Three Days, Two Nights Part Deux

What is this? Am I stuck on three days and two nights? I came up short one night again, but the good thing is...So What? Conditions turned less than ideal so I headed home on a Thursday. On the way back into the Denver metro area I saw lots of folks headed up....into the snow. Bound and determined to use all of their Memorial Day weekend come hell or high water, or whatever. A smile spread over my face as I headed down into more reasonable weather.

The picture at the top of the post was taken about 5 miles from my campsite at about 9 am this morning. Three days and two nights provided plenty of "decompression", mountain fix, and just plain good times to last for a while. The picture to the right shows what my campsite looked like on Tuesday afternoon...What a great place.

I was about 200' from the lake. One other camper in the small campground. Camping was FREE. Temperature was in the upper 70's. Can it get any better than that?

Well, I was there to find out, because a big activity on my list was fishing. Could I have all of this good stuff and catch fish too? I guess the "his self" mojo was working because I didn't have any problem catching fish. There is a four fish limit on trout at this reservoir and I had that filled within the first hour and a half. Nothing spectacular but plenty of fun with 10-12" rainbow and Snake River cutthroat trout. After I had my limit I continued to fish and release everything I caught. I probably caught 10 or 11 fish that afternoon.

Because it was proving to be so easy, I even bent the barbs down on my hooks to make it more difficult. That solved my problem big time. Once I did that, I still had numerous "fish on" but failed to land a one. Wednesday was not as easy but I still caught my limit and then some when I went back to standard barbed hooks.

All these fish were caught on #2 Mepps spinners. This is a venerable lure, invented in 1938. I have fished with this lure since the late 1950's and it is always the "go to" lure. It will catch fish when everything else fails.

While fishing occupied a lot of time, there was still time for some hiking, reading and plain old "communing with nature".

This morning broke cloudy with numerous rain/snow showers and temps in the 50's. I decided to try a little more fishing in between showers but it proved too uncomfortable...even though I caught two fish inside of 30 minutes. When it started snowing I said enough is enough, packed up and headed down to the Denver area.

Round trip for this excursion was 175 miles. 175 miles and free camping may just get a lot of workout this summer. This is a place I will definitely return to.

I was totally out of contact while I was gone. No cell coverage and absolutely no internet. When I returned I discovered that my father, The Colonel, has had some medical issues that are concerning. He fell an broke his hip on Tuesday and while at the hospital it was discovered that he had pneumonia and some heart issues as well.

Brother #1 will go to Georgia next week to be with him. If need be I will follow in June after my daughter's (Cajenn) wedding. After a good trip, this is a sobering return. It's hard to keep an old Horse Soldier down but the years are making it difficult for him. My thoughts and prayers are with him.

Thanks for visiting.