its spot and it was. This time I got down on my knees and tried to stay back behind the fish to keep out of its site. This time the fish stayed put and within a couple of casts, I was hooked up. After a short fight, Tim was able to net the fish. I was pretty pumped, as it was my largest snake river cutt, another 20 inch fish. I caught one more nice rainbow in the 17-18 inch range before deciding to call it a day.

The flows were up around 144 cfs and the best flies were black beauties and mysis. There seemed to be more fish downriver then up in the stretch by the dam.