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No, not me (are you kidding?)...My bro-in-law. :lol:
My sister in law (Sandra) has been back in Utah from New Jersey for a couple of months and her husband (Whitley) finally got a chance make it over here for a visit. They've lived in Jersey for several years, but Whitley was originally from St.Vincent (Grenadines), so he hasn't seen much of the mountains or anything Utah really has to offer. He's leaving today (Sunday) to go back to NJ, so we wanted to do something special for him.
My wife decided that since I've lived here for so long that it was my job to come up with a scenic tour into the mountains. I agreed that this could be done, but only if fishing was involved.
I had a really hard time coming up with a destination because of the time of year. I didn't want to go up to the "high" Uintas because the weather might be really cold or snowing. I was sure nobody wanted that. I thought about Joe's Valley, but that's where I took Sandra a few weeks ago and I thought it would be best for everyone if we all went somewhere new.
Finally, while reading the forum, I saw that .45 and luckystrike were planning a trip to Smith & Morehouse, this weekend. Perfect, I thought. I'd never been there, but I'd seen photos and they looked great. Upon further research, I found out that the reservoir was only at 7960 ft and that the weather would most likely be warmer than on the other side by Trial and Washington. Thanks guys, for inadvertently helping me out. :wink: I would've gone today and met up with you, but Whitley will be on a plane around 4:00pm. No can do.
I checked out the weather forecast and solunar table for Saturday and realized that the weather was most likely going to be a problem. I started checking tons of other spots (all over the state) and found that the whole state was going to be crappy with high chances of precip. The solunar table showed a huge spike in the morning, though. I figured we'd be alright until around noon, so S&M it was.
The plan was to pick them up in Provo at 6:00am and get a move on it to maximize our fishing time. Well, the gremlins in my alarm clock came back and we woke up around 7:30. :? I remember checking that the alarm was set before bed! As soon as I realized we missed the alarm, I got up and checked the clock to make sure the alarm was set. It was! WTH? Gremlins. SHEESH! We were supposed to wake up the others, once we arose.
So we ended up at their house around 9:00 and I stepped on it through Provo Canyon, Heber Valley, Rock Cliff, Kamas, Oakley, and Weber Canyon. We were getting rained on pretty hard through Provo Canyon and Heber, so the outlook was grim. It seemed to clear up the closer we got to S&M. (Happy thoughts, happy thoughts.)
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We arrived to see a beautiful valley and dry ground!
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We even got some sunshine here and there. Fish were surfacing all over, but mostly within 40 feet of shore. I made sure everyone was rigged up and ready to go and then realized I needed to give a quick lesson. Whitley used to fish back in the Grenadines, but never like this. He was used to tying some line to a long stick with some bait on it while wading through a sandy bay in perfect weather. (Just imagine...Okay, back to Utah.)
I showed his how to cast and what to do to retrieve and the like. His first cast went out about 20 feet or so. Not too bad, for a virgin.
He got the first nibble less than 5 minutes into his soak (worm/bubble), but he didn't set the hook properly and his fish got off. I don't think it helped that his wife (2nd time fishing) was barking advice to him louder than I was. :lol:
Sonia (my wife) actually had the first fish about 15 minutes after she cast. She pulled it in and we all got a look at the size of rainbows to expect:
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Just a good planter of about 12 or 13 inches.
I still hadn't set my own pole up yet (I opted to fish with one today, so everyone had a pole) and was getting a little impatient. Just as I sat down to rig, Sandra had a hit and I was called into service again:
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I sat down, once again to rig after replacing eaten worms on 2 poles and was interrupted by Whitley's first freshwater fish ever. I wasn't disappointed at all for this because this was his day and I wanted nothing more than to see him succeed. Just like his wife's first fish (at Joe's), his first trout was a tiger trout!
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I didn't realize that there were tigers in S&M, but that made me really happy for him.
Now that everyone had caught fish (besides myself), I insisted that they let me at least get a few casts in after rigging. We'd been there for about an hour by now and I hadn't done more than throw a spinner out while I waited for the others to get to the water (while making sure my son didn't jump into the lake).
