Did someone say brook trout in the backcountry of Banff National Park? Yep! But, we are heading deep into the backcountry to the headwaters of the Red Deer River. Josh, Steve, Pat and I were going to have to pay the price. I hadn't been to this area in 40 years. Sweat equity definitely was required but we were willing to pay the price. The weather was going to be hot and smoky. The first day with our full kit was a real grind. We hiked 27 km! How many steps is that on your step counter? I think close to 40 000! We did throw our packs off to rig up our fly rods and catch some beautifully coloured brookies at the half way mark. Once we reached our designated camping spot, booked back in March, we tossed up our tents and headed to our first lake. There were brookies in all of the lakes, creeks and rivers. Several were very difficult to fly fish because of their large deep shoal areas. I even swam out to an island to fish. That was a bit crazy but it was warm. We covered a lot of ground and the scenery would have been spectacular if it was not for the smoke.
Both Steve and Josh had heavy packs. They both decided to take an amazing amount of camera gear! And as you can see, the pictures from the trip are spectacular! We did put our fly fishing gear away to head up a valley to see a Natural Bridge. That was almost 30 km from the car!
The lakes taught us a lot about next time. We had a taste of excellent book trout fly fishing. We used mainly dry flies although streamers and balanced flies caught us fish too! Our mission is to catch a monster brook trout! We hooked several dandies and lots of beautifully coloured mountain brookies.
This is a trip for the fit and well prepared. You are 21 km from the car with two mountain passes in between.
The toughest part of the trip was the down hills. Blisters? Ya we got some. Legs were screaming at times, too. Was it worth it? Most definitely!
Will we be back? Definitely!
The trail head starts with a fire road but then it turns into an uphill hike well into the backcountry!
Steve Luethi photo
Steve said just walk fast and look straight ahead!
Steve Luethi photo
Off to an island to fish. The water looked 4 feet deep. It was close to 10 feet deep!
Yep THAT island!
Steve Luethi photo
Steve Luethi photo
Steve Luethi photo
Natural Bridge
Steve Luethi photo
A mouthful of stoneflies.
Steve Luethi photo
Brookie eats the dry fly. An amazing shot Steve!
Steve Luethi photo
Steve Luethi photo
Josh almost to the the first lake.
Marmots were whistling as we wandered by!
The horseflies were fierce at times.
Headwaters of the Red Deer River
I could fly fish for brookies for days!
Cooking supper!
After an amazing cast with a caddis emerger, Josh hooked this beautiful brookie. What a great moment!
Up and over another pass.
The grind!
This lake was full of very willing brookies.
Nope that was not us.
The reward. Ice cream and Poutine.
...and two Advil
No comments:
Post a Comment