I'd seen so many fish rising and I didn't feel like dropping a worm under a bubble, so I set up with my dry about 5 feet behind a bubble and let it fly. I seriously got in two casts and retrieves before my wife got impatient and tried to get me to hold James for awhile. I think the look on my face convinced her that she needed to wait for a bit. :lol: After casting for about 10 minutes in total, I had no hits and took a shift with the boy.
Sandra kept trying to set the hook when there wasn't a bite, reeling in, and then casting back out...She never let her worm soak for more than a couple of minutes. Eventually, she got a bite, but missed the hookset. :rotfl:
Poor girl.
Whitley got a good 14 inch rainbow a little bit later:
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He was holding it way out, but it was 14.
Finally, Sandra set the hook on an actual fish and scored a tiger, too:
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Sonia caught another (no pic) and I couldn't get any fishing in since I was the only one who could calm down our boy. I took a walk with him and once he settled, I handed him over to Sonia, rigged my blue fox (that battered, bent, scratched, wonderful thing), and ditched everyone for the next half hour while I hit the creek below. -/O\-
I knew I wasn't going to get much fishing done with everyone "needing" me every few minutes for something or other, so I left them to fend for themselves for a short while and indulged in a sacred bond between myself and moving water.
I couldn't resist trying out the wash at the base of the dam and got hits on almost every cast into the bubbles. The only problem was that the fish were so small, they couldn't really get their mouths open wide enough to take the hook. :lol: I managed to pull a couple up for a quick look before they flipped off and moved to a standing pool of water under the dry spillway. There must've been about 50 fish in the clear, mossy water. I didn't have a stealth way of advancing on the hole, so they all spooked before I could get a cast off. I threw it in a few times, anyway. I had a couple followers on the first cast and then nothing after that. I moved on.
Downstream a ways, I hit every hole I could find and kept getting hits that wouldn't set from little fish, but it was still neat to get some solitary stream fishing in. Finally, I hooked up with a fish big enough to eat my hook:
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Beautiful little brookie! It made me happy to see a brook trout in between all the tiny rainbows in the creek. I gently placed him back and missed a few more strikes from tiny fish in that same area.
I moved down to the next group of holes and got a really, really nice fish to bite. It fought so hard I couldn't get a good look at it. I think it was a brookie, but I really couldn't see it too well. It was much larger than the other fish I'd seen and I honestly believe it was over 15 inches. I had it on the line for about 5 seconds and it was about 6 feet away when it threw my hook back to me and disappeared forever.
Needless to say, that got my heart pounding. For such a trend of small fish, seeing a long body curling, thrashing, and rolling on my line was a real treat. It motivated me to move down further, but I knew my selfish stream trip was almost over. I had family up at the lake and needed to get back to them. Plus, I didn't want my wife to throw a fit for the rest of the day. It was nice while it lasted and it soothed my nerves enough to relax a little.
Back at the dam, Sandra had caught another fish. She saved it for me to get off the hook, though. :lol:
The fishing had slowed down and the visitors were getting restless. They wanted to see another place and I wasn't sure what to recommend. They reminded me that I'd told them about the "other" Uintas,..The more scenic Mirror Lake Highway. I told them that I was game, but the elevation was a couple thousand feet higher and the weather was more chaotic.
They decided it was worth the risk (they funded the trip, so decisions ultimately came down to them.) and we took a couple of pics from the dam before we head out:
Last day together for a few months:
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A happy man admiring what didn't get released:
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We ate some lunch and made our way down the road. I told them all that they had to let me run down to the creek at least once on the way down and they obliged. :mrgreen:
I stopped on the side to the road where there were no fences or signs and scrambled down to a small pond. No fish in there. Quickly, I ran to the creek and found some nice looking holes. My first three casts got strikes, but no hookups. I moved upstream just a ways and saw a sweet spot where I found this honey:
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I really wanted to show Sandra and Whitley what a brookie looked like, so I made a few more casts and pulled in this girl:
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The brookies look so much better than the planter bows with rubbed fins. Gorgeous!
I made it back to the car with my fish before I hit the threshold of impatience. They were very amazed at the beauty of the brook trout. I apologized for my need to break off and hit the creek while they waited, but luckily they kept themselves occupied with some snacks. I explained that there's a crazy little monkey that lives in my brain who makes me unable to resist the temptations that water constantly seduces me with. :wink:
With the monkey at bay, we continued on our quest to reach the Mirror Lake Scenic Byway. The monkey woke up several times while we passed hole after hole of Beaver Creek, but I had to suppress his promptings.
Whitley and Sandra kept nodding off while I drove and were missing out on the dramatic changes in scenery. I had to pull over at Provo River Falls to wake them up and give them something to look at.
The chipmunks there are great. It's obvious they know how to play humans for food, so I broke down and gave them some of James' Cheerios (oh, come on...they're chipmunks, not bears). Here's a quick video of these cute little clowns:
James loved watching how quickly they dart around on the rocks and how curious they were. It was nice. We got a timed photo of the group, as a whole while James wanted to go play more with the 'munks.
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The falls are so pretty...Even with low water:
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Notice how nice the weather was at the falls. We got back in the car and continued up to an undecided lake. I wasn't sure where to go, but the clouds were looking stormy while they tumbled their way down the surrounding peaks with noticeable speed.
I knew time was short and we needed to be close to the car in case an evacuation was required. I reluctantly pulled over at Teapot Lake and we hurried to get to the water. I was worried that we wouldn't catch anything at Teapot because last time I visit, I spent a couple of hours there with no luck while fish were caught all around me.
Well, the storm had officially started, but it was very calm. Corn snow was falling, but it wasn't windy. We had the whole lake to ourselves and the overall feeling was peaceful. The temperature wasn't too bad, either. Nobody was complaining. Nice.
I made just a few casts with my blue fox and had a solid rainbow within just a few minutes (notice the dense pellets of corn snow).
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Not long after that, the snow flakes started looking more traditional and clumped together when Whitley started laughing and hopping around. There's definitely something special in the air up in the High Uintas. To get a Caribbean Island-born, warm blooded man to dance around with glee while getting snowed on pretty hard, there has to be. He really dislikes the snow and the cold, but he was feeling the love and he was very happy to catch this rainbow from a natural lake in such a setting:
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It was really coming down, now:
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Sonia caught one right after Whitley (no pic) and then I got a brook trout with my blue fox (no pic).
Sandra reeled in another bow with snow in her hair:
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Sonia was done fishing and I hadn't used my 2nd pole permit all day. I decided, after seeing some bigger splashes out toward the middle, that I'd finally use the worm/bubble combination with Sonia's new rod. Man, can that thing launch! I got that worm way out there. I only got in a couple casts with my spinner before my rod was dancing. I couldn't even watch the bubble. With all the snow falling, I could hardly see it out there.
There was over 2 inches of fresh snow on the ground and it was still snowing hard. Our tackle boxes were hard to find under the new ground cover.
We decided to leave before the road became too hazardous for my little Nissan. The general mood of everybody was giggly with a crazy edge. We had so much fun at Teapot that the snow was just something else to laugh at. I'm so glad we went up there. I'm pretty sure it was the last time for the year, but I sure needed to go up and "kiss it goodbye".
The main objective was to show Whitley a good time and get him into the wilderness. Mission accomplished. When I saw that big smile spread across his face and heard him laughing while he landed that last fish of his, I knew the day was a success.
Remember how I mentioned how nice the weather was at Provo River Falls, earlier in this post? Well here's the turnoff to PRF on our way down:
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Quite the difference from one hour to the next, eh? In classic Uinta style.
Then the snow turned into rain:
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A little further down, it really cleared up and we saw some sky with sun-lined clouds:
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Some sunlight found it's way up the mountainside and reflected off of the wet rocks (sorry for the tilt):
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Then the light turned ambient and it really brought out some colors in the trees:
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A nice view of the Rock Cliff area as we cut through Francis:
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And after a wonderful day trip through beautiful country, we had to make one more stop that many a fishing trip ended with for many different people:
![]()
Nothing like a greasy double cheeseburger and a thick peanut butter cup shake to end a great day.
We set out to show Whitley a good time before he went back to New Jersey (Lodi) and couldn't have had more fun doing so.
WHAT A GREAT DAY!
Happy Fishing, Humans.
My sister in law (Sandra) has been back in Utah from New Jersey for a couple of months and her husband (Whitley) finally got a chance make it over here for a visit. They've lived in Jersey for several years, but Whitley was originally from St.Vincent (Grenadines), so he hasn't seen much of the mountains or anything Utah really has to offer. He's leaving today (Sunday) to go back to NJ, so we wanted to do something special for him.
My wife decided that since I've lived here for so long that it was my job to come up with a scenic tour into the mountains. I agreed that this could be done, but only if fishing was involved.
I had a really hard time coming up with a destination because of the time of year. I didn't want to go up to the "high" Uintas because the weather might be really cold or snowing. I was sure nobody wanted that. I thought about Joe's Valley, but that's where I took Sandra a few weeks ago and I thought it would be best for everyone if we all went somewhere new.
Finally, while reading the forum, I saw that .45 and luckystrike were planning a trip to Smith & Morehouse, this weekend. Perfect, I thought. I'd never been there, but I'd seen photos and they looked great. Upon further research, I found out that the reservoir was only at 7960 ft and that the weather would most likely be warmer than on the other side by Trial and Washington. Thanks guys, for inadvertently helping me out. :wink: I would've gone today and met up with you, but Whitley will be on a plane around 4:00pm. No can do.
I checked out the weather forecast and solunar table for Saturday and realized that the weather was most likely going to be a problem. I started checking tons of other spots (all over the state) and found that the whole state was going to be crappy with high chances of precip. The solunar table showed a huge spike in the morning, though. I figured we'd be alright until around noon, so S&M it was.
The plan was to pick them up in Provo at 6:00am and get a move on it to maximize our fishing time. Well, the gremlins in my alarm clock came back and we woke up around 7:30. :? I remember checking that the alarm was set before bed! As soon as I realized we missed the alarm, I got up and checked the clock to make sure the alarm was set. It was! WTH? Gremlins. SHEESH! We were supposed to wake up the others, once we arose.
So we ended up at their house around 9:00 and I stepped on it through Provo Canyon, Heber Valley, Rock Cliff, Kamas, Oakley, and Weber Canyon. We were getting rained on pretty hard through Provo Canyon and Heber, so the outlook was grim. It seemed to clear up the closer we got to S&M. (Happy thoughts, happy thoughts.)
We arrived to see a beautiful valley and dry ground!
We even got some sunshine here and there. Fish were surfacing all over, but mostly within 40 feet of shore. I made sure everyone was rigged up and ready to go and then realized I needed to give a quick lesson. Whitley used to fish back in the Grenadines, but never like this. He was used to tying some line to a long stick with some bait on it while wading through a sandy bay in perfect weather. (Just imagine...Okay, back to Utah.)
I showed his how to cast and what to do to retrieve and the like. His first cast went out about 20 feet or so. Not too bad, for a virgin.
He got the first nibble less than 5 minutes into his soak (worm/bubble), but he didn't set the hook properly and his fish got off. I don't think it helped that his wife (2nd time fishing) was barking advice to him louder than I was. :lol:
Sonia (my wife) actually had the first fish about 15 minutes after she cast. She pulled it in and we all got a look at the size of rainbows to expect:
Just a good planter of about 12 or 13 inches.
I still hadn't set my own pole up yet (I opted to fish with one today, so everyone had a pole) and was getting a little impatient. Just as I sat down to rig, Sandra had a hit and I was called into service again:
I sat down, once again to rig after replacing eaten worms on 2 poles and was interrupted by Whitley's first freshwater fish ever. I wasn't disappointed at all for this because this was his day and I wanted nothing more than to see him succeed. Just like his wife's first fish (at Joe's), his first trout was a tiger trout!
I didn't realize that there were tigers in S&M, but that made me really happy for him.
Now that everyone had caught fish (besides myself), I insisted that they let me at least get a few casts in after rigging. We'd been there for about an hour by now and I hadn't done more than throw a spinner out while I waited for the others to get to the water (while making sure my son didn't jump into the lake).
I'd seen so many fish rising and I didn't feel like dropping a worm under a bubble, so I set up with my dry about 5 feet behind a bubble and let it fly. I seriously got in two casts and retrieves before my wife got impatient and tried to get me to hold James for awhile. I think the look on my face convinced her that she needed to wait for a bit. :lol: After casting for about 10 minutes in total, I had no hits and took a shift with the boy.
Sandra kept trying to set the hook when there wasn't a bite, reeling in, and then casting back out...She never let her worm soak for more than a couple of minutes. Eventually, she got a bite, but missed the hookset. :rotfl:
Poor girl.
Whitley got a good 14 inch rainbow a little bit later:
He was holding it way out, but it was 14.
Finally, Sandra set the hook on an actual fish and scored a tiger, too:
Sonia caught another (no pic) and I couldn't get any fishing in since I was the only one who could calm down our boy. I took a walk with him and once he settled, I handed him over to Sonia, rigged my blue fox (that battered, bent, scratched, wonderful thing), and ditched everyone for the next half hour while I hit the creek below. -/O\-
I knew I wasn't going to get much fishing done with everyone "needing" me every few minutes for something or other, so I left them to fend for themselves for a short while and indulged in a sacred bond between myself and moving water.
I couldn't resist trying out the wash at the base of the dam and got hits on almost every cast into the bubbles. The only problem was that the fish were so small, they couldn't really get their mouths open wide enough to take the hook. :lol: I managed to pull a couple up for a quick look before they flipped off and moved to a standing pool of water under the dry spillway. There must've been about 50 fish in the clear, mossy water. I didn't have a stealth way of advancing on the hole, so they all spooked before I could get a cast off. I threw it in a few times, anyway. I had a couple followers on the first cast and then nothing after that. I moved on.
Downstream a ways, I hit every hole I could find and kept getting hits that wouldn't set from little fish, but it was still neat to get some solitary stream fishing in. Finally, I hooked up with a fish big enough to eat my hook:
Beautiful little brookie! It made me happy to see a brook trout in between all the tiny rainbows in the creek. I gently placed him back and missed a few more strikes from tiny fish in that same area.
I moved down to the next group of holes and got a really, really nice fish to bite. It fought so hard I couldn't get a good look at it. I think it was a brookie, but I really couldn't see it too well. It was much larger than the other fish I'd seen and I honestly believe it was over 15 inches. I had it on the line for about 5 seconds and it was about 6 feet away when it threw my hook back to me and disappeared forever.
Needless to say, that got my heart pounding. For such a trend of small fish, seeing a long body curling, thrashing, and rolling on my line was a real treat. It motivated me to move down further, but I knew my selfish stream trip was almost over. I had family up at the lake and needed to get back to them. Plus, I didn't want my wife to throw a fit for the rest of the day. It was nice while it lasted and it soothed my nerves enough to relax a little.
Back at the dam, Sandra had caught another fish. She saved it for me to get off the hook, though. :lol:
The fishing had slowed down and the visitors were getting restless. They wanted to see another place and I wasn't sure what to recommend. They reminded me that I'd told them about the "other" Uintas,..The more scenic Mirror Lake Highway. I told them that I was game, but the elevation was a couple thousand feet higher and the weather was more chaotic.
They decided it was worth the risk (they funded the trip, so decisions ultimately came down to them.) and we took a couple of pics from the dam before we head out:
Last day together for a few months:
A happy man admiring what didn't get released:
We ate some lunch and made our way down the road. I told them all that they had to let me run down to the creek at least once on the way down and they obliged. :mrgreen:
I stopped on the side to the road where there were no fences or signs and scrambled down to a small pond. No fish in there. Quickly, I ran to the creek and found some nice looking holes. My first three casts got strikes, but no hookups. I moved upstream just a ways and saw a sweet spot where I found this honey:
I really wanted to show Sandra and Whitley what a brookie looked like, so I made a few more casts and pulled in this girl:
The brookies look so much better than the planter bows with rubbed fins. Gorgeous!
I made it back to the car with my fish before I hit the threshold of impatience. They were very amazed at the beauty of the brook trout. I apologized for my need to break off and hit the creek while they waited, but luckily they kept themselves occupied with some snacks. I explained that there's a crazy little monkey that lives in my brain who makes me unable to resist the temptations that water constantly seduces me with. :wink:
With the monkey at bay, we continued on our quest to reach the Mirror Lake Scenic Byway. The monkey woke up several times while we passed hole after hole of Beaver Creek, but I had to suppress his promptings.
Whitley and Sandra kept nodding off while I drove and were missing out on the dramatic changes in scenery. I had to pull over at Provo River Falls to wake them up and give them something to look at.
The chipmunks there are great. It's obvious they know how to play humans for food, so I broke down and gave them some of James' Cheerios (oh, come on...they're chipmunks, not bears). Here's a quick video of these cute little clowns:
James loved watching how quickly they dart around on the rocks and how curious they were. It was nice. We got a timed photo of the group, as a whole while James wanted to go play more with the 'munks.
The falls are so pretty...Even with low water:
Notice how nice the weather was at the falls. We got back in the car and continued up to an undecided lake. I wasn't sure where to go, but the clouds were looking stormy while they tumbled their way down the surrounding peaks with noticeable speed.
I knew time was short and we needed to be close to the car in case an evacuation was required. I reluctantly pulled over at Teapot Lake and we hurried to get to the water. I was worried that we wouldn't catch anything at Teapot because last time I visit, I spent a couple of hours there with no luck while fish were caught all around me.
Well, the storm had officially started, but it was very calm. Corn snow was falling, but it wasn't windy. We had the whole lake to ourselves and the overall feeling was peaceful. The temperature wasn't too bad, either. Nobody was complaining. Nice.
I made just a few casts with my blue fox and had a solid rainbow within just a few minutes (notice the dense pellets of corn snow).
Not long after that, the snow flakes started looking more traditional and clumped together when Whitley started laughing and hopping around. There's definitely something special in the air up in the High Uintas. To get a Caribbean Island-born, warm blooded man to dance around with glee while getting snowed on pretty hard, there has to be. He really dislikes the snow and the cold, but he was feeling the love and he was very happy to catch this rainbow from a natural lake in such a setting:
It was really coming down, now:
Sonia caught one right after Whitley (no pic) and then I got a brook trout with my blue fox (no pic).
Sandra reeled in another bow with snow in her hair:
Sonia was done fishing and I hadn't used my 2nd pole permit all day. I decided, after seeing some bigger splashes out toward the middle, that I'd finally use the worm/bubble combination with Sonia's new rod. Man, can that thing launch! I got that worm way out there. I only got in a couple casts with my spinner before my rod was dancing. I couldn't even watch the bubble. With all the snow falling, I could hardly see it out there.
There was over 2 inches of fresh snow on the ground and it was still snowing hard. Our tackle boxes were hard to find under the new ground cover.
We decided to leave before the road became too hazardous for my little Nissan. The general mood of everybody was giggly with a crazy edge. We had so much fun at Teapot that the snow was just something else to laugh at. I'm so glad we went up there. I'm pretty sure it was the last time for the year, but I sure needed to go up and "kiss it goodbye".
The main objective was to show Whitley a good time and get him into the wilderness. Mission accomplished. When I saw that big smile spread across his face and heard him laughing while he landed that last fish of his, I knew the day was a success.
Remember how I mentioned how nice the weather was at Provo River Falls, earlier in this post? Well here's the turnoff to PRF on our way down:
Quite the difference from one hour to the next, eh? In classic Uinta style.
Then the snow turned into rain:
A little further down, it really cleared up and we saw some sky with sun-lined clouds:
Some sunlight found it's way up the mountainside and reflected off of the wet rocks (sorry for the tilt):
Then the light turned ambient and it really brought out some colors in the trees:
A nice view of the Rock Cliff area as we cut through Francis:
And after a wonderful day trip through beautiful country, we had to make one more stop that many a fishing trip ended with for many different people:
Nothing like a greasy double cheeseburger and a thick peanut butter cup shake to end a great day.
We set out to show Whitley a good time before he went back to New Jersey (Lodi) and couldn't have had more fun doing so.
WHAT A GREAT DAY!
Happy Fishing, Humans.